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Becoming Visible in Iran

Becoming Visible in Iran PDF Author: Mehri Honarbin-Holliday
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN: 0857710761
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 224

Book Description
The state of women in Islamic societies is the subject of much interest and heated debate. Yet, these discussions and representations in the media and elsewhere rely on inadequate information and misperceptions, imagining Muslim women as oppressed victims in need of liberation by outside forces. 'Becoming Visible in Iran' disputes these widespread stereotypes, providing a vivid account of women in contemporary Iran as they go about their daily lives. Beginning at home, women are infusing dramatic change by challenging the patriarchal conceptions of their fathers, brothers, uncles and others within the intimate sphere of family and home. Empowered by education, they transport the power of their minds and being from the domestic to the public and political. Mehri Honarbin-Holliday presents the experiences of these young women who wield a key if indirect political influence on the seemingly male dominated politics of this society, as they achieve a new visibility. She shows us how women understand their place in contemporary Iranian society, and how they interrogate it, making demands for shifts in attitudes and behaviours, both at home in relation to male relatives and in the wider world. Women's daily existence weaves between the public and the private, from home to classrooms, parks, metros, cafes and taxis, negotiating socio-political limitations and the current regime's policies of female invisibility. Detailed interviews and striking narratives draw our attention to the women's reflexive and critical stance and their desires to be recognized as independent and active architects of their own personal lives, whilst also contributing to the discourses of change and a more just civil society. From this fieldwork, and focusing especially on young women, Honarbin-Holliday presents women's views on such key topics as public visibility, body presentation, and sexual curiosity, in addition to education, civil society and political and social change. Highlighting links and continuities with the history of women in Iran, from the early twentieth century to the present moment, she shows how Iranian women today strive: to be the author of one's fate, to resist narrow interpretations of religion, to conduct meaningful, rich and complex lives, to bring about change in the mindsets of male relatives, and to contribute to legal and political debates in the country. For its direct presentation of women's voices as well as its analysis and insight, this book is a vital contribution to our understanding of the lives of Muslim women and the possibilities before them today. 'Becoming Visible in Iran' is indispensable for those concerned with women in Islamic societies, gender studies, sociology, anthropology as well as Iran and the Middle East.

Becoming Visible in Iran

Becoming Visible in Iran PDF Author: Mehri Honarbin-Holliday
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN: 0857710761
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 224

Book Description
The state of women in Islamic societies is the subject of much interest and heated debate. Yet, these discussions and representations in the media and elsewhere rely on inadequate information and misperceptions, imagining Muslim women as oppressed victims in need of liberation by outside forces. 'Becoming Visible in Iran' disputes these widespread stereotypes, providing a vivid account of women in contemporary Iran as they go about their daily lives. Beginning at home, women are infusing dramatic change by challenging the patriarchal conceptions of their fathers, brothers, uncles and others within the intimate sphere of family and home. Empowered by education, they transport the power of their minds and being from the domestic to the public and political. Mehri Honarbin-Holliday presents the experiences of these young women who wield a key if indirect political influence on the seemingly male dominated politics of this society, as they achieve a new visibility. She shows us how women understand their place in contemporary Iranian society, and how they interrogate it, making demands for shifts in attitudes and behaviours, both at home in relation to male relatives and in the wider world. Women's daily existence weaves between the public and the private, from home to classrooms, parks, metros, cafes and taxis, negotiating socio-political limitations and the current regime's policies of female invisibility. Detailed interviews and striking narratives draw our attention to the women's reflexive and critical stance and their desires to be recognized as independent and active architects of their own personal lives, whilst also contributing to the discourses of change and a more just civil society. From this fieldwork, and focusing especially on young women, Honarbin-Holliday presents women's views on such key topics as public visibility, body presentation, and sexual curiosity, in addition to education, civil society and political and social change. Highlighting links and continuities with the history of women in Iran, from the early twentieth century to the present moment, she shows how Iranian women today strive: to be the author of one's fate, to resist narrow interpretations of religion, to conduct meaningful, rich and complex lives, to bring about change in the mindsets of male relatives, and to contribute to legal and political debates in the country. For its direct presentation of women's voices as well as its analysis and insight, this book is a vital contribution to our understanding of the lives of Muslim women and the possibilities before them today. 'Becoming Visible in Iran' is indispensable for those concerned with women in Islamic societies, gender studies, sociology, anthropology as well as Iran and the Middle East.

