Base on the introduction up to chapter two of “Gendered Paradoxes,” I think Adely analyzes gender in Jordan from a cultural relativist rather than an ethnocentric standpoint. Adely is born in the United States and she is a Jordanian American. Adely’s writing is already leading me towards the side that she is not ethnocentric, I am not sure if she can be ethnocentric because she is a Jordanian American. I don’t believe an anthropologist can be ethnocentric when doing his/her research because cultures are all different. Adely digs deep and explains why the Jordanians’ gender issues can be paradoxical from her research “strategically situated ethnography”.
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
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will bring a better life for their children. The culture of education in Jordan is not the same to the U.S. but Adely did not judge it but explains why it’s different. When Adely revisits the al-Khatwa school, many people along with the school guidance counselor ask her to go do her research elsewhere, in Amman. Adely finds out it is because life for young people in Amman is different from Bawadi al-Naseem. Bawadi al-Naseem is a small town where people knows each other but in Amman, or else in the country, girls have distinct experiences. For instance, the girls told Adely about why they can’t stay after school in school grounds. Teachers and neighbors think they are waiting for a boy. Society view in Bawadi al-Naseem gossips and interferes everything in the town. Adely interprets the gossips as “a woman’s actions reflect upon her family, and her family’s reputation is important for her future”. Even if you do have education in Jordan, there’s a lot of grey areas where people get jobs from kin relations and reputation. She also gives the snapshots of serval students attending al-Khatwa school, including Hiba.
In Hiba’s story we can see Adely finds out more about the view on education from Jordanian parents, “despite being obviously wealthy, Hiba’s mother was embarrassed that neither she nor her husband had completed their education”. It is clear that the Jordanians focus a lot of emphasis into education but we also know from earlier that education won’t get what you want in Jordan. However, like Adely says, the situation of women in Jordan today cannot be understood outside the historical events and political and economic context she outlined. The culture and gender issues of Jordan have to comprehend from someone who understands Jordan’s roots from beginning to
now.
In the article titled “Pashtana’s Lesson” by Beth Murphy, she records the story of a 15 year-old Afghani girl who has a fiery passion for acquiring knowledge and pursuing education, but old traditions oppress her devotion to study. Pashtana is in the 7th grade at an all girls school which has been rejected by the elders in their community, asked to be torn down, or turned into an all boys school. Her mother strongly enforces studies on her children because she never went to school herself and she doesn’t want her children to end up blind to things in the world like her. In order to support her mother and three younger siblings financially, Pashtana is being forced by her uncle and father to marry her first cousin which is not uncommon, the
The place of women in Saudi society is determined by a deeply conservative culture, vindicated by a narrow interpretation of religion, and enforced by law. That place it would appear is at home, subservient to and legally dependant on their male guardian. Saudi society suffers from pervasive segregation along gender lines and women's freedom of movement is impeded, forcing them to rely on male chaperons.
Khaled Hosseini, an inspirational author, has experienced and wrote books based on the society and culture of Afghanistan. In A Thousand Splendid Suns, the main protagonist, Laila, is in the middle of a war-fighting country. At one point, her father says to her, “marriage can wait, education cannot” (Hosseini 103). Her father urges her to take the advantages of knowledge rather than jumping into marriage. Marriage is a life-long process that according to the Quran, bids a woman to follow her husband. All in all, it’s general knowledge that love, respect, and trust is what keeps the strong bond between man and wife. There have been too many times where they have been caged and looked down upon. Women deserve the same equality as men. It won’t happen immediately, but the change is happening, slowly. One way to gain that right, is to create an organization and promote the idea of women being able to get a job, education, and not being married at an early age in Afghanistan. The organization would be able to collect money for two buildings. One building will be for a school, so that women get the education they deserve. The other building opens up for opportunities for a job. Those jobs could range from sewing to cooking. Women are more than just a trophy to just sit there and act as though they do not have a voice. The challenge may be a struggle but not
Women learn their rights and how to be independent outside the comfort of their homes. In order for them to gain independence they must enter the labor force and interact with others; however, if they do not need the money that comes from their job they will prefer to stay home, raise their children, and live on the high salaries of their husbands. Reduction in the presence of women in the labor force and the few economic opportunities for Muslim Women lead women to support fundamental Islam (Ross 107). They are less likely to be educated because education is seen as a means to make an income and women in oil rich states do not need an income. Since women stay home, reproduction rates increase and the dependency of women on men also increases. When women enter the wo...
