La Guera by Cherrie Moraga (1998) Summary

Week 5 La Guera by Cherrie Moraga (1998) Mother:  By the standards in this country – considered largely illiterate  Born in Santa Paula, Southern California – only daughter of six to marry Father who is an anglo  Independent as a kid:  Pulled out of school at ages of 5, 7, 9 and 11 to work in fields along with brothers and sisters  Her father drinking away whatever small profit she was able to make for the family – going long way home to avoid meeting him on street  Main support of family at age 14  Doing piecework for electronics plant in neighborhood – sit in front of the T.V. set, wrapping copper wires into back of circuit boards, talking about “keeping up with younger girls”  By that time she was already in her mid-fifties Author:  Well-educated daughter – wore it with a keen sense of pride and satisfaction – “my head propped up with the knowledge, from my mother, that my life would be easier than hers” – emphasizing the importance of education  Go with mother to fill out job applications for her, or write checks for her at the  supermarket Most important – “la guera” – fair skinned – born with features of Chicana mother but skin of Anglo father  Being light was something valued in my family – all Chicana, with the exception of father  Everything about my upbringing attempted to bleach me of what color I did have.  Never taught much Spanish at home – picked up from school and over-heard snatches of conversations among relatives and mother  My family had been poor and farmworkers – mother would like to forget as on a basic economic level to her, being Chicana meant bring “less”  Became “anglocized” through mother’s desire to protect children from poverty  and illiteracy – more effectively pass in white world, better guaranteed our future From all of this, I experience, daily, a huge disparity between what I was born into and what I was to grow up to become – crept under my “guera” skin – no choice   but to enter into life of my mother Pretended to be the happy, upwardly mobile heterosexual Profound connection with my mother reawakened in me when finally lifted lid to  my lesbianism – heartfelt identification with and empathy for my mother’s oppression (being poor, uneducated and Chicana) was realized My lesbianism is the avenue through which I have learned the most about silence and oppression, and it continues to be the most tactile reminder to me that we are not free human beings.  The difference in the privileges attached to looking white instead of brown are merely a generation apart.  Lesbianism is a poverty – as is being brown, as is being a woman, as is being just plain poor – the danger lies in failing to acknowledge the specificity of the oppression and in attempting to deal with oppression purely from a theoretical base – without an emotional, heartfelt grappling with the source of our own oppression, without naming the enemy within ourselves and outside of us, no authentic, nonhierarchical connection among oppressed groups can take place.  Gay friend – being a women meant being raped by men – in order for him to create an authentic alliance with me, he must deal with the primary source of his own sense of oppression – emotionally come to terms with what it feels like to be  a victim To remember may mean giving up whatever privileges we have managed to squeeze out of this society by virtue of our gender, race, class or sexuality.  Connections among women of different backgrounds and sexual orientations have been fragile – indicative of our failure to seriously address ourselves to some very frightening questions – we have let rhetoric do the job of poetry  Frightening to acknowledge that I have internalized a racism and classism, where the object of oppression is not only someone outside of my skin, but someone inside my skin    The major reason for my total alienation from and fear of my classmates was rooted in class and culture. All along I had felt the difference, but not until I had put the words “class” and “color” to the experience, did my feelings make any sense. They had enough privilege to be atheists – more guts to rebel against their parents and run around the country hitch-hiking, reading books and studying “art”  For years I had disowned the language I knew best – ignored the words and  rhythms that were the closest to me For a lesbian trying to survive in a heterosexist society, there is no easy way around these emotions.   In a white-dominated world, there is little getting around racism and our own internalization of it. A woman with a foot in both worlds – refusing the split Oppressor’s nightmare:  What the oppressor often succeeds in doing is simply externalizing his fears, projecting them into the bodies of women, Asians, gays, disabled folks, whoever seems most “other”  Fears to discover the same aches in himself, same longings as those of the people he has shitted on   Fears immobilization threatened by his own incipient guilt Fears he will have to change his life once he has seen himself in the bodies of the people he has called different  Fears the hatred, anger, and vengeance of those he has hurt.  