Reading Lolita in Tehran

Reading Lolita in Tehran PDF Author: Azar Nafisi
Publisher: Random House
ISBN: 1588360792
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 386

Book Description
#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • We all have dreams—things we fantasize about doing and generally never get around to. This is the story of Azar Nafisi’s dream and of the nightmare that made it come true. For two years before she left Iran in 1997, Nafisi gathered seven young women at her house every Thursday morning to read and discuss forbidden works of Western literature. They were all former students whom she had taught at university. Some came from conservative and religious families, others were progressive and secular; several had spent time in jail. They were shy and uncomfortable at first, unaccustomed to being asked to speak their minds, but soon they began to open up and to speak more freely, not only about the novels they were reading but also about themselves, their dreams and disappointments. Their stories intertwined with those they were reading—Pride and Prejudice, Washington Square, Daisy Miller and Lolita—their Lolita, as they imagined her in Tehran. Nafisi’s account flashes back to the early days of the revolution, when she first started teaching at the University of Tehran amid the swirl of protests and demonstrations. In those frenetic days, the students took control of the university, expelled faculty members and purged the curriculum. When a radical Islamist in Nafisi’s class questioned her decision to teach The Great Gatsby, which he saw as an immoral work that preached falsehoods of “the Great Satan,” she decided to let him put Gatsby on trial and stood as the sole witness for the defense. Azar Nafisi’s luminous tale offers a fascinating portrait of the Iran-Iraq war viewed from Tehran and gives us a rare glimpse, from the inside, of women’s lives in revolutionary Iran. It is a work of great passion and poetic beauty, written with a startlingly original voice. Praise for Reading Lolita in Tehran “Anyone who has ever belonged to a book group must read this book. Azar Nafisi takes us into the vivid lives of eight women who must meet in secret to explore the forbidden fiction of the West. It is at once a celebration of the power of the novel and a cry of outrage at the reality in which these women are trapped. The ayatollahs don’ t know it, but Nafisi is one of the heroes of the Islamic Republic.”—Geraldine Brooks, author of Nine Parts of Desire

Captive in Iran

Captive in Iran PDF Author: Maryam Rostampour
Publisher: Tyndale House Publishers, Inc.
ISBN: 1414382200
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 368

Book Description
Maryam Rostampour and Marziyeh Amirizadeh knew they were putting their lives on the line. Islamic laws in Iran forbade them from sharing their Christian beliefs, but in three years, they’d covertly put New Testaments into the hands of twenty thousand of their countrymen and started two secret house churches. In 2009, they were finally arrested and held in the notorious Evin Prison in Tehran, a place where inmates are routinely tortured and executions are commonplace. In the face of ruthless interrogations, persecution, and a death sentence, Maryam and Marziyeh chose to take the radical—and dangerous—step of sharing their faith inside the very walls of the government stronghold that was meant to silence them. In Captive in Iran, two courageous Iranian women recount how God used their 259 days in Evin Prison to shine His light into one of the world’s darkest places, giving hope to those who had lost everything and showing love to those in despair.

Democracy in Iran

Democracy in Iran PDF Author: Ali Gheissari
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0195396960
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 233

Book Description
Today Iran is once again in the headlines. Reputed to be developing nuclear weapons, the future of Iraq's next-door neighbor is a matter of grave concern both for the stability of the region and for the safety of the global community. President George W. Bush labeled it part of the "Axis ofEvil," and rails against the country's authoritarian leadership. Yet as Bush trumpets the spread of democracy throughout the Middle East, few note that Iran has one of the longest-running experiences with democracy in the region. In this book, Ali Gheissari and Vali Nasr look at the political history of Iran in the modern era, and offer an in-depth analysis of the prospects for democracy to flourish there. After having produced the only successful Islamist challenge to the state, a revolution, and an Islamic Republic, Iranis now poised to produce a genuine and indigenous democratic movement in the Muslim world. Democracy in Iran is neither a sudden development nor a western import, Gheissari and Nasr argue. The concept of democracy in Iran today may appear to be a reaction to authoritarianism, but it is an old ideawith a complex history, one that is tightly interwoven with the main forces that have shaped Iranian society and politics, institutions, identities, and interests. Indeed, the demand for democracy first surfaced in Iran a century ago at the end of the Qajar period, and helped produce Iran'ssurprisingly liberal first constitution in 1906. Gheissari and Nasr seek to understand why democracy failed to grow roots and lost ground to an autocratic Iranian state. Why was democracy absent from the ideological debates of the 1960s and 1970s? Most important, why has it now become a powerfulsocial, political, and intellectual force? How have modernization, social change, economic growth, and the experience of the revolution converged to make this possible?Gheissari and Nasr trace the fortunes of the democratic ideal from the inchoate demands for rule of law and constitutionalism of a century ago to today's calls for individual rights and civil liberties. In the process they provide not just a fresh look at Iran's politics but also a new understandingof the way in which democracy can develop in a Muslim country.

