Fernea - Guests of the Sheik - NOTES

- Guests of the Sheik background

-set in 1956-1958, mostly the year 1957
- ie. one year before a revolution, land reform, dismantling of the feudal system of landed sheiks
- El Nahra: mostly Shia, or Shi'ite
- Spelling details
- today the preferred spelling is "Muslim", not "Moslem"
- Arabic uses a different alphabet, so many Arabic words and names are written in multiple ways in the Latin alphabet
- Diwaniya, Diwaniyah
- Abayah, abaya
- lid, eid, id, 'id (feast)
- Id al fitr, id el fitr, id ul fitr ... (feast at the end of Ramadan)
- And many more ...
- Maps
- Aerial views (why are the doors blue?)
- suq
- abayah
- dishdasha
- kaffiyeh (and agal)
- aba (cloak)
- mudhif

Introduction- "I am not an anthropologist" .... no?

- 1st two years of marriage to Robert (Bob) Femea, social anthropology grad student from University of Chicago
- Chapter 1, Night Journey: Arrival in the Village
- El Nahra
- Guests of Sheik Hamid Abdul Emir el Hussein, chief of the El Eshadda tribe
- Arrive at station in Diwaniya
- BJ is the only woman without an abayah
- "Why should I have to wear that ugly thing? It's not my custom"
- "They sayan uncovered woman is an immoral woman"
- "If they can't take me as I am - if we have to make artificial gestures to prove we are human beings too - what's the point?"
- "my principles were weakening before my embarrassment"
- "my principles were not as strong as my desire to be inconspicuous and well thought of in
my new home"
- Um Hassan = Mother of Hassan; Abu Hassan = Father of Hassan
- does this suggest anything about the importance of having children?
- culture shock - p. 10
- "I knew what I should do ... But I couldn't do it. I felt only a flood of irrational resentment
against my new husband for bringing me here ... "
- "I was still clutching the despised abayah tightly under my chin ... "
- p. 22, food details: "boiled potatoes, sliced tomatoes, and canned corned-beef hash with
fried eggs ... angel-food cake ... Nescafe ... "
- Mohammed is as uncomfortable ("scared") of her as she is of him p. 14
- cold, rainy
- high wall around the garden gives them complete privacy
- "doors painted blue, the color to ward off the evil eye" p 16
- Mohammed mortified that people might learn that he was washing dishes - woman's work
- BJ saves the "extra" lunch, instead ofleaving it for children, servants, etc; the man (Ali, the
sheik's gardener) who brought it assumes she ate it all- news travels! - they are observing her

- Chapter 2: The Sheik's Harem

- each of Hamid's 3 wives has own, separate block of rooms for her and her children
- notice the crescent and star flag ... and the crescents and stars on Selma's dress ... ?
- Kulthum and Selma refer to "Haji Hamid"
- A Haji (or Hajji) is someone who has made the haj (or hajj), a pilgrimage to Mecca
- Hamid's father: Abdul Emir, famous warrior against British-backed government, head of a
confederation of tribes
- Hamid inherited his position at Abdul Emir's death
- later we learn that succession was not simple
- rivalry with uncle Urthman (brother of Hamid's father) (p 118)
- Hamid's older brother Abdulla is second in command (p 126)
- various other brothers are more or less favored
- 3 day's hospitality at mudhif for any traveler
- strained silence - no common ground?
- Selma starts asking where clothes and jewelry came from (family or husband?, and costs
- lots of heavy gold: insurance
- Selma is wearing at least $1000 in gold, in 1957 dollars
- In 2006 dollars, that is at least $7,194
- Selma and Alwiyah eat with BJ when she insists (p. 34)
- Selma amused
- Alwiyah uncomfortable
- haranguing to eat more
- wives of Hamid: one deceased, now Kulthum (oldest), Bahiga, Selma
- "where is your mother?"
- they assume she is lonely without her mother
- "To be alone without any of one's womenfolk was clearly the greatest disaster which could befall any girl."
- Kulthum: "Children are gifts of Allah ... When you have children, you will not feel so alone without
your mother"
- They don't wear the abayah in America ... "Why not?"
- Just as reasonable a question as ''why do they wear it in Iraq?"
- Bob assumes Selma is beautiful because Hamid gave 1500 pounds to her family when he married her
- "I couldn't help laughing at his male naivete."
- [why is this naive?]

