Afghan Women: The Impact Of Conflict On Women

During the reign of the Taliban, women were subjected to silence while injustice flared through the Middle East. Forced to stay submissive to their superiors, women had no rights nor freedom to surpass society’s upbringings. The main intention of the three novels eliminates the withholdings of education from certain groups. Without these fundamental regulations in women’s favor, the value of peace is threatened.

In Afghanistan, Women’s rights were very denied and completely dismissed. Women were treated horribly. They were beaten, abused verbally, and even killed. Under the rule of the Taliban, women were better off staying in the safety of their own homes.

The Constitution that was created in Afghanistan during the 1920’s, stated equal rights for women and men. In fact, during the year of 1959, new policies created educational and career opportunities and voluntary removal of having to wear the burka. Women’s roles become similarly equivalent to male roles; they had the opportunity to acquire knowledge from universities, and were provided jobs in industrial, business, and entertainment settings. The atrocities that came about during the Mujaheddin and Taliban control were unheard of years prior, when women lived in peace and prosperity

The Taliban is an extremist Islamic group highly emphasizing a strong interpretation of sharia law that arose in the early 1990s after the withdrawal of Soviet troops from Afghanistan. Referencing the BBC article, a common belief holds that the Taliban first emerged in religious seminaries that preached a hard line of Sunni Islam. The Taliban’s promise to Afghanistan, Pakistan, and the surrounding area was to restore peace and security using their interpretation of the sharia law once they were in power (“Who Are the Taliban?”). Along with the many new policies and regulations of society, there arose a new interpretation of the role of women in society. Women became very restricted and had to live in a way that was extremely submissive to men to the point where it was almost dehumanizing, as many would argue. Although the Taliban has been out of control in Afghanistan since December of 2001, remnants of their oppression towards women remain. In this paper, I will demonstrate the Taliban’s remaining effects in Afghan society regarding many aspects of everyday life, such as the workforce, education, healthcare, and human rights. To begin, I will give a brief overview of how Afghan women participated in society before the Taliban came to power. I will then provide information and examples that shed light on women’s life during Taliban rule. In the final section of this paper, I will describe how the lifestyle of women has changed as a result of the Taliban’s oppressive laws and

In the case of Afghani women’s memoirs and life stories offer new understanding of life under repression and how Afghani women struggled to keep their autonomy despite the oppression they faced. “Zoya’s Story”, “My Forbidden Face”, and “A Bed of Red Flowers” are memoirs written by Afghani women who experienced life under the Soviet Union and the Taliban in Afghanistan. These memoires along with interviews with Afghan women provided a complete picture that Afghani women are not as passive as they are portrayed in the history and book in the media. Women resisted in different shape and form, some engages in violent resistance, while others engaged in non-violent form of opposition. For instance, Zoya joined RAWA and participated in non-violent

Women are constantly being put down as if they are not good enough; discrimination of women is sadly seen throughout the world in history. Women have and still are degraded as inferior to men, forced to think that it is the woman's ‘duty’ to tend the house and children while the men do the ‘important’ work. Within the 20th and early 21st century, Afghanistan’s female population has had to endure the harshest of these sexist restraints. The book A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini is able to accurately describe the typical life of a female in modern Afghan society, causing the readers to feel as if they are suffering alongside the main characters, Mariam and Laila. A Thousand Splendid Suns is not just one of the most inspirational and

he second article being looked at is ‘Muslim Women’s Quest for Equality: Between Islamic Law and Feminism’ by author Ziba Mir-Hosseini. This article looks at the plight of women in both the Middle East and Southwest Asia and looks the the distinction between sharia law and fiqh. Mir-Hosseini argues that Muslim women will be treated as second class citizens as long as patriarchy is justified and upheld in the name of Islam (pg.629). Both the invasion of Iran and Afghanistan were justified on the basis that Muslims were in need of “freedom” and “democracy”. By doing this is has brought upon many internal and external struggles. Muslims in these countries see the “neo imperialist intervention as a direct assault on their religion” (pg. 631). Further giving more reason to legitimize the power of radical Islamists such as Al-Qaeda.

Throughout time, Afghan women have dealt with rights inferior to those of men; although tragic, it is actually accepted by the majority of women living in Afghanistan due to the fact that traditions in the Afghan culture significantly contribute to the formation of women's values (Text 3). The reason regarding this is the fact that Afghan women are identified by their roles as mothers and wives (Text 4). Women feel as though men are

A Thousand Splendid Suns has a rich and intricate historical background, starting during a time where gender equality seemed viable and Afghanistan was on the brink of becoming a modernized country and continuing till the abolishment of the Taliban and the United States invasion. The most prevalent conflict between this time was certainly the inequality between both genders, which was accentuated by the rise of the Taliban. Gender inequality used to be a problem around the world, but the majority of countries managed to rid their culture of the severe forms of oppression towards females. However, Afghanistan was not one of them. Afghanis were close to escaping these shackles, but the government was stubborn towards this matter.

After 20 years of civil war, the Taliban, an extremist militia, took over and plunged Afghanistan into gender apartheid. The Taliban is a group composed of all men; they initially started to take over in 1994, but they didn’t overthrow the capital, Kabul, until 1996. Many people originally thought they would help stabilize the country; however, its oppressive laws threw women into destitution. Shortly after the Taliban came to power, women’s right for healthcare, education, and other lifestyle constraints drastically changed placing women into a state of virtual house arrest.

The reason I chose to study Islamic Feminism and Afghanistan, is that for many people, these words do not belong in the same sentence. Afghanistan has come to be recognized as a country that follows strict and fundamentalist Islam, hindering the lives of women and even damaging their lives. Since I entered high school, Afghanistan has been known to me and my generation as a country

Afghanistan is a stark contrast to the western world through the difference of cultural practices. “A culture that believes it is okay to harm and abuse women is not a

Religion goes hand in hand with culture, and in the Muslim countries this is very apparent. The cultural importance of men over women may have stemmed from religion, however it was further recognized when imperialist countries introduced capitalism and class divides. “Islam must combat the wrenching impact of alien forces whose influence in economic, political, and cultural permutations continues to prevail” (Stowasser 1994, 5). Now, instead of an agrarian state where both men and women had their place, difficulties have formed due to the rise in education and awareness that women can and do have a place in society beyond domestic living Though women are not equal to men anywhere around the

The rise and expansion of Islam has had a significant impact on the role and rights of women throughout history. Since its origin in the seventh century until modern times, the Muslim faith has somewhat broadened, but has mostly restricted women’s rights in numerous Islamic communities. The history of Muslim women is complex, as it involves many advances and declines in numerous locations, such as Egypt, Afghanistan, and Iran, concerning several subjects, including both civil and social rights. Thus, in general, the rights of Islamic women did not improve significantly over time, instead, conditions remained the same or became worse for women as Islam evolved and spread as a world religion.

Afghanistan is a landlocked country located within South and Central Asia. It is an Islamic Republic with the nation currently being led by President Ashraf Ghani. Afghanistan is a multiethnic society with a population of approximately thirty-one million people. In September 1996 to December 2001, the Taliban, a political movement, formed a government and spread throughout Afghanistan. They misinterpreted Islamic law and inflicted strict and unjust order amongst the Afghans, specifically women. Even after the Taliban’s fall from power, women are still being discriminated. Women’s rights in Afghanistan are violated, specifically in Article two of the Universal Declaration of the Human Rights, through rape, forced marriage, and self-immolation.