Cultural Revolution in Iran

Cultural Revolution in Iran PDF Author: Annabelle Sreberny
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN: 0857734407
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 353

Book Description
The Islamic Republic of Iran is several decades into its existence and the values and legacy of the Revolution upon which it was founded continue to have profound and contradictory consequences for everyday Iranian life. Despite a powerful system of surveillance and control, an extremely lively cultural milieu exists in the country, utilising many different forms of expression, including film, theatre, music and dance. Cultural Revolution in Iran examines the diverse areas of social and cultural innovation that are driving change and progress, both negotiating and resisting government policies and censorship. While religious conservatism remains the creed of the establishment, this volume uncovers a hidden world of new technologies, social media and entertainment that speaks both to women seeking a greater public role and to a restless younger generation that organises and engages with global trends online. In this volume, Annabelle Sreberny and Massoumeh Torfeh highlight the huge range of cultural activities which allow Iranians to express themselves, voice their coded opinions in between the 'red lines' of censorship and even engage in social and civil disobedience. From film to rock music and from painting to video games, there is a vast array of cultural expression and dissent that often eludes the international observer. For example, film production in Iran is highThe Islamic Republic of Iran is several decades into its existence and the values and legacy of the Revolution upon which it was founded continue to have profound and contradictory consequences for everyday Iranian life. Despite a powerful system of surveillance and control, an extremely lively cultural milieu exists in the country, utilising many different forms of expression, including film, theatre, music and dance. Cultural Revolution in Iran examines the diverse areas of social and cultural innovation that are driving change and progress, both negotiating and resisting government policies and censorship. While religious conservatism remains the creed of the establishment, this volume uncovers a hidden world of new technologies, social media and entertainment that speaks both to women seeking a greater public role and to a restless younger generation that organises and engages with global trends online. In this volume, Annabelle Sreberny and Massoumeh Torfeh highlight the huge range of cultural activities which allow Iranians to express themselves, voice their coded opinions in between the 'red lines' of censorship and even engage in social and civil disobedience. From film to rock music and from painting to video games, there is a vast array of cultural expression and dissent that often eludes the international observer. For example, film production in Iran is high and women directors, such as Rakhshan Bani-Etemad, Samira Makhmalbaf and Manijeh Hekmat, have come to the fore, making both popular but also prize-winning films. In addition to this, there is a vibrant music scene in Iran where many performances occur literally 'underground', in private basements, as illegal activity. Sometimes an audience has to wait patiently in the auditorium for the start of a public performance – for example, to hear Morteza Shafiei conducting the Isfahan Symphony Orchestra – whilst the organisers debate with the authorities as to whether the performance can go ahead or not. It is these activities and modes of communication and expression that are central to this volume, making Cultural Revolution in Iran essential for those researching the modern Iranian state as well as those looking at everyday life and popular culture under authoritarian governments and women directors, such as Rakhshan Bani-Etemad, Samira Makhmalbaf and Manijeh Hekmat, have come to the fore, making both popular but also prize-winning films. In addition to this, there is a vibrant music scene in Iran where many performances occur literally 'underground', in private basements, as illegal activity. Sometimes an audience has to wait patiently in the auditorium for the start of a public performance – for example, to hear Morteza Shafiei conducting the Isfahan Symphony Orchestra – whilst the organisers debate with the authorities as to whether the performance can go ahead or not. It is these activities and modes of communication and expression that are central to this volume, making Cultural Revolution in Iran essential for those researching the modern Iranian state as well as those looking at everyday life and popular culture under authoritarian governments

Theater State and the Formation of Early Modern Public Sphere in Iran

Theater State and the Formation of Early Modern Public Sphere in Iran PDF Author: Babak Rahimi
Publisher: BRILL
ISBN: 9004209794
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 405

Book Description
This first systematic study of a wide range of Persian and European archival and primary sources, analyzes how the Muharram rituals changed from being an orginally devotional practice to public events of political significance, setting the stage for the emergence of the early modern Iranian public sphere in the Safavid period.

