Lives of Circumcised and Veiled Women

Lives of Circumcised and Veiled Women
Author: Debangana Chatterjee
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
Total Pages: 181
Release: 2023-08-11
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1000928071

The book unravels the politics of representation and the process of exoticising women’s bodies through the prism of external gaze and knowledge production. It brings out the intricacies of representational discourses around cultural practices of female circumcision (FC)/female genital cutting (FGC) and Islamic veiling. Focusing on crucial international legal texts and national legislation, the book gives an overview of the cultural nuances in FC/FGC and juxtaposes it with the Indian variation, khafz. The author studies the international veiling narratives that conjure up a fractured discourse containing aspects of colonialism, Islamophobia, and Islamic fashion and maps them with the regional variations of Islamic purdah in India. The volume explores the cultural practice of khafz and purdah through narratives in India, portraying how representational factors from international discourses reflect on the Indian context and vice versa. Amid the world of binaries and polarised opinions, the book offers a nuanced analysis of the space in-between, characterised by narratives from women. By situating women’s narratives in relation to family, community, state, and international politics, the book explores the global-Indian interplay of discourses on FC/FGC and Islamic veiling. This volume will be of interest to scholars, students, and readers of gender studies, feminism, cultural and religious studies, sociology, South Asian studies, and International Relations.

The Politics of Silence, Voice and the In-Between

The Politics of Silence, Voice and the In-Between
Author: Aliya Khalid
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
Total Pages: 260
Release: 2023-12-19
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1003832911

The Politics of Silence, Voice and the In-Between: Exploring Gender, Race and Insecurity from the Margins seeks to dismantle the deficit discourses generated through research about people as agency-less and, by extension, objects of study. The book argues that, regardless of marginalisation, people create spaces of liminality where they seek control over their lives by navigating the structures that exclude them. Challenging the false binary of silence as violence and voice as power, the book introduces the idea of an in-between ‘liminal space’ which is created by people to navigate conditions of oppression and move towards a politically stable and inclusive world. This book will be of great interest to students and scholars of gender studies, international development, peace and conflict studies, politics and international relations, sociology and media studies. It will be an important resource for courses incorporating gender, feminist and postcolonial perspectives.

Female Genital Mutilation

Female Genital Mutilation
Author: World Health Organization
Publisher:
Total Pages: 30
Release: 1997
Genre: Political Science
ISBN:

This document contains the joint statement of the World Health Organization (WHO), UN Children's Emergency Fund (UNICEF), and the UN Population Fund (UNFPA) on female genital mutilation. The introduction to the statement notes that the purpose of the statement is not to criticize or condemn but to allow people to understand the hazards and indignity of harmful practices and to realize that it is possible to give up harmful practices without giving up meaningful aspects of their culture.

LIFE

LIFE
Author:
Publisher:
Total Pages: 160
Release: 1955-05-09
Genre:
ISBN:

LIFE Magazine is the treasured photographic magazine that chronicled the 20th Century. It now lives on at LIFE.com, the largest, most amazing collection of professional photography on the internet. Users can browse, search and view photos of today’s people and events. They have free access to share, print and post images for personal use.

The Banality of Suicide Terrorism

The Banality of Suicide Terrorism
Author: Nancy Hartevelt Kobrin
Publisher: Potomac Books, Inc.
Total Pages: 229
Release: 2010
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1597976016

Terrorist organizations have been able to market mass murder under hysteria's banner of alleged martyrdom. But when it comes to understanding Islamic suicide terrorism in particular, there is much more to it than martyrdom. In this groundbreaking book, Nancy Kobrin dismantles the psychological dynamics of suicide terrorism to help the reader gain a new perspective on one of the most destructive forces the world has witnessed to date. Until now, no one has explained why the mother-child relationship is central to understanding Islamic suicide terrorism. The Banality of Suicide Terrorism exposes the very ordinariness of one of the deepest yet most poorly understood causes of the suicide bomber's motivation: a profound terror of abandonment that is rooted in the mother-child relationship. According to Kobrin, this terror is so great in the would-be suicide terrorist that he or she must commit suicide (and mass murder in the process) in order to fend off that terror of dependency and abandonment. Suicide terrorists seek a return to the bond with the mother of early childhood-- known as maternal fusion--by means of a "death fusion" with their enemies, who subconsciously represent the loved (and hated) maternal figure. The terrorist's political struggle merely serves as cover for this emotionally terrifying inner turmoil, which can lead down the path of ultimate destruction.