higher education, choice of a husband and access to a prosperous/independent future-that a woman would be positioned to escape gender oppression. However, this is not the case for the Arab women of Fatima Mernissi’s Dreams of Trespass and Ahdaf Soueif’s In the Eye of the Sun. The two main characters of these novels-Asya and Mernissi herself-enable the reader to understand how gender inequality is rooted in the frontiers and accepted social norms that are defined by the community and adhered to by the individual. Although these woman have access to an equal education with the hopes of becoming an enlightened, liberated women, education does not guarantee that they will ever become truly liberated. This paper will discuss the differences between the educated and seemingly liberated women of Dreams of Trespass, and In the Eye of the Sun, in hopes to understand whether cultural and educational frontiers are the only characteristics which govern a woman's right to escape the gendered Arab hierarchy. Why do some women, with access to westernization and an equal education still fall victim to the subservient expectations of an unliberated and uneducated female in the Arab world? Why are these women maintaining such domination when they are surrounded by tools of
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 middle east if full of degenerates that only want one thing, Power, even though the laws for women have gotten better over the years they still till This day can't express themselves the way a woman in the U.S would by: wearing what she wants, going out when she wants, doing whatever she wants, attending college, getting a good education in general. While in some places in the middle east women are treated better in others they are used as compensation to fix certain issues in the communities, In Doc #1 it shows us that regardless of how fate may look for these women some still have hope she says”But I am Woman,Woman, a Woman a statue of love and I will rise” that shows that even when she may see women down she knows they can keep on going.. For example let's take a look at a girl named Sakina, her story was dreadful it didn't make sense to me that a girl would be punished so harshly for something that had nothing to do with her. In her story she explained how her brother eloped with her cousin, causing great pain to her cousin's husband, because of that Sakina was handed off to the grieving husband's father to marry so the conflict between the families in the future would not occur. She decided to run off to her uncle and he believed that his son would be a better husband since they were the same age and he married her to him. further into her story her
One primary reason why Middle Eastern men oppress women is their deeply rooted belief system as well as their needs. For example, their belief that the Middle Eastern woman’s duty is being a dedicated homemaker encourages them to disallow her from seeking an education. Ramsay M. Harik and Elsa Martson, revisit this concept in their book, Woman in the Middle East, as they state that many males convince their women that education is unnecessary nor relevant to their household responsibilities. "The girl will spend her life cooking and having babies, why does she need to read or write? This was a common attitude in much of the Middle East until the last fifty years or so" (24). The common consensus was that once educated, these women would question many of the injustices suffered, would demand better treatment...
In the past decades and even century, the women’s movement towards equality made tremendous progress. In the year 2014 women have attained the right to vote, to a higher education, to divorce abusive spouses, to own land, and to keep bank accounts among many other things. But, feminists argue that this progress is commonly mistaken for the false belief that true equality exists between the sexes. Feminist, in fact, argue that injustices still exist and may need our attention more than ever in many areas including the regular exclusion of women from voting in Saudi Arabia, lack of education for women in Middle Eastern countries, and the international gap between the amount of work women do and the amount of the world’s income that women receive. But the main focus of this report, however, will be mainly on the political injustices in in laws and the workplace, and the social inequalities in the home and in the ...
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.
Her powerful voice to the Islamic world says. Her ideal asserts that education for both girls and boys is a critical step towards becoming a country in which gender equality exists in everyday life.
His Highness Sheikh Zayed Bin Sultan Al Nahyan, founder of the United Arab Emirates, or UAE, stated, “The greatest use that can be made of wealth is to invest it in creating generations of educated and trained people.” From its conception, the United Arab Emirates was founded on the importance of education. Since it’s founding in 1971, the small country’s population has risen to over nine million people. This dramatic rise in population was a cause for the dramatic investment the countries government has put into its education system. In 1975, the rate of adult literacy was 54% among men and 31% among women, while today, literacy rates f...
The critical rank for reducing gender inequalities should be education, labor force participation, and lastly, wages. There are obvious differences between men and women whether it’s anatomically, financially, and so forth. The gender inequalities women face compared to men is alarming and saddening. Gender stereotypes reinforce gender inequalities because stereotypes can often be internalized which results in biases against either sex. These biases against a person can result in negative results. Gender inequality has been within our society for a long time especially amongst women.
Due to this fact, his highness made education accessible for everyone (Al-Abed and Vine, 2004, p.20). In Sheik Zayed’s view everyone, women and men, should get the chance of education and therefore have the opportunity to participate in the country’s development actively (Al-Abed et al., 2005, p. 20). While between 1970 and 1980 only 40% of folk enjoyed education, nowadays almost every inhabitant has the chance of higher education (Embassy Of The United Arab Emirates, n.d.). A remarkable statistic from Al-Abed et al. (2005, p. 227) shows that primarily women are graduating from university. Although women in traditional Arab countries are usually responsible for the household and cannot benefit from the same rights as men, it is astonishing that particularly women in the UAE as well have the possibility of an education (Ministry of State for Federal National Council Affairs, 2008, p. 3). A Report (Ministry of State for Federal National Council Affairs, 2008, pp. 6-8) written about women in the United Arab Emirates emphasizes that besides education, women are occupying in today’s world significant job positions in the government, private sector and what is notably in men controlled
...n into their police force. While the United States have been using women some sixty years before the Jordanians, both recruit women for the same purpose: sensitivity. Women are generally more caring and understanding and easier to talk to than men. In the United States, this was used as a way to communicate and help prostitutes as well as other women dealing with some form of domestic abuse. In Jordan, they suffer some of the same problems, but women play a more sensitive role in the Public Security Force. Because Jordan is mostly an Islamic nation, women have certain rules they must abide by as well as unique issues that are a huge threat to them specifically, such as rape and other forms of sexual abuse (Lia, 2006). The women of the Jordan Public Security Force have been able to reason with women and comfort them in a much more proficient manner than the men have.