EGYPT

Women Demand Change

Women Demand Change

Photo essay: Egyptian women take to the streets

by Azadeh Azad
01-Feb-2011 (39 comments)

>>>

RESPONSE

Defending a convicted murderer?

Iranians need no lessons in democracy from ill-informed foreign observers

16-Jan-2011 (4 comments)
The execution of Shahla Jahed does not offer any special insight into the Iranian nation’s understanding of women, let alone any entrenched cultural or social misogynistic tendencies. Ms. Yazdani’s flawed premise draws a link between a murder conviction and the socio-cultural condition of a people. At best, the Jahed execution might offer insight into institutional misogyny in Iran, expressed in a possibly flawed legal judgment. However, to then take that judgment and draw from it conclusions about a nation’s democratic maturity and its understanding of women seems to me to be an unfounded and uninformed leap>>>

WOMEN

آیا 17 دی روز مهمی است؟

این روزی ست که در آن زنان توانستند حکومتی قادر و قدرتمند را قانع کنند که خواسته های آن ها را قانونی و رسمی کند

06-Jan-2011 (one comment)
من، مثل هر انسان عدالت طلب و آزادی خواه، طبعا رضاشاه را به عنوان یک دیکتاتور می شناسم، حتی روش های تحمیل گرایانه ی او را برای برداشتن چادر از سرزنان عملی دیکتاتورمآبانه می دانم، و تحقق نیافتن بسیاری از خواست های انقلاب مشروطیت ، مثل آزادی های بیان و انتخاب و احزاب و غیره را، نتیجه ی مستقیم عملیات نادرست او می دانم اما، به اعتقاد من، هر حرکتی که به آزادی انسان از بندهایی که سنت ها به دست و پای او بسته بیانجامد حرکتی قابل تعمق و توجه و ارج گذاری است>>>

REMEMBERED

Forgotten Poet

Ksenia Nekrasova

17-Oct-2010 (6 comments)
For most of her tragically short life, Ksenia Nekrasova lived in abject poverty without even a bed to call her own, totally dependent on the generosity of friends. She published only one slim volume of poems during her lifetime. Derided and dismissed by most of her contemporaries, she enriched the lives of a whole generation of poets in ways which only later (after her death) bore the indelible signature of her unique vision>>>

MARRIAGE

Husband & Wives

Iranian women poised for major setback

29-Sep-2010 (3 comments)
In the past month the government has pursued the passage of laws through parliament that would roll back what limited legal rights women are granted in Iran. In late August, a controversial bill, ironically dubbed the "Family Protection Bill," was reintroduced to the Iranian parliament after languishing three years while tabled for review. Articles 22, 23 and 24, seek to impose heavy taxation of women's alimony and dowry, remove the requirement to register temporary marriages, and eliminate the need for a husband to prove financial solvency or ask his wife's permission before marrying another woman>>>

ADMISSION

زهرا رهنورد

در صف مقدم حرکتی میلیونی در یکی از سخت‌ترین شرایط مبارزه سیاسی ایران

29-Sep-2010 (10 comments)
خانم رهنورد در مصاحبه اخیر خود با نیک‌آهنگ کوثر در سایت «خودنویس» از این قتل عام تحت عنوان «جنایت» و «لکه‌های سیاهی ... که به آب زمزم و کوثر سفید نتوان کرد» یاد کرده است. فراموش نکنیم که رهبران اصلاح‌طلب در جمهوری اسلامی تا همین یکی دو سال گذشته حتا به ندرت حاضر می‌شدند در مورد این فاجعه سخنی بگویند. و اکنون زهرا رهنورد در عین این که از همسرش به عنوان یک «مذهبی دوست‌دار امام خمینی» یاد می‌کند ابایی ندارد که قتل عام سال ۶۷ را جنایت و لکه سیاه بنامد.>>>

TV

The Next Apprentice?

Iranian-American contestant Mahsa Saeidi-Azcuy

15-Sep-2010 (4 comments)
"I have to say that The Apprentice is one of the best-produced shows. And it is real. The tension is real. The feelings are real. The tasks are real. You work like an animal. You almost get no sleep. The producers are so careful with the rules that all the drama that unfolds on screen is real. The second you walk in, you feel the pressure and it starts to impact you. But that's also what makes it so fun to watch. And this season more than any other previous season, the craziest things happen, you have to watch!">>>

ETHNICITY

The E Factor

Role of ethnicity as an added burden in women’s struggle for their rights

25-Jul-2010 (3 comments)
Is ethnicity important in women’s struggle for their rights, at all? Studying English in middle school, this question seemed an exciting one. It made me imagine myself abroad and answer it proudly. But, this innocent imagination was shattered. Yes, I grew up as a woman facing the reality of much discrimination. Discriminations that kill you and re-kill you, shape you and reshape you, frame you and reframe you to the point that you don’t know who you are>>>