Chapter 3: Women of the Tribe

- Mohammed (servant) is a Sayid, descendent of Mohammed (the Prophet)

- not members of EI Eshadda tribe

- but treated with respect, act as mediators
- in [mancial straits since 180 of their 200 acres were too salinized to farm
- BJ spends many evenings with them, conversation is relaxed and happy
- She is making friends and contacts already
- sister Sherifa: abandoned by husband
- "neither widow, virgin, nor divorcee, and hence had no future"
- "kept chickens and sold eggs; she raised lambs in the spring and sold the meat and wool. She helped keep
her family alive."
- Fadhila, wife of Mohammed's older brother
- "had no chi1dren .. .it was always the wife who was at fault in these matters ... was judged inadequate as a
woman and as a wife."
- Ali and Sheddir want to marry off their son and daughter
- paternal first-cousin marriage is preferred (p. 44)
- ideal: marry father's brother's child
- payment: groom's father to bride's parents
- if brothers exchange children in marriage, saves bride price

- visits strain hosts' resources

Chapter 4: Women of the Town

- Old pontoon bridge at mosque replaced by American engineer

- "Point Four" engineer: Point Four was a foreign technical assistance program run by the
US during the 1950s to encourage less developed countries to side with the US and not with the USSR
- a new, modem bridge
- build to cement bridge - hard to get onto from dirt road
- at village center, joining taxi stand and coffee shops
- now women can't cross without being observed; crossing to the suq or to visit now a major foray
- women now went out much less
- Aliyah started school for girls, won trust, got good enrollment
- in part by having common acquaintances among teachers in Diwaniya
- her younger sister, Hind
- Sitt Aliyah: Sitt a tenn of respect for educated woman
-Abu Saad (mayor) educated, rational, but can't overcome family history and allow his wife Urn Saad to go without
the abayah
-A good woman, in tribe or town:
- reputation for fidelity unreproachable
- hard-working
- devoted wife and mother
- good cook and housekeeper
- quiet, obedient companion to her husband
-yet influenced men a lot
- husbands
- especially sons
- who sons and daughters marry
- whether they would go to school or university
- Chapter 5, Gypsies
- BJ and Bob driving with Jabbar and his dense sister Khadija

- they perform juggling and acrobatics, women as background

- abayahs used provocatively - BJ is shocked
- why? What is happening to her that she should respond this way?
- leader asks Jabbar if they would like one of the girls to dance
- Khadija says yes, Jabbar says "that's enough"; Khadija sulks
- why these reactions?
- later, Abdul Razzak (engineer friend of Jabbar) invites them to come visit the camp
- he is to deliver gifts to his mistress Fatima (!)
- Khadija does not go, reasons not explained ... ?
- Abdul brings Fatima hashish, among other gifts
- dismal scene; everyone tired, dirty, some sick. ..
- sick, fat, malnourished child

Chapter 6, Housekeeping in EI Nahra

- daily ethnographer's routine
-BBC
- Arabic drill, newly learned phrases
- Bob goes off for interviews
- BJ does housekeeping
- both do visits in afternoons
- evenings together, reviewing, writing in journals, reading, playing chess

