Arab Women

1043 Words3 Pages

“Targeted violence, dismal healthcare and desperate poverty make Afghanistan the world’s most dangerous country in which to be born a woman” (Lisa Anderson). Khaled Hosseini’s A Thousand Splendid Suns is both an epic and horrendous account of two young Afghan women, Mariam and Laila. Blinded by the atrocious tragedies practiced on women in Afghanistan, Nana instructs her daughter, Mariam, that there is “only one skill a woman like you and me needs in life… And it’s this: tahamul. Endure” (Hosseini 17). What’s more, the reader sympathizes with the characters and “marvel at how every Afghan story is marked by death and loss and unimaginable grief. And yet… people find a way to survive, to go on” (350). Mariam and Laila bear excruciating circumstances and live in a country mangled by political oppression and war. For this reason, their lives are regulated and controlled, they don’t have the right to exercise freedoms, and they are abused on many levels. Hosseini exposes the mutilations imposed on women by men and the marginalized life they lead in Afghanistan. Although Hosseini’s A Thousand Splendid Suns is a fictional novel, his ability to illustrate and identify with the difficulties of Afghan women through their child marriages, lack of education and the Taliban laws is achingly accurate and unparalleled.
The deleterious consequences such as poor health, abuse, and low literacy are the devastating effects of child marriage which are demonstrated throughout the novel. The parlous implications when examining a young wife’s health include early death, extremely high risks of fistulas, and the risk of being infected with sexually transmitted disease. Commonly, girls are “admitted to hospitals shortly after marriage in a state of sh...

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...omen’s life is regulated under Taliban law and failure to comply can lead to imprisonment, abuse, and executions. They bring a great deal of political oppression and war into Afghanistan. A fraction of the message that is employed by the Taliban stated that women “will stay inside your homes at all times… If you are caught alone on the street, you will be beaten and sent home” (248). Rasheed refusing to accompany her, Laila is beat on several occasions per week when she goes to see her daughter in the orphanage. Additionally, Mariam hears that “men and women would be seen if different hospitals, that all female staff would be discharged from Kubal’s hospitals and sent to work in one central facility” (254). When later accused of murdering her husband, Mariam is brought to Ghazi Stadiam by the Taliban where “thousands of eyes bore down on her” (328) and she is shot.

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