Do They Hear You When You Cry

Do They Hear You When You Cry
Author: Fauziya Kassindja
Publisher: Delta
Total Pages: 543
Release: 1999-01-12
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 0385319940

For Fauziya Kassindja, an idyllic childhood in Togo, West Africa, sheltered from the tribal practices of polygamy and genital mutilation, ended with her beloved father's sudden death. Forced into an arranged marriage at age seventeen, Fauziya was told to prepare for kakia, the ritual also known as female genital mutilation. It is a ritual no woman can refuse. But Fauziya dared to try. This is her story--told in her own words--of fleeing Africa just hours before the ritual kakia was to take place, of seeking asylum in America only to be locked up in U.S. prisons, and of meeting Layli Miller Bashir, a law student who became Fauziya's friend and advocate during her horrifying sixteen months behind bars. Layli enlisted help from Karen Musalo, an expert in refugee law and acting director of the American University International Human Rights Clinic. In addition to devoting her own considerable efforts to the case, Musalo assembled a team to fight with her on Fauziya's behalf. Ultimately, in a landmark decision in immigration history, Fauziya Kassindja was granted asylum on June 13, 1996. Do They Hear You When You Cry is her unforgettable chronicle of triumph.

Woman at Point Zero

Woman at Point Zero
Author: Nawāl Saʻdāwī
Publisher: Zed Books
Total Pages: 148
Release: 1983
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 9780862321109

So begins Firdaus' story, leading to her grimy Cairo prison cell, where she welcomes her death sentence as a relief from her pain and suffering. Born to a peasant family in the Egyptian countryside, Firdaus suffers a childhood of cruelty and neglect. Her passion for education is ignored by her family, and on leaving school she is forced to marry a much older man. Following her escapes from violent relationships, she finally meets Sharifa who tells her that 'A man does not know a woman's value ... the higher you price yourself the more he will realise what you are really worth' and leads her into a life of prostitution. Desperate and alone, she takes drastic action. -- Publisher description.

Islamic Law and Society in the Sudan

Islamic Law and Society in the Sudan
Author: Carolyn Fluehr-Lobban
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 339
Release: 2013-10-15
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 1134540426

Few studies exist which deal with Islamic law in practice, and this is among the first such studies in the English language for Islamic Africa. It is significant that the present study was completed just prior to the extension of Islamic law as the sole governing law in the Sudan in 1983, for it captures many essentials of the Shari’a as it has been applied for decades prior to this important change. Numerous movements for reform and change are discussed in the book, which reflect the contemporary debate in the Sudan over the position of Shari’a in society.

Tournaments of Value

Tournaments of Value
Author: Anne Meneley
Publisher: University of Toronto Press
Total Pages: 264
Release: 2016-01-01
Genre: History
ISBN: 1487521324

A significant contribution to our understanding of the varied experience of women in the Islamic Middle East, Tournaments of Value gives a careful description of a world of female socializing, and the velocity, energy, and elaborateness of this remarkable female social world. Meneley's data challenges assumptions about the cross-cultural validity of a division between household and community, between domestic and public domains. She demonstrates the fluidity of social life, the shifting nature of community organization, and in doing so provides a welcome counterpoint to more rigid formulations of Middle Eastern social structure usually expressed in ethnographies. Tournaments of Value incorporates vignettes to illustrate more analytical points and to enliven the text, allowing the reader to enter fully into the rich world of Zabid in Yemen. This expanded 20th anniversary edition introduces this seminal work on Middle Eastern ethnography and women's studies to a new generation of readers.

Transcultural Bodies

Transcultural Bodies
Author: Ylva Hernlund
Publisher: Rutgers University Press
Total Pages: 387
Release: 2007-06-07
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 0813541387

Female "circumcision" or, more precisely, female genital cutting (FGC), remains an important cultural practice in many African countries, often serving as a coming-of-age ritual. It is also a practice that has generated international dispute and continues to be at the center of debates over women's rights, the limits of cultural pluralism, the balance of power between local cultures, international human rights, and feminist activism. In our increasingly globalized world, these practices have also begun immigrating to other nations, where transnational complexities vex debates about how to resolve the issue. Bringing together thirteen essays, Transcultural Bodies provides an ethnographically rich exploration of FGC among African diasporas in the United Kingdom, Europe, and Australia. Contributors analyze changes in ideologies of gender and sexuality in immigrant communities, the frequent marginalization of African women's voices in debates over FGC, and controversies over legislation restricting the practice in immigrant populations.