- heavy laundry done in Diwaniya, EI Nahra people won't do Christians' laundry

- only very low-status women go to the market
- description of the food ... general interest and ethnographic duty!
- "local bread ... healthful and good when hot, but usually it was dry and often tasteless."
(they will think similarly of hers!)
- water buffalo do better than cows; herders prosperous, but low status
- a cow confers status, a water buffalo does not
- arbitrary cultural construction of meaning ...
- BJ getting nowhere with the women after two months
- thinks they are talking about her, giggling at her, but can't be sure, so can't respond
- classic paranoia of culture shock
- even if it was true
- why isn't she making any friends?
- "I felt very strongly that we must have some common humanity between us, although we
were from such different worlds. But how to find it?" [sounds like Middleton!] p. 71
- Bob to be gone two days; Sheik Hamid sends servant Amina to stay overnight.
- neither looking forward to it
_ finally, at bedtime, she asks "Is your husband kind to you?", cries, launches into life story
- at 15, married to a 65 year old man (she was one of 12 children, poor)
- almost died with stillbirth
- husband dies, leaving nothing
- husband's family mostly dead, remainder don't want her
- Hamid buys her, gives her to Selma
- now gets all the food she wants, Selma gives her cigarettes, Hamid is wonderful...
- hasn't seen family in seven years
- Amina: get a lot of gold jewelry from your husband while you are young!
- next day, the Sheik's women visit
- they ignore her, refuse her tea
- BJ points this out sharply: shocked silence.
- Selma makes excuses and takes some tea
- all then accept cigarettes
- why doesn't she do laundry with them at the canal?
- we never see much laundry hanging ... BJ must be lazy ...
- she cooks - brings out Western bread to try
- Sheddir spits it out
- claims she can't cook rice, so Bob eats at the mudhif
- BJ admits that she can't cook this rice; it is different from American rice
- "Rice? Rice is the same everywhere" ... "I was obviously slow-witted as well as lazy"
- notice any naive realism here?
- Fine for the anthropologist to be a cultural relativist, but what if no one else is?
- start to tease about sleeping with Bob
- BJ sees them out and cries
- "I would not have believed that I could be so upset at being accused of laziness and
incompetence by a group of illiterate tribal ladies .. .it was a real and very terrible snub now ... "
- BJ feels indignant, "they are nothing but a group of curiosity seekers"
- Of course, what are BJ and Bob?
- self-righteous, hurt ... next day, unreasonably depressed
- next morning, Laila and two others come teach her how to cook rice
- "We don't want your husband to beat you ... After all, you are here alone without your mother."
- What are the assumptions here?
- Would BJ have thought of herself this way?

- that afternoon, visits Sheik's family, accidentally unannounced (Mohammed forgot)

- sees Selma in daily clothes, making Sheik Hamid's bed
- Samira (Kulthum's daughter) asks if she embroiders, suggests she embroider Bob some
pillowcases
- Laila to lend patterns
- BJ has been sitting on the floor - not a chair
- Selma too busy to think about entertaining her
- Selma: the Sheik wants to meet you; here or your place?
- "I must ask my husband" - the right answer!
- Purdah = Seclusion of women

Chapter 7, Problems of Purdah [Sheik Hamza]

- Sheik Hamza arrives in car with driver to visit when Bob is gone
- BJ does not open the gate; "my husband would be glad to see you"
- anger, gate rattling, leave
- Bob describes him as a wastrel, absent, spending "sharecropper's" money
- embroidery working
- Laila traced pattern
- BJ brings it everywhere
- "the women all remarked on it" [apparently not quite typical behavior] but then forget her strangeness and
talk freely
- BJ doesn't have to talk constantly
- could pick things up by listening
- Hamza had invited Bob to visit him through Jabbar; repeats, inviting BJ to his harem
- Hamza's 3-story "palace" (p. 85)
- Hamza takes a large share from his fellahin, so they are poorest in the area
- Jabbar: he has to go when the revolution comes, as expected in the countryside - but not by diplomats in
Baghdad
- Ethnography is actually a good way to learn what is going on
- Lynn Maners, grad student studying traditional dance in Yugoslavia: predicted the war in Bosnia based on
changes he saw in the dancing
- US consulate staff in Lima not allowed to leave a few neighborhoods of the capital, clueless about the
country
- Hamza has sent his women away to Karbala, they have no choice but to go in with BJ
- "Trying to be as dignified as possible with two menservants, Hamza and his teenage son standing by goggling,
I took off my abayah ... " p. 87
- [BJ has really internalized the modesty rules in just a few months]
- BJ refuses liquor, asks for tea
- excruciating decor... "vulgar"
- petrified pastries, canned cookies, weak tea with condensed milk
- plaster cake!
- beautiful gardens and view; Hamza unmoved, says he is bored and will leave soon
- "Mambo Italiano" and Elvis Presley
- gives them four armed guards as they drive two hours to next tiny town - Hamza is not too popular ...
- is anyone being ethnocentric here?
- What standards is BJ applying to Hamza? Is this fair?