WOMEN

Gathering in Paris

Gathering in Paris

Photo essay: 21st Iranian women's studies conference

by Monireh Kazemi
24-Jul-2010

>>>

LIONS

Sheerzan

Iranian women know their place in history

30-Jun-2010 (29 comments)
For the last three decades Iranian women have borne a double burden. Not only do they suffer the oppression afflicted on all citizens of that country by a theocracy, but they also endure the extra humiliation of being women in an Islamic society. They are forced to cover themselves only so that men might not lose control and go astray; they are counted as only half a man when it comes to testifying in court, inheriting less than their borthers in the same family upon passing of the father>>>

WOMEN, MEN

The Dual Burdens

Most Iranian men support Iranian women in their struggle to gain equal rights

06-May-2010 (26 comments)
Iranian men unfortunately are once again victims of stereotyping and this time not by the American Betty Mahmoody in a movie called “Not without My Daughter” but in Sadr’s article titled “What is Different between Tehran’s Friday Sermon Imam and the rest of Iranian Men?”. The image she has portrayed of Iranian men in her article is misleading. Without raising objection to the original comments and minimizing the Ayatollah’s statement she takes Iranian men to a kangaroo court and denies them all due process rights>>>

MEN

مردهراسی یا مردستیزی

چالش مردان از سوی خانم صدر

03-May-2010 (11 comments)
خانم صدر بر نقطه حساسی در فرهنگ مردسالار ما انگشت گذاشته و مردان جامعه را برای نگرش به نقش خود در این فرهنگ و نقد آن به چالش کشیده است. ولی تعمیم‌گرایی ایشان (که از یک حقوق‌دان انتظار نمی‌رود) مسئله را به حد یک نبرد دایم و حل‌ناپذیر سلطه بلامنازع مرد بر زن کاهش داده است. نه همه مردان مانند امام جمعه صدیقی فکر یا عمل می‌کنند، و نه تنها مردان مسئول ادامه فرهنگ خشن مردسالار حاکم بر جامعه‌اند. باید مردان را در مبارزه علیه فرهنگ مردسالار تشجیع کرد، ولی در این مبارزه باید همه حاملان آن (و نه فقط مردها) هدف قرار گیرند>>>

DEBATE

Fault-Lines and Hem-Lines

Censorship and the Boobquake vs. Brainquake Debate

28-Apr-2010 (70 comments)
Boobquake was rightly making a mockery of a comment made by a moronic cleric in the Islamic Republic. Brainquake’s - HEY EVERYBODY WE HAVE BRAINS! – project is further unpalatable because of its pandering to a challenge that women should not even be engaged in; we should not have to sell ourselves and our accomplishments, we should not have to sell our boobs or our brains; if after more than a century of struggle for our inalienable rights we are still shouting these banal and insipid statements as women - perhaps it is us and our movement that needs a shaking at the core, and not mother earth>>>

FILM

Complete without men

Shirin Neshat's "Women without Men"

12-Apr-2010 (7 comments)
Women, given enough time, get to a point where they realize they are complete even without men. On Friday night I went to see the LA premier of Women without Men by Shireen Neshat. The treat was that she was there with us, and at the end of the film took some questions from the audience. A diminutive and soft spoken woman, Shireen Neshat is incredibly articulate and unmistakably passionate about her beliefs, her art and her cause. Her art resonates as globally well as it does because it is a representation of what she firmly believes and has a burning desire to share with the world>>>

HEJAB

به حجاب اجباری نه می گویم

دختر آیت الله خلخالی: کیان نظام اسلامی زیر چادر من پنهان نیست

06-Apr-2010 (16 comments)
از حرف زدن در مورد حجاب خسته نمی شوم. در تمام سالهای کودکی و جوانی ام، «حجاب» بخشی از زندگی من بوده و سرنوشت مرا تعیین کرده است. با آن بزرگ شده ام. دو رو برم در خانواده تقریباً همه محجبه اند و مادرم هنوزهم مرا به خاطر، به قول خودش «اهمال و کوتاهی در حجاب» نبخشیده است. حجاب بزرگترین چالش فردی و سیاسی زندگی من بوده است. بعدها وقتی از کودکی درآمدم، به دانشگاه رفتم و خواندم و دیدم که بزرگترین چالش زندگی زنانی بوده است که من حتی با آنها در بسیاری جهات دیگر متفاوتم>>>