Women – afraid to look at how we have taken the values of our oppressor into our hearts and turned them against ourselves and one another – afraid to admit how deeply “the man’s” words have been ingrained in us  Usual response among white women’s groups when the “racism issue” comes up  is to deny the difference The only reason women of a privileged class will dare to look at how it is that they oppress, is when they’ve come to know the meaning of their own  oppression. Women of color and working-class women often shrink from challenging white middle-class women  Easier to rank oppressions and set up a hierarchy, rather than take responsibility for changing our own lives On The Beach: Sexism and Tourism by Cynthia Enloe  No matter how good feminist tourist’s intention, relationship between British woman on holiday and working women of Portugal – fall short of international sisterhood  Women in many countries are being drawn into unequal relationships with each other as a result of governments’ sponsorship of the international tourist industry – because they have no choice / making their own decisions about how to improve their lives  Many women are playing active roles in expanding and shaping the tourist industry – as travel agents, travel writers, flight attendants, craftswomen, chambermaids – even if they don’t control it  Women who travel are not merely creatures of privilege – not only from Western societies Often had to fight against confining presumptions of feminine respectability to  travel away from home on their own British women’s dilemma in trying to find a postcard expressing sisterhood rather  than exploitation suggests that the galloping tourist industry is not necessarily making the world a more equal or harmonious place    Being feminine has been defined as sticking close to home Masculinity – the passport for travel Feminist geographers and ethnographers have been accumulating evidence revealing principal different between women and men in countless societies – the licence to travel away from a place thought of as ‘home’  A women who travels away from the ideological protection of ‘home’ and without the protection of an acceptable male escort is likely to be tarred with the brush of ‘unrespectability’ – risks losing her honor/being blamed for any harm that befalls her on her travels  A man is deemed > manly until he breaks away from home and strikes out on his own  While some women ran away to sea/enlisted as drummer boys to escape suffocating village life, others claimed they were simply acting as a loyal wife/sweetheart, following their man.  If a woman was exposed – while being treated for a battle wound or giving birth – the punishment she received frequently depended on which of these two interpretations was believed by the men who pulled away her disguise. Women have been lured into joining the military – without a disguise – by  thoughts of leaving home  ‘Pat and I had become nurses with the expectation that we could go anywhere and work. We wanted to go somewhere, and we wanted to do something really different.’ – didn’t want to surrender as a respectable young woman  Victorian lady travellers – most famous of women who set out to travel further than convention allowed without disguise  Most came from white middle classes of North America and Europe  Set out upon travels that were supposed to be preserve of men  Defied strictures of femininity by choosing parts of the world which whites in late nineteenth and early twentieth century considered ‘uncharted’, ‘uncivilized’  Wanted adventure – going to lands just being opened up by imperial armies and capitalist traders  Viewed with suspicion because they dared to travel such long distances with so little proper male protection  Insist upon separateness of their own experiences  Most were white – chose to travel in continents whose populations were not, added to the ‘exotic’ aura surrounding their journeys  The world’s fairs of this era preached that white men’s manliness fueled the civilizing imperial mission and that pursuing the imperial mission revitalized the nation’s masculinity – designed to show that women’s domestication was proof of the manly mission’s worthiness  White women were meant to come away from the fair feeling grateful for the benefits of civilization they enjoyed – not expected to measure progress from savagery to civilization in terms of voting rights/economic independence – adopt a scale that had domesticated respectability at one end and hard manual labour at the other  White men were to look at ‘savage’ men’s treatment of their over-worked women and congratulate themselves on their own civilized roles as protectors and breadwinners  Some American women saw the world’s fair as a perfect venue for showing women’s special contributions to the nations progress Tourism – Flight attendants and chambermaids:     A package of ideas about industrial, bureaucratic life A set of presumptions about manhood, education and pleasure Doesn’t fit neatly into public preoccupations with military conflict and high finance Depended on presumptions about masculinity and femininity  If women are of a different culture, male tourist feels he has entered a region where he can shed civilization’s constraints, where he is freed from standards of   behavior imposed by respectable women back home. A powerful motor for global integration Entails a more politically potent kind of intimacy  Making sense of the strange local currency is about all that is demanded  Promoted today as an industry that can turn poor countries’ very poverty into a  magnet for sorely needed foreign currency Being touted as an alternative to the one-commodity dependency inherited from colonial rule  May be creating a new kind of dependency for poor nations  Indebted governments that have begun to rely on tourism include those which previously were most dubious about this as a route to genuine development, especially if ‘development’ is to include preservation of national sovereignty  Place reduction of international debt and earning of foreign currency on top of their political agenda  Many ads luring travelers to sunny beaches and romantic ruins are designed and paid for by government tourist offices  Local men are militarized in their manliness / local women are welcoming and available in their femininity   International business travelers are men / service workers are women Most women working as flight attendants do not yet have backing of strong trade unions – subject to their employers’ desire for flight attendants to represent not only airline company that employs them but feminine essence of their nation – distinctive femininity is a major attraction in the eyes of the flight attendant’s  employer and her government Airlines – first used a racial and gendered division of labor to maximize profits while constructing a notion of leisure   Ocean-liner crews were male, ranked by class and race White officers were to exclude both competence and romance for passengers  Indonesian, Filipino and other men of color serving in dining rooms and below  deck reflected a comforting global hierarchy while permitting company to pay lower wages Women crew members multiplied when company executives began to realize   that their women passengers preferred to be waited by women Hundreds of women today are hired to work as service personnel in burgeoning cruise-ship industry – ‘Love Boat’ kept afloat by a sexual division of labor When people go on holiday, they expect to be freed from humdrum domestic tasks - To be a tourist means to have someone else make your bed – chambermaids, waitresses and cooks are as crucial to the international tourism  industry Even a low-paid, over-worked male employee on a banana or sugar plantation has a machete, a sense of strength, a perception of his work as manly  Many nationalist movements have rallied around the image of exploited male plantation worker; represented denial of national sovereignty  Nationalist leaders who have become alarmed at tourism-dependent policies imposed by foreign bankers and their own governments have been reluctant to  rally around symbol of oppressed chambermaid Men in nationalist movements may find it easier to be roused to anger by vision of a machete-swinging man transformed into a tray-carrying waiter in a white  resort – a man who had his masculine pride stolen from him ‘Nation of chambermaids’ doesn’t seem to have same mobilizing ring in their ears – a women who has traded work as an unpaid agricultural worker for work as a hotel cleaner hasn’t lost any of her femininity  ‘Labor-intensive’ industry – requires construction crews, airplanes, gallons of frozen orange juice, and a high ratio of employees to paying customers – tourists need and expect a lot of service  Women in most societies are presumed to be naturally capable at cleaning, washing, cooking, serving Sex Tourism in International Politics  Not an anomaly – one strand of gendered tourism industry  A network of local and foreign companies encourages men to travel to Third  World countries specifically to purchase sexual services of local women To succeed, sex tourism requires Third World women to be economically desperate enough to enter prostitution – also requires men from affluent societies to imagine certain women, usually of color, to be more available and submissive than women in their own countries   Industry depends on an alliance between local governments in search of foreign currency and local and foreign businessmen willing to invest in sexualized travel Part of domestic and international political system  Changes occurring both within and between countries that could radically alter sex tourism industry – AIDS – official nationalism – Asian and African feminist movements – international alliances between feminist organizations   Public admission of AIDS – seen as damaging to economy and national pride Migration as entertainers and brides to foreign men has been latest step in making world travel different for men than for women  Tourism is not just about escaping work and drizzle – but about power increasingly internationalized power  Government and corporate officials have come to depend on international travel for pleasure in several ways (1) seeing tourism as an industry that can help diversify local economies suffering from reliance on one/two products for export  embedded in inequalities of international trade – often tied to politics of particular products (2) providing them with foreign currency, a necessity in the ever more globalized economies of both poor and rich countries (3) a spur to more general social development – ‘trickle down’ of modern skills, new technology and improved public services is imagined to follow in the wake of foreign tourists (4) to secure political loyalty of local elites  certain hotel licences may win a politician more strategic allies today than mere civil-service appointment (5) raise their nations’ international visibility and even prestige  continues to be promoted by bankers and development planners as a means of making international system less unequal, more financially sound and more politically stable  without ideas about masculinity and femininity – impossible to sustain tourism  industry and its political agenda in their current form the very structure of international tourism needs patriarchy to survive  men’s capacity to control women’s sense of their security and self-worth has been central to evolution of tourism politics Report from the Bahamas by June Jordan (1992) June Jordan:  Black American  Political activist Ito Noe  Born Kyushu (margins and site of strong masculine dominance) in 1895  Six years of school  Family was well off but father was bankrupt  Worked in post-office  Jealous of other girls in family who received higher schooling  Her determination evident by fact that she convinced relatives to fund her education at Ueno Higher Girls School – so she went “up” to Tokyo  Marriage arranged  