- Chapter

8, I Meet the Sheik

- Bob invites the Sheik the day after visiting Hamza

- Hamid plus brother Abdulla and oldest son Nour
- elaborate menu
-BJ wants to prove that she can cook. .. p. 96
- Mohammed reassures or distracts Bob when he is harassing BJ (p. 96, 97) - BJ finds him an ally as well as a
servant!
- BJ declines a cigarette, Abdullah says "It is better for a woman if she does not smoke" (just like Kulthum, who
said Hamid prefers women not to smoke ... )
--Sheik Hamid impressed by her industry, having cooked all that food "by herself"

Chapter 9, Ramadan
- A holy month

- Dates are approximate

- For many, they depend on actual lunar sightings, which can be affected by local conditions
- Last year, September 23- October 20
- This year (1428 in the Islamic calendar), September 12-0ctober 11
- Fast all day, not even water
- So eat before sunup and after sundown
- Krayas for men, others for women
- Women's krayas led by female mullahs
- Highly esteemed and profitable
- How does this fit with the rest of women's roles here?
- Fadhila, Sherif a, other girls don't wear face veils on "tribal" side of the canal, but do for
crossing the bridge and walking on the other side
- What does this suggest about their concept of veiling, etc.?
- A woman arrives in makeup and a green and white over yellow hashmiya
- Clearly being rebellious, looking for responses
- Most of the older women ignore her completely
- What does this say about the rigid rules of female behavior in this culture?
- Why do most women follow them?
- Kraya is the retelling of the betrayal and death of Hussein
- We will look at this story next time
- Everyone gets very emotional
- What is the purpose or effect of the krayas?
- When did they originate?
- 1500's, when Ottoman (Turkish) Empire oppressed Iraqis
- Ottomans were Sunni
- Krayas were assertion of religious difference, and protest
- Might Sunni/Shiite relations be different in former provinces of the Ottoman Empire
than they are elsewhere?
- What sort(s) of explanation(s) does this suggest?
- Urban Baghdad Shiite says krayas aggravate splits within Islam
- Make Arab unity impossible
- Why go?
- Social contact
- Childhood memories
- Enjoys the ceremony
- Does this remind you of anything in your own culture?

Chapter 10, The Feast (lid el-Fitr)

- Feast at end of Ramadan
- Sheik's household feeds 200-800 men at the mudhif
- The women do all the work
- Urthman, Sheik Hamid's uncle, wanted to be sheik but lost to Hamid
- Even some of the children's dances are about Hussein's betrayal and death
- Chapter 11, Moussa's House
- Laila has chosen BJ as her friend
- Qanda the beautician/tattooist
- Tattoos will help you keep your husband
- What assumptions are implied by that?
- Why is BJ so adamantly against what they think is a fine idea?
- Why was she accepted?
- Her Arabic got better
- Instead of smiling and nodding, she could talk back to sarcastic remarks
- They had thought she was deaf or stupid, but she became better company ...
- Chapter 12, Weddings
- Ali has arranged to swap daughter and son with a brother in marriage
- An efficient, first-cousin marriage
- Ali' s daughter Sahura, no beauty
- BJ hopes her husband is not hard on her when he sees her for the first time ...
- Mother and other women wail as she leaves
- Different reactions by different brides
- The Sheik's guards are looking the other way so the women can go out and see the dancing p.143
- Man dances the "bride's" part
- Apparently reluctant at first
- Men ritually wash in canal, with mullah
- Then groom and bride sign agreement
- Groom goes in to the bride's home to consummate the marriage
- Tension as it takes a while
- Bride's mother as a witness
- Show the bloody sheet to all, proving her virginity
- Congratulations all around
- Bride can be killed or ruined for life if she does not appear to be a virgin
- Why?
- Is this a good system?
- Chapter 13, Salima
- Tribe endogamy preferred
- First cousin marriage preferred
- But Moussa's daughters don't have enough male cousins
- They love their expected husbands; grew up with them as children
- Laila does not expect to marry
- Has to care for her mother
- The higher-status men all go off to study, want to marry more modem women they meet there
- Femea says they will have meaningless lives "for reasons which they would never be able to understand" p 160
- Is that fair?
- Best option: become a teacher

- Closed to older girls - school for girls became acceptable too late for them

Chapter 14, One Wife or Four

- Hussna thought to be a poor wife; husband Abad considers taking as a second wife a recent widow with two small
boys
- Even women who oppose multiple marriages approve
- Hussna goes to a wise woman in Samawa
- Widow's son gets sick, Abad gives up the marriage
- People say they don't believe, but they do notice ...
- Un Khalil and women mullahs visited about illness, barrenness, to make cruel husbands kind, but especially to
prevent him from taking another wife - Only 9 of 104 households had ever been polygamous
- 4 divorces in just the last 18 months!
- Second wife is expensive
- "Isn't our way better?"
- Bob can divorce you and leave you penniless
- But if he takes a second wife, he still supports the first
- Mothers have final say in sons' marriages while alive
- Second wife is often the man's choice
- Mohammed's rules of polygamy were intended to stop female infanticide
- Often the only option for women
- no place for them outside a family
- her children will have relatives to support them and to marry
- Femea says the practice is rare in cities
- Multiple wives needed to cook and care for children
- Abdulla treats Khariya and Bassoul equally, and they get along well

