JORDAN: When education diverges from law: LGBTQ narratives in Jordanian textbooks
IMPACT-se (20.01.2026) – IMPACT-se has published a report this year which examines how Jordanian school textbooks address homosexuality and gender non-conformity. Through analysis of religious and language curricula, it shows how textbook narratives often reflect prevailing social and religious norms rather than state law, highlighting the role of education in transmitting societal attitudes.
In Jordan, homosexuality has been decriminalized since 1951, marking a change in Jordan’s stance, yet this decriminalization does not equate to full legalization, since there is no protection against discrimination, persecution or hate speech even though the consequences for engaging in homosexual activity are less punitive in law. Despite being created by the state Ministry of Education, the Jordanian curriculum tends to reflect public attitudes rather than that of the state.
Textbooks frame homosexuality as a dangerous moral and demographic threat, but makes no mention of legal consequences. In some senses, this is consistent with state perspectives of decriminalization rather than legalization, since although there is no discussion of the criminal nature of homosexuality, textbook attitudes are not warm towards it. Textbooks instead tend to reflect public opinion, and avoid discussing its decriminalization. In a similar vein, traditional gender norms are enforced through Jordan’s textbooks via a religious prohibition.
One Grade 11 Islamic Education textbook for the 2025-26 academic year asks students to “explain the danger posed by sexual perversion and homosexual propaganda to […] the continued existence of mankind.” The lesson in question discusses the objectives of Shariah law, one of which is claimed to be “preserving progeny,” with heavy punishments for those who commit “the sins of adultery and sexual perversion.” It is in this context that homosexuality is presented alongside sexual perversion. It is not only depicted in a negative manner but is also linked to notions of propaganda, implicitly casting it as a nefarious influence intended to recruit or convert others.
It is noteworthy that earlier textbooks did not include content explicitly characterizing homosexuality as dangerous. The introduction of such material therefore represents a deterioration in the curriculum’s approach to homosexuality. This shift is not reflective of Jordan’s prior legal stance on homosexuality, but instead appears to mirror prevailing social attitudes, which are heavily informed by Islamic concepts. This is particularly striking given that the textbooks are produced by state-mandated authorities, yet they do not reflect the country’s legal framework; rather, they appear to align with interpretations of shariah. Moreover, this perspective is not presented as one among several religious viewpoints, but is instead conveyed uncritically as an objective truth.
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- Preserving Progeny
Islam encourages procreation and reproduction, to populate the Earth and to preserve the existence of mankind.
Therefore, Islam laid down a series of measures and rules which contribute to preserving progeny. These are the most prominent among them:
[…]
b) Forbidding the sins of adultery and sexual perversion and legislating deterring punishments in this world and in the Hereafter against those who commit them, as God Almighty said: “And do not approach adultery. Indeed, it is ever an immorality and is evil as a way” [Al-Isra’ Surah, verse 23], and He said: “The woman and the man guilty of adultery or fornication, flog each of them with a hundred stripes” [Al-Nur Surah, verse 2
I will explain:
I will explain the danger posed by sexual perversion and homosexual propaganda to the preservation of progeny and the continued existence of mankind.
With respect to the subject of transgender, the curriculum teaches that cross-dressing is prohibited according to Islam. In a chapter discussing clothing in a Grade 10 Islamic Education textbook, students learn that Islam forbids wearing anything that makes a man look like a woman or a woman look like a man. This argument is bolstered by a hadithrelating that Muhammad cursed “men imitating women and women imitating men.” Therefore, textbooks use religious texts in order to condemn those who engage in transgenderism.
Prohibition to wear anything that makes a man effeminate or women manly […], the Messenger of God cursed men imitating women, and the women imitating men [narrated by al-Bukhari].
In Jordanian law, transgender identity is not explicitly criminalized, but it is also not protected, in a similar manner to homosexuality. In both cases, the legal framework is defined more by ambiguity than by positive rights: consensual same-sex relations are legal because the Penal Code does not prohibit them, yet homosexuality enjoys no formal recognition or anti-discrimination safeguards. Transgender people, however, occupy a more precarious legal position, as the state has intervened more directly in regulating gender identity through medical law.
The 2018 Medical and Health Liability Law effectively bans gender-affirming medical transition by prohibiting “sex change” procedures for transgender individuals, while permitting “sex correction” only in intersex cases, and there is no clear statutory pathway for legal gender recognition. As a result, the legal position of transgender people is more constrained than that of homosexual conduct, which remains legal by omission. This legal distinction, however, is not reflected in school textbooks. Instead, transgender people are described as “cursed” by Muhammad, while homosexuality is portrayed as a form of “sexual perversion.”
Neither portrayal accurately reflects the law: homosexuality is legally permitted despite being framed as deviant, and cross-dressing is depicted as deserving condemnation even though it is not regulated by statute. These representations suggest that Islamic Education curricula are shaped less by legal reality than by prevailing religious and social attitudes, with public moral norms informing how both cross-dressing and homosexuality are presented despite their non-criminal legal status.