Fled arranged marriage to live with her anarchist Dadaist, shakuhachi player English teacher (Tsuji Jun)  Sought advice from famous feminist Hiratsuka Raicho re divorce  Mother of 7 children – 2 sons then 4 daughters and 1 son  Famously took up with Japan’s most famous (and dashing) anarchist  Wrote as activist with her partner until their murders by the Higher Police in the crack down on dissidents that followed the 1 September, 1923, Great Tokyo Earthquake The Blue Stockings by Sharon L. Sievers (1983) Bluestocking:  An educated and intellectual women Bluestockings magazine:  Designed to encourage and advertise women’s creative talents – relatively unknown in Japanese literary circles With All Our Strength by Anne E. Brodsky (2004) The Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan  Salima – a RAWA member based in Afghanistan  Role in the covert filming of the infamous execution of Zarmeena  Zarmeena - Mother of seven, accused of killing her husband, publicly executed       by the Taliban in Kabul’s soccer stadium in 1999 in front of a crowd of women, children, and men that included her family, in-laws, and children. Taliban had decided that fall to make an example of her, especially as a warning to the women of Kabul To document this Taliban violence, RAWA members had risked their lives by sneaking a video camera into the stadium. Despite years of efforts by RAWA, no world news organization would broadcast the execution until September 11 made Afghanistan and Afghan women suddenly newsworthy. After the footage became well known, a common question to ask any RAWA representative was whether she was the one responsible for the undercover filming. No RAWA story/activity is ever about only one individual – it was not her story, but RAWA’s story None of them knew how to use a video camera but they were willing to learn because nobody could document this, to show the brutalities – they were willing to sacrifice their lives to do this as it was a matter of determination.  The member who filmed it was chosen finally because she was born in Kabul and      knew most places and so we predicted that if something happened and she was arrested, she knew the side streets and could escape better – she also learned recording faster and better, and she remembered what she learned better. It was painful and heartbreaking to see little kids present in such a shocking scene. The immediate reaction from the men and women was screaming, yelling, crying. Many women whom were closer were asking why and expressing hate toward the Taliban. Taliban had further terrorized the city; and all they had been able to do was take pictures for a world they weren’t even sure cared. It is a story that is embedded in many layers of context, including Salima’s geographic and historical location, the role of RAWA and the people within it, as well as her family and peers. Salima’s Story  The city faced the much more personal terror inflicted by roving bands and roadblocks of armed factional jihadi.  They used their weapons, gender, and power to exhort the civilian population of money, property, and even more relevant for a 16-year-old girl, women’s bodies, lives, and personal freedom.  At 16, Salima saw the atrocities firsthand, witnessing the brutality inflicted on girls in her school and neighborhood and experiencing the leers and threats of the jihadi who manned the roadblock at the end of her street. Nothing Sacred by Betsy Reed (2002) Women Respond to Religious Fundamentalism and Terror Introduction  Bangladesh – Muslim fanatics throw acid in the faces of unveiled women  Nigeria – Newly established shariah courts condemn women to death by stoning for having sex outside of wedlock  Israel – Women walking in ultra-Orthodox neighborhoods have been physically attacked for wearing sleeveless tops  US – Protestant evangelicals and fundamentalists have forged a powerful rightwing political movement focused on banning abortion, stigmatizing homosexuality, and limiting young people’s access to contraception and accurate information about sex  Natural similarity of sexes supposed to stand revealed, making possible new,               more equal and companiable relationships between them – cause organized religion to wither away/at any rate modulate away from dogma and authority and reaction toward a kind of vague, nondenominational spiritual uplift whose politics would be liberal. In many other parts of the world, religion is tightening its grip. Fundamentalist In many countries and regions, antimodernists religious movements that claim to offer a return to a better, more orderly, “traditional” way of life are rapidly growing in popularity. The subordination of women – central feature of ever variety of fundamentalist religion. Female subjection is a feature of most non-fundamentalist religion. e.g. Catholic Church’s intransigence on contraception, abortion, divorce, and women priests. Feminists warned about the Taliban for years – raising awareness about the regime and its extreme restriction on women was a major project of the Feminist Majority and other groups as well. The Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan (RAWA) had to get footage of the now-notorious public execution of a women in the Kabul soccer stadium – footage that appeared on television practically every day after September 11, when a Afghan women held the media spotlight and was discovered that they did not like being confined to their houses and deprived of jobs and education after all. The Taliban were not noble warriors but operators of a clerical police state, ignorant, corrupt, vicious, and sadistic, as likely to commit rapes, murders, and abductions as to prevent them. The hatred