Chapter 15, Summer

- Sheik Hamid takes a two-month vacation annually to Lebanon with the other sheiks
- Spoiled son Feisal gets typhoid
- Laila insists that BJ will forget them after she leaves
- Charms, the Book of Stars
- Is it against the Koran?
- Midwife knows how to get rid of babies
- Americans put their old women in houses by themselves
- Chapter 16, Hussein
- Hussein, their armed guard
- Migrant labor in Baghdad
- Hussein can repeat his family tree back five generations
- All the wives and children as real to him as though they were alive today (p. 190)
- Visitor from Baghdad terrified when Hussein shoots a gun at night to test it
- The "Experience with the Tribe"
- BJ hit in the head by a mourning dove
- She screams
- Bob was in the outhouse, did not hear it
- Denies to Hussein that she was screaming
- Hussein assumes he was beating her
- Strikes EI Nahra women as very funny
- Either because they believed it
- Or because they thought it was an elaborate lie

- Chapter 17, Muharram

- The month in which Hussein went to Karbala to demand the Caliphate, was denied, and was killed in the battle of
Karbala - Krayas
- Mourning processions
- Reenactments
- British-backed government requires a deposit, forfeited if violence breaks out between factions
- Jabbar thinks BJ and Bob will find it primitive and barbaric, and think badly of Iraqis
- Compare to CNN article about Ashura ...
- Is Jabbar's concern justified?
- Jabbar also thinks the British encourage the rituals in order to accentuate the Shi'ite/Sunni split and prevent Arabs
from uniting against them - Is this a reasonable interpretation?
- Consider the boundaries of Iraq, cross-cutting Shi'ites, Sunnis, and Kurds ... why?
- He says "when the revolution comes, all this will change" p. 196
- Taaziya processions of men flagellating themselves or cutting foreheads with knives
- Shabih (passion play) reenactment of battle of Karbala
- The war "between the good men of Hussein's family and the evil men of Muawiya"
- "don't they speak Arabic in America?" p. 208
- English sound hilariously funny to the women they visit for the reenactment in Suffra
- They are unimpressed by BJ's white gold wedding band
- Reenactment of Hussein's burial
- Led by a young boy (representing Ali, Hussein's son)
- Mannequin of dead Hussein, with a bloody cow's neck
- Taaziyas
- Everyone wailing
- Amina switches the wailing and dust-throwing on and off
- Watch the ceremony through the mosque windows
- Chapter 18, Pilgrimage to Karbala
- Shiites should not only visit Mecca, but also the shrines of the twelve imams (for "twelver" Shiites)
- Actually, several sects, who consider slightly different sequences of imams to be correct
- Laila wants to go to Karbala and pray in order to get Moussa to send her with Basima to secondary school in
Diwaniya
- Bob would be too obvious when Karbala "was particularly sensitive to the presence of unbelievers"
- But BJ could pass in her abayah
- Conversation with shopkeeper about wearing the abayah
- Procession, taaziyas, BJ steps on a prayer rug, Sitt Najat drags her to safety ...
- Sitt Najat's ideal of how Karbala is turns out to be far from the real

Chapter 19, Autumn

- Sitt Aliyah, girl's school principal, leaves for Diwaniya
- Sitt Aziza replaces her
- Becomes friend ofBJ's

Chapter 20, An Excursion into the Country

- Aziza with her cousin trom Diwaniya invites BJ for a ride into the country
- Laila comes along
- Laila is very quiet
- The women meet some hostile probable squatters
- Laila begs Aziza not to say where they are trom, but she does p. 259
- Laila refuses to be photographed
- Later, at home, Mohammed explains the trouble Laila is in, and BJ is at fault
- She could be beaten or killed
- The cousin has a bad reputation

- All agree to lie, say that it was another cousin who was with BJ and Aziza
- Laila's 3 older sisters chew BJ out for endangering Laila
- Months later, Selma asks, BJ remembers to lie
- BJ had thought she understood the culture, but discovered that he was only seeing the tip of
the iceberg

