“The Harem Within” is a life story that portrays Mernissi’s childhood experiences while growing up in her family house in Fez, Morocco. Fatema Mernissi was a daughter of wealthy landowners and agriculturalists family. Even though she was raised in indulging and a privileged neighborhood, detached from the poverty most Moroccans experienced, her childhood was spent in the limits of her household shape. Mernissi was raised in a “classical domestic harem”, which abides of extended family and was designed to keep the women sheltered from men outside of the family and the public in general. Occasionally, this exceedingly limitation nurtured feelings of frustrating separation and isolation. Mernissi’s upbringing in this habitat influenced her progress as a scholar and writer. The author starts the narrative with the memories of her family house built in a traditional Arab style, where the nature is replaced by “geometric …show more content…
You will realize the nationalists’ dream. You will learn foreign languages, have a passport, devour books, and speak like a religious authority. At the very least, you will certainly be better off than your mother.” Reading this masterpiece we can easily see the Middle East women’s dreams for education and freedom, things that we the women from the West taking as granted. “The Harem Within” is a pioneering work that opens discussion of women’s rights in Islamic societies. With her humble life story Mernissi gives not only a voice to Moroccan women, but stands her advocacy for individual freedom and battle against the harem within. The narrative is a literature example that figures the women discrimination and appeal for
...made. “Their domain of activities has extended, if not in the formal market, to the informal sector of the economy and to social affairs. The remarkable indices of these reforms are that urban and rural women volunteers participate in most important political institutions (i.e., parliament and Islamic councils) or in the establishment of NGOs.”21 This is a very large improvement, furthermore, women are gaining access to and “empowerment through higher education”21. Higher education leads to many positives, higher paying jobs, greater social standing, are just some of the advantages that will be accelerated over time as the gender gap becomes less prominent. However, “in Iranian society, men still are perceived to be more important than women”21 though this idea is decreasing at an increasing rate, it illustrates how pervasive and damaging a negative ideology can be.
The Ottoman Empire was one of the longest running empires in history, spanning 624 years. The women of the Ottoman empire were often limited to the household of their husband’s and held back by Ottoman lawmakers and authorities. The point of view of outsiders varied, but there were both positive and negative views. Women in Ottoman society had extremely restricted roles as shown in documents 2, 3, 4, and 1. Document 2 is a chapter of the Qur’an with regard to women’s rights, behavior, and treatment.
Adely suggests that family’s reputation and geography can affects young women’s path in the modern Jordan. She points out the best private schools provided better education but majority of the poor couldn’t afford such luxury. Education is a big part of the development in Jordan since the very foundation of the nation but being educated will not automatically means successful as she writes, “with unemployment for Jordanians under the age of twenty-five over 60 percent in 2003, the return on education are not guaranteed.” However, families continue to hope education
It is precisely this point, which proves the argument of this paper. The well intentioned attempt of Western feminist to write a feminist book in order to help, both women in the East in an exchange of ideas and stimulation of still more ideas and women in the West in providing knowledge with which to further aid the women of the East. On both counts it fails. In the West it gives further ground to the false generalizations and assumptions of women in the Muslim and more generally the developing world who are seen as oppressed and in need of “liberation” while in the East it serves to colonize and dehumanize the women. These good intentions did not create what can be construed as a positive contribution.
Mernissi constantly questions the elders in her life, her mother and aunts who all shut her down from asking questions. Some of her questions seem to hold little or no importance and that they are just those of a child. But with further examination, it is really the life in the harem that is being tested. Mernissi's life in the harem is mainly shaped by this frontier that no one was answering her questions about. “In a harem, you don’t necessarily ask questions to get answers. You ask questions just to understand what is happening to you” (Mernissi, 22). The education she received was all centered on knowing the hudud, the frontiers of harem life. This understanding of the hudud pays attention to the culture and cultural practices. In Mernissi's practices, discussion with her family, and composed thoughts of the hudud help her understand how the hudud is a sacred frontier that needs to be respected and obeyed. This concept illustrates the somewhat religious orientation on boundary lines and frontiers. It specifically, ...
One of the most famous contemporary ethnographic studies of women and gender within Islam is Erika Friedl’s Women of Deh Koh, in which her main concern seems to be providing he...