of women brought Taliban to the extreme point of mania, perhaps because their ranks were filled with young men who had grown up as orphans in the all-male world of Pakistani madrassas (religious boarding schools) – men who had never had real contact with women, even in their families. Women were to paint their windows black so that no man could see them, they were not allowed to wear white socks (the color of the Afghan flag) or shoes that made a noise and would entice men to lust. Even to save her life in childbirth, could a women be treated by a male doctor – but women doctors were barred from working Women could not leave their homes w/o a male relative as escort, but Kabul alone had 40,000 widows. Important to remember just how barbarous and cruel the Taliban were and not to use their example to obscure/deny the common thread of misogyny that connects them with Focus on the Family and the Christian Coalition, who see modern women (working mothers, sexually active singles) as the source of an immense range of social woes, or the Promise Keepers, who urged men to “take back” the leadership of their families and somehow never did include domestic nonviolence in their principles of Christian manhood. Attention to women’s status was inescapable – the key to smaller family size in the developing world was raising the abysmal social position of women, by providing education, employment, health care, and legal rights and by raising their status in the family.  Our image is still men fighting, women on the sidelines, with sexual assault the     regrettable but politically irrelevant result of having a lot of armed and desperate men rampaging about far from wives and girlfriends. One has to consider the role of mass rape in Bosnia, Rwanda, and the Congo to see that wartime assaults on women are profoundly political acts. The bodies of women are one of the terrains upon which modern wars are fought – humiliating the community by destroying its “honor”, breaking up families by forcing the rejection/even murder of daughters, wives, and mothers, polluting the hated ethnic group by forcing alien children upon it Women’s bodies – what they should wear, where they can be, who can look at them/touch them, who controls their sexuality and fertility – are crucial battlegrounds for all varieties of fundamentalism Ultra-Orthodox Israelis regard women’s hair and women’s voices raised in song as an “abomination,” practice strict segregation of the sexes, demand large families (while banning abortion, even where Judaism permits it), and have managed the neat trick of maintaining male dominance in marriage despite the fact that wives, often better equipped for the modern world than their yeshivabutcher husbands, not only do all the housework and childcare but earn all the money, too  Fierce debate over whether September 11 and the militant Islam behind it can be          best understood as a politically motivated response to U.S. foreign policy – its support for Israel and sanctions on Iraq, as well as the larger fact of American world dominance – or, as Ellen Willis argues in her essay, primarily as a religiously motivated attack on “the West”, meaning secularism, consumerism, cultural pluralism, and the emancipation of women. Janet Afary & Fatima Mernissi: Islamic fundamentalism is popular among men who find themselves competing with women for jobs in a declining economy, and with women who find that modern ways have freed them for boring and pointless low-paid employment, while releasing their husbands from traditional obligations to the family. Christian fundamentalist - realized that lots of anxious workers and small business people, as well as a good many ex-alcoholics and ex-addicts and other casualties of contemporary life, who are attracted to the practical support system, emotional fellowship, and structured ideology provided by their churches. Fundamentalism is not without its rewards for certain women. All fundamentalisms express great concern and respect for family and childraising, the traditional sphere of women, and for traditional culture, of which women are typically the custodians. Like every large social movement, fundamentalism needs female cadres to carry out its mission – thus some women are able to use their involvement in fundamentalist activities to get more personal freedom and respect in return for policing the behaviour of other women. When progressive writers try to understand fundamentalism, the intense satisfactions of intolerance, violence, groupthink and the conviction that God is on your side smiting your enemies tend to drop out of the picture. When it comes to Afghanistan, feminism has been little more than a flag of convenience under which the War Party is currently sailing. Afghan women, a potential source of support for democracy, modernization, and peace, have gotten a lot less out of the recently concluded Loya Jirga than the Northern Alliance and other warlords who brought nothing but ruin and backwardness on their country and who are still raping and pillaging with impunity in many parts of it. The opposite of fundamentalism is feminism. Fundamentalism:  Western media often give impression – a purely Islamic phenomenon.  Fundamentalist Judaism/Christianity/Hinduism/Buddhism/Sikhism/Confucianism  Not a monolithic movement – each form of fundamentalism, even within same     tradition, develops independently and has its own symbols and enthusiasms, but its different manifestations all bear a family resemblance. Only takes shape when modernization process if quite far advanced. Islam – last to develop fundamentalist strain, when modern culture began to take root in Muslim world in late 1960s & 1970s Quite well established among Christians & Jews – who had a longer exposure to modern experience. Fundamentalist movements in all faith share certain characteristics – reveal deep disappointment and disenchantment with modern experiment, which has not fulfilled all that it promised – express real fear.  