Chapter 21, Winter

- Cold, TB flares up
- BJ gets sick
- Laila, Rajat insist on being with her
- A sick person needs social support more than ever
- Bob wants to give donation to a poor man who gets charity from many people
- Gets strange reactions or is ignored when he mentions it
- Asks Mohammed to buy a sack of grain for him
- "He is a man; let him decide"
- discussing charity is bad taste
- recipient has as many or more rights than donor
- "how many ways we seek to gratify ourselves"
- Two engineers arrive for dinner and cards
- The women come to keep BJ company
- Chapter 22, Jabbar Becomes Engaged
- Jabbar is respected for his fair dealings and respect for both Sheik Hamid and the mayor
- Revolutionary, anti-Western, Marxist
- College friend Naji finds Jabbar a potential wife, trom a powerful, conservative family
- Another college friend, Abdul Razzak, runs into Jabbar and Naji
- Suggests his sister, just released to be married because her sick mother has died
- Jabbar prefers marrying into Abdul Razzak's family
- The sister is also "modem", wants to meet Jabbar, they don't like each other
- Jabbar gets engaged to the first girl

Chapter 23, Death in the Tribe and in the Town

-- Um Saad's mourning
. Chapter 24, At Home in EI Nahra
- Hamid's son Ahmar wants to marry Moussa's daughter Sanaa
- Hamid wants him to marry one of Abdullah's daughters
- Moussa doesn't want to irritate Hamid, because he may soon have to buy land from him
- marriage as a matter between families, not just between the bride and groom
- Chapter 25, Back to Baghdad
- Mohammed comes with them to Baghdad
_ Depressed because no one knows him, he doesn't know the suq ...
- Abdullah's son Ahmed and Hamid's son Hadhi both at college in Baghdad
- Both have quarreled with their fathers, are being supported by their mothers
- These women are not completely powerless
- Hadhi considers marrying Hamid's daughter Sabiha
- BJ says no, must be Samira
- Samira is beautiful, warm, smart
- Sabiha is "silly"
- But Sabiha has the lighter skin: more prestigious

- Maybe Bob was not so naIve to assume that Selma was beautiful because Hamid made a large bridewealth payment
- Lunch with Jabbar, his fiance Suheir, and his dim sister Khadija
- None wearing abaya
- Khadija is uncomfortable
- Suheir is to "educate the women of EI Nahra away from the abayah"
- Khadija is terrified at the thought
- Is it likely to work?
- BJ and Bob accompany Sayid Muhsen, his wife, and five male relatives to the American Hospital to see a female
doctor about birth control
- Previous doctor told her to wear an examination instrument!
- Awkwardness with thanks and goodbyes as they leave
- Hamid invites Bob and BJ to a reputable nightclub with him and Nour
- BJ impressed that he would consider their foreign ways, even though he would never take his own wives to such
a place
- Nour uncomfortable eating with his father and with a woman, and with western table etiquette
- Hamid assumes the dancing women in cocktail dresses are prostitutes ("that tart")
- BJ suddenly sees them as ridiculous
- Hamid assumes that Bob and BJ would never do such a thing
- Can't introduce a couple that they know because Hamid would only think worse of Bob and BJ, not better of the
couple
- He respects BJ because she has followed his culture's rules
- Not because he is a cultural relativist
- He has not decided that western practices are understandable and OK, but only that some westerners do not
do them
- He would never believe that the dancing women were faithful wives or respectable single women
- Just as BJs friends at home would never believe that the women ofEI Nahra were not living in against
their will in near-serfdom
- Bob and BJ have not brought understanding and tolerance to EI Nahra
- Only personal ties ... a small first step

Chapter 26, Leave-taking

- Laila doubted that BJ would return
- BJ tries to say she is speechless because she is touched by their kindness
- They don't comprehend the concept at all
- Laila teases about the bird story
- ''who, me? I'm not even married."
- She obviously doesn't believe it was really a bird ...
- "God willing, you will have a boy" "you don't want Mr. Bob to divorce you" "when she is with her mother, she'll have a
boy"
- "Ask Mr. Bob to bring your mother and then you'll never have to leave us"
- The women never envied BJ, just made her fit into their ways
- Discussion about Basima going to school in Diwaniya
- Will she wear an abayah?
- Is wearing the abayah in the Koran?
- Most can't read, so they don't know
- Tension between Selma (Hamid's wife) and Fatima (Moussa's wife)
- Hamid's son Ahmar wanted to marry Moussa's daughter Sanaa
- But Hamid was opposed
- In the postscript, we learn that Ahmar married Sanaa anyway

