Women In The Middle East: A Cultural Analysis

I had mixed notions about what it means to be a woman as I was growing up, and I trace a part of this conflict back to my heritage. My parents are both Chinese immigrants, but I was born and raised in America, so I identify with both cultures. The cultural differences between America and China about what qualities woman should or should not have was interesting to explore, especially as I was entering college. In my parents’ eyes, being a woman meant that I had to eventually settle down and raise children, essentially have my own nuclear family. I began challenging that notion, suggesting the possibility that I would never get married and never have children. I do not believe that just because I am woman that I had to start my own family or get married. That is not to say I am opposed to those life events happening, but I wanted to at least know that those were not my only options, especially if I am pursuing a career after attending college.

“Elham was eight years old when she first wrapped herself in a chador; the all-encompassing black cloth Iranian women wear to disguise their figures. She spent her entire adolescence under its heavy drape”. This was until she laid foot in Australia and freed herself from the gender roles and expectations of Iran, unveiling herself both theoretically and in practice. Similar to beauty ideals, my investigation also aims to identify whether gender roles and opportunities for power for Persian women have changed as a result of migration to Australia.

As time went on women continued their struggle to earn their right even today. In some areas around the world, women are still expected to be those perfect 50’s housewives where they cook, clean, make, and raise the children. In areas around the world like Israel, women who cannot have children appear as something useless to society. Their husbands

All societies in all times and places have their black sheep, “charlatans” such as fake priests, palm readers, and others that do everything to get their words, their own beliefs across to people. They compose a special speeches, performances or write texts based on their beliefs and their great powers given to them by the divine, that are specially designed to manufacture the consent of the people. In some parts of the world, people are born with more authority over others, for instance, kings, people with political power, wealth and dominant gender. According to Craig Martin, these acts are almost always linked to locally authoritative figures, texts and symbols which help gain authority and power to those without it (117). For example, within pre-Islamic Arabia women were accepted as possessions than as human beings of their male husbands that had authority over them.

Many politicians argue that foreign interventionism is a responsibility of the United States, as the “world’s policeman,” but perhaps the responsibility lies instead with the church. For example, protestant reformation started as a push for religious freedom and correct theology, yet it fundamentally altered political thought and the governments of many nations. The people of the Middle East suffer primarily from bad government. Therefore, it can be fixed by a turn to government based on a Biblical worldview. The proper entity to fix the Middle East are the Christians living there, who must apply their worldview across the board, and who should reform their society on the basis of reality. Islamic law, beliefs, and unfriendly foreign interference have to halt before the Middle East can be a less violent and dangerous area.

Women's rights in Iran have for many years been a very controversial and heated topic. The way women live and are viewed by men in Iran has changed in so many ways throughout the end of the twentieth century leading into current day. Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi was the last Shah of Iran and throughout his attempt to westernize his country he was overthrown by the Iranian Revolution, also known as the Islamic Revolution, on February 11th, 1979.[1] Religious rulers took over and influenced the Sharia Law, which are decisions on how to live life by studying religious texts. Ever since this change women have faced a struggle to survive in harsh conditions every day of their lives. Inequality between Iranian men and women is a major

There are many types of family roles and dynamics that are taking rule in this two particular scenarios. The Middle Eastern woman that holds a Doctorate degree and should be very capable of taking care of herself financially and obviously has enough knowledge, still chooses companionship over a solitary life. In her relationship with her companion, she is known as the second wife and she’s ok with that because her culture believes having more than one wife is an equitable way of organizing relationships. Or the two Lesbian woman that have children together and are hoping their children fit into society even if they don’t. Worried that their children have two mommies and no man figure in their lives, these two types of family roles are definitely

The essay I wrote about was based on the experiences of Women in Islam which is consist of a group of Muslim female students at city college of New York. The essay was mainly focused on their Muslim identities and the negative effects that comes with being a Muslim in America. The main reason why I decided to study this group of students and use them as my ethnography topic was because I am part of the group and I can relate with what they are going through for the mere fact of being a Muslim. This subculture is something I am very passionate about, because it gives me a sense of belonging and inclusion whenever I feel like the world is against my identity as a Muslim woman. In other words, I do not have to worry about being judge or

In the development of the Middle East, there has been a constant constriction of women being political prisoners in their own countries. Within a male hegemonic society, women became the first vast target of political and social suppression. The development of a new age has implemented the animation of feminism within society, where women break their position of being prisoner to the male force. Over time women resisted the views upon them, using art as a medium for expression, therapy, and a way to allocate to the western ideas of the Middle Eastern woman. These women have created a crying outpour of their ordeals through painting, music, film, photography, and installations available to a global eye. Not only are these women’s works

“Stop reading. Look at your cousins, habibti. They are always at their mother’s side cooking and washing the dishes. How will you feed your husband someday?” my mother shouted from the kitchen.

My colleagues and I during the workshop portion of class discussed how there is still a pressure on women surrounding the need to get married. Young girls are told that their wedding day will be ‘the happiest day of their life’, and something that is greatly sought after. There is a notion that when a woman gets married, she becomes a housewife and a mother. If she does go back into the labour market, it is often part-time work after the children are old enough to go to school (Rahman & Jackson, 2010, p. 62-63). During the discussion, my peers agreed that in our own families it is the women who are the ones performing the majority of domestic

Many young girls grow up playing with baby dolls, dreaming of the day when they can become mothers. According to The Washington Post, in 2000 nearly 75 percent of women of childbearing age had children or were hoping to have children. In contrast, according to the Huffington Post, the number of women choosing to not have kids in recent years has risen to 48 percent. In today’s society women who choose to not have kids could be considering practical financial reasons or simply removing themselves from the judgement they may receive from the rest of society. While women are still becoming mothers, many struggle to juggle a family and work. The world pushes women away from being stay at home moms who depend on their husbands, yet judges the mothers who leave their kids “to be raised in childcare.” All in all, the lack of acceptable options for working mothers as well as the feelings of guilt when it comes to motherhood are contributing factors to a stressful culture regarding women and mothers in the twenty-first century.

The treatment of women compared to that of men in the Middle East is presumed to have an extreme disparity due to the portrayal of the country through the media. Although this holds as being partly true, as seen in the two films and the novel, the lives of women who lived in this region are inherently different than formerly perceived. The three pieces, similarly, depicted the women as being strong characters who fought, albeit small, internal as well as external battles to overcome the hurdles and restrictions that were placed on them. Furthermore, the three pieces, similarly, described the gender relations between the men and women as predominantly male domination. But, the novel Girls of Riyadh, as well as the film A Separation portrayed a variation, in which the women were seen with slightly more importance than their counterparts. Apart from the similarities that the two films and the novel shared, there were also some differences that were representative of the diversity of how women lived and the kind of relationships they had with their male counterparts. These main differences were due mainly because of the wealth, social standing, and how adherent the men that these women had relationships with were to society’s expectations.

Upon review of Western opinion regarding the Middle East, there seems to be a number of inconsistencies. The United States during the Bush administration seemed to be invested in women’s rights in Iraq and Afghanistan right up until it was decided that the invasion of Iraq was more beneficial to the United States’ own agenda. During the invasion, violence and even death, but never emancipation, was the new fate of the women in those countries.

Humans operate for their own self-interest, regardless of what that might mean in the relation to other individuals. The world in its basic form is separated into political entities called nation-states. Nations because of lingual, religious, cultural, or political formulas affecting the majority of individuals within a certain undefined boundary and states because of judicial and governmental legitimacy over a certain defined geographical territory. Because of our hierarchical structuring of our international