Doing Psychoanalysis in Tehran

Doing Psychoanalysis in Tehran PDF Author: Gohar Homayounpour
Publisher: MIT Press
ISBN: 0262305062
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 175

Book Description
A Western-trained psychoanalyst returns to her homeland and tells stories of displacement, nostalgia, love, and pain. Is psychoanalysis possible in the Islamic Republic of Iran? This is the question that Gohar Homayounpour poses to herself, and to us, at the beginning of this memoir of displacement, nostalgia, love, and pain. Twenty years after leaving her country, Homayounpour, an Iranian, Western-trained psychoanalyst, returns to Tehran to establish a psychoanalytic practice. When an American colleague exclaims, “I do not think that Iranians can free-associate!” Homayounpour responds that in her opinion Iranians do nothing but. Iranian culture, she says, revolves around stories. Why wouldn't Freud's methods work, given Iranians' need to talk? Thus begins a fascinating narrative of interlocking stories that resembles—more than a little—a psychoanalytic session. Homayounpour recounts the pleasure and pain of returning to her motherland, her passion for the work of Milan Kundera, her complex relationship with Kundera's Iranian translator (her father), and her own and other Iranians' anxieties of influence and disobedience. Woven throughout the narrative are glimpses of her sometimes frustrating, always candid, sessions with patients. Ms. N, a famous artist, dreams of abandonment and sits in the analyst's chair rather than on the analysand's couch; a young chador-clad woman expresses shame because she has lost her virginity; an eloquently suicidal young man cannot kill himself. As a psychoanalyst, Homayounpour knows that behind every story told is another story that remains untold. Doing Psychoanalysis in Tehran connects the stories, spoken and unspoken, that ordinary Iranians tell about their lives before their hour is up.

Female Bodies and Sexuality in Iran and the Search for Defiance

Female Bodies and Sexuality in Iran and the Search for Defiance PDF Author: Nafiseh Sharifi
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 3319609769
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 197

Book Description
This book uses storytelling as an analytical tool for following wider social attitude changes towards sex and female sexuality in Iran. Women born in 1950s Iran grew up during the peak of secularization and modernization, whereas those born in the 1980s were raised under the much stricter rules of the Islamic Republic. Using extensive ethnographic research, the author juxtaposes narratives of body and sexuality shared by these different generations of women, showing the intricate ways in which women construct and convey meanings and communicate their emotions about the unspoken aspects of their lives.

Unthinkable

Unthinkable PDF Author: Kenneth Pollack
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1476733937
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 560

Book Description
A foremost expert on Middle Eastern relations examines Iran's current nuclear potential while charting America's future course of action, recounting the prolonged clash between both nations to outline options for American policymakers. By the author of The Persian Puzzle.

Days of God

Days of God PDF Author: James Buchan
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1416597824
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 432

Book Description
A myth-busting insider’s account of the Iranian Revolution of 1979 that destroyed US influence in the country and transformed the politics of the Middle East and the world. The 1979 Islamic revolution in Iran was one of the seminal events of our time. It inaugurated more than thirty years of war in the Middle East and fostered an Islamic radicalism that shapes foreign policy in the United States and Europe to this day. Drawing on his lifetime of engagement with Iran, James Buchan explains the history that gave rise to the Revolution, in which Ayatollah Khomeini and his supporters displaced the Shah with little diffi­culty. Mystifyingly to outsiders, the people of Iran turned their backs on a successful Westernized government for an amateurish religious regime. Buchan dispels myths about the Iranian Revolution and instead assesses the historical forces to which it responded. He puts the extremism of the Islamic regime in perspective: a truly radical revolution, it can be compared to the French or Russian Revolu­tions. Using recently declassified diplomatic papers and Persian-language news reports, diaries, memoirs, interviews, and theological tracts, Buchan illumi­nates both Khomeini and the Shah. His writing is always clear, dispassionate, and informative. The Iranian Revolution was a turning point in modern history, and James Buchan’s Days of God is, as London’s Independent put it, “a compelling, beautifully written history” of that event.