- Postscript
- Six years later, 1964
- The revolution did not change much; Hamid is still sheik
- Fernea and Fernea: Symbolizing Roles: Behind the Veil
- Most variants ofIslam see gender identities as explicitly established by Allah (God)
- the two genders are a fundamental feature of existence
- adherence to the gender roles is required by God
- some Christian sects take this position, too
- In many Muslim societies, modesty is essential to female identity
- Purdah: seclusion of women
- Hijab: literally means barrier; modest clothing
- marks women as devout, respectable Muslims
- Hijab is a minor issue to some Muslim women, a big deal to others
- Purpose or meaning of hi jab
- expression of male power over women?
- modesty, same as US women not going topless
- warns others to treat her with respect
- in some cases, indicates a degree of wealth and independence
- protection outside - from dirt and men
- protects men from sights that could cause them to become impassioned and misbehave
- anonymity in public
- protects family honor
- the honor of an entire family is based on the behavior of each member
- one person's loss of honor affects everyone
- male honor is based on bravery, piety, and hospitality
- can be regained if lost
- female honor is based on chastity outside marriage
- cannot be regained if lost
- Culture as meaning; cultural relativism:
- We can't understand
- why women wear hijab
- how it affects them
- how it fits into their culture
- without understanding the meanings that women and men place on it
- we must be cultural relativists in order to understand
- applying our own values first would keep us from ever really getting it
- Revival of popularity of hi jab: two theories
- men asserting their male identity (as having power over women), which is threatened by
- women increasingly going to work and earning money and respect
- women asserting their female identity (as being pious and respectable), despite their
- increasingly having to go to work and be exposed to vulgarity, profanity, and disrespect
- Both illustrate all three of Middleton's approaches to understanding cultural practices
- both are about communicating meaning
- specifically, the identity that men and women want others to attribute to them
- both are about culture as a system of interrelated parts
- both bring in economic forces and work practices to explain a choice of clothing
- both are about culture as an adaptation (this may be the weakest of the three)
- both show how hijab solves a practical social problem that men or women face
- it is unusual to find an explanation that embodies all three approaches; usually an explanation basically applies just
one

- Recent conflicts over hijab

- 2005/2006 in France: banned wearing obvious religious symbols in public schools
- mostly aimed at hijab
- supposedly to encourage equality and solidarity
- England: allowed wearing hijab in public schools
- to permit free exercise of religion
- October 2006 in England:
- Jack Straw, leader of House of Commons, ex Foreign Secretary
- asked that women remove niqab (full face veil) to speak with him
- said it is a "visible statement of separation and of difference" (BBC News, 5 Oct. 2006)
- said he feared that "wearing the full veil was bound to make better, positive relations
between the two communities more difficult". (BBC News, 5 Oct. 2006)
--Tony Blair, Prime Minister, called Straw "perfectly sensible" on this
- BBC headline: "Bilingual [elementary school] support worker Aishah Azmi, 24, was
asked to remove the veil after pupils found it hard to understand her during English language lessons."
(BBC News, 5 Oct. 2006)
- a court found that the school had "victimized" her and awarded her a fine
- but did not order that she be re-hired
- October 2006 in Australia
- "Australia's most senior Muslim cleric ... Sheikh Taj el-Din al-Hilali said women who did
not wear a hijab (head dress) were like "uncovered meat".
- "If you take out uncovered meat and place it outside ... and the cats come and eat it ...
- whose fault is it, the cats' or the uncovered meat?" he asked ....
- "If she was in her room, in her home, in her hijab, no problem would have occurred," he
added.
- Sheikh Hilali also condemned women who swayed suggestively and wore make-up,
- implying they attracted sexual assault.
- "Then you get a judge without mercy ... and gives you 65 years," he added."
- This sermon was immediately condemned by many Muslims
- AI-Hilali said that his statements had been taken out of context
- He said he was referring to infidelity, not assault.
- "I unreservedly apologize to any woman who is offended by my comments. I had only
intended to protect women's honor," the statement published in The Australian said. - An extreme example of
hijab being interpreted as both
- protection for women from men
- and protection for men from temptation that they cannot resist
- (BBC News, 26 Oct. 2006)