Convinced that secular establishment is determined to wipe religion out.  Secularism has often been imposed very aggressively in Muslim world  Look back to a “golden age” before irruption of modernity of inspiration, but are not atavistically returning to Middle Ages.  All are innovative and often radical in their reinterpretation of religion.  An essential part of the modern scene  Wherever modernity takes root – likely to rise up alongside it in conscious reaction.  Often express discontent with modern development by overstressing those elements in their tradition that militate against it.  All highly critical of democracy and secularism  Tend to emphasize conventional, agrarian gender roles, putting women back into              veils and into the home because emancipation of women has been one of the hallmarks of modern culture Seen as shadow side of modernity – can also highlight some of darker sides of modern experiment Exists in symbiotic relationship with a coercive secularism Always feel assaulted by liberal/modernizing establishment, and their views and behavior become more extreme as a result. Reveals a fissure in society, which is polarized between those who enjoy secular culture and those who regard it with dread. Begins as an internal dispute, with liberalizers or secularists within one’s own culture or nation. Begin by withdrawing from mainstream culture to create an enclave of pure faith e.g. within ultra-Orthodox Jewish communities in Jerusalem/New York Sometimes conduct an offensive which can take many forms, designed to bring mainstream back to the right path and resacralize the world. Some resort to terrorism Vast majority do not commit acts of violence but simply try to revive their faith in a more conventional, lawful way Successful – pushed religion from sidelines and back to center stage – plays major part in international affairs once again, a development that would have seemed inconceivable in the mid-twentieth century when secularism seemed in the ascendant Not simply a way of “using” religion for a political end Rebellions against secularist exclusion of divine from public life, and frequently desperate attempt to make spiritual values prevail in modern world Desperation and fear tend to distort religious tradition, and accentuate its more aggressive aspects at the expense of those that preach toleration and reconciliation.                      The stress and fear of cultural and religious annihilation had led to the development of a more extreme and potentially violent distortion of the faith. Taliban are seen as quintessential Muslims, but their regime violates crucial Islamic precepts – viewed by some circles of the West Most of Taliban belong to Pashtun tribe – tend to target non-Pashtuns, who fight regime from north of the country – forbidden by Prophet and by Qur’an Taliban’s discrimination against women is completely opposed to practice of Prophet and conduct of first ummah Taliban typically fundamentalist Muslim fundamentalists, in their struggle to survive, make religion a tool of oppression and even of violence People felt that Muslim had failed because they had not been true to their religion While secularism and democracy worked very well in the West, they did not benefit ordinary Muslims but only an elite in the Islamic world Seen as a “postmodern” movement, which rejects some of the tenets and enthusiasms of modernity, such as colonialism Islamic dress – when forced upon people against their will, coercive and likely to create backlash as aggressive techniques of Reza Shah Pahlavi – many Muslim women feel that veiling is a symbolic return to precolonial period, before their society was disrupted and deflected from its true course. Surveys – large proportion of veiled women hold progressive views on such matters as gender For women who come from rural areas to university and are first members of their family to advance beyond basic literacy – assumption of Islamic dress provides continuity and makes their rite of passage to modernity less traumatic than it might otherwise have been Veiling can be seen as a tacit critique of some of less positive aspects of modernity West people often flaunt their tanned, well-honed bodies as a sign of privilege – try to counteract signs of aging and hold on to this life. Shrouded Islamic body declares oriented to transcendence Uniformity of dress abolishes class difference and stresses importance of community over Western individualism Some Sunni and Shi’ite fundamentalists are also using religion to make alien tenor of modern culture familiar, giving it a context of meaning and spirituality that makes it more accessible Secularists and intellectuals were willing to join forces with ulama because they knew that only Khomeini could command grass-roots support of people Religion proved to be so powerful a force that brought down Pahlavi state, which has seemed most stable and powerful in Middle East Islamic revolution may have helped Iranian people to come to modernity on their own terms Khatami’s election signalled strong desire of large segment of population for greater pluralism, a gentler interpretation of Islamic law, more democracy and a more progressive policy for women. Lecture Religion fundamentalism Bachabazi – boy play Extensive Open secret Women for babies, boys for pleasure When the Taliban came to power, they killed whoever caught It costs more to have a wife than a ‘