Middle Eastern women need to stand up for their rights and get educated to reverse the notion that they are servants and properties of their men. Furthermore, they need to rise up to their potentials and prove beyond doubt that they are equal to men. This practice would lead the path for future generations to follow and protect the inalienable rights of women. Finally, these women need to break the cycle of oppression by addressing these deeply rooted beliefs, gaining the tools to fight back, and joining forces to make lifelong changes.
Although “It’s a Night Job” by Joanita Male and “Mother’s Inheritance” by Fawziyya Abu-Khalid occur in different cultural contexts- Male’s writing in Africa and Abu-Khalid’s in the Middle East- both literary works regard the formative nature of mother-daughter relationships. In addition to this, they explore the dignity and attitudes of young women in societies where they are forced to relinquish personal autonomy in order to succeed or be safe from potential physical or mental harm.
Ibnouf, Fatma Osman. “Women And The Arab Spring.” Women & Environments International Magazine 92/93(2013): 18-21. MasterFILE Elite.Web.31 Mar. 2014.
The Women of the Middle East have played substantial roles for their corresponding countries since the advent of colonialism in the region. Middle Eastern women have worked in all types of fields including medicine, education, agriculture, government, private sector, and even defense. They have kept roofs over their family’s heads while their husbands were away in wars, or even in foreign countries to work in jobs that they could not find in their own countries. The roles of women in the countries of Yemen and Oman are no exception, but while they still find ways to contribute to their country, they care constantly stereotyped, discriminated, and ridiculed by men who are known and unknown to them. This paper will discuss the individual contributions of the women living in Yemen and Oman, and will discuss in further state laws and cultural norms that are affecting the women living in these countries today.
In this incredible and most beautiful interesting video, Houda al-Habash a Muslim scholar and with a secularists mentality about the critical state of affairs of the Muslim women throughout the world but particularly the young women of Syria. She founded a Qur’anic memorization institute for young girls to be educated in the Islamic faith and at the same time instill in them the belief in their fundamental human rights protected by the religion of Islam. It’s obviously for far too long women in majority strict religious conservative and patriarchal societies have been denied an equal representation and participation in the day today affairs of the running the affairs of their respective regions. This type of man-made system of dominant mechanism
she is only 16-year-old from an Islamic country leading the first vital step towards raising the status of women in the Arab region is undoubtedly laudable. Indeed, she deserves to be called an ideal person of all girls in the world, who fight against any obstacles that abuse women’s individual rights. She is raising confidence to all girls and urging them to speak out what they want to be and ask for what they should have
A lady is an object, one which men attempt to dominate. A man craves to get a hold of this being beneath his command, and forever have her at his disposal. In her piece “Size Six: The Western Women’s Harem,” published in 2002, Fatema Mernissi illustrates how Eastern and Western women are subjugated by the control of men. Mernissi argues that though she may have derived from a society where a woman has to cover her face, a Western woman has to face daily atrocities far worse then ones an Eastern woman will encounter. Moreover, Mernissi’s core dogma in “Size 6: The Western Women's Harem” is that Western women are not more fortunate than women raised into harems in other societies. Additionally, she asserts that though women in the Western world are given liberties, they coincide with the unattainable ideals of what is aesthetically pleasing. Furthermore, to strengthen her argument towards her wavering audience, Mernissi’s main approach in her paper is to get the reader to relate with her issue by means of an emotional appeal, while also utilizing both the ethical and logical appeal to support her thesis.
Perhaps the main reason I liked this book was the unfaltering courage of the author in the face of such torture as hurts one even to read, let alone have to experience first-hand. Where men give in, this woman perseveres, and, eventually, emerges a stronger person, if that is even possible. The book’s main appeal is emotional, although sound logical arguments are also used. This book is also interesting as it shows us another face of Nasir – the so-called “champion of Arab nationalism” – who is also the enemy of pan-Islamism. The book is also proof of history repeating itself in modern-day Egypt.
In “Araby”, author James Joyce presents a male adolescent who becomes infatuated with an idealized version of a schoolgirl, and explores the consequences which result from the disillusionment of his dreams. While living with his uncle and aunt, the main character acts a joyous presence in an otherwise depressing neighborhood. In Katherine Mansfield’s, The Garden Party, Mansfield’s depicts a young woman, Laura Sherridan, as she struggles through confusion, enlightenment, and the complication of class distinctions on her path to adulthood. Both James Joyce and Katherine Mansfield expertly use the literary elements of characterization to illustrate the journey of self-discovery while both main characters recognize that reality is not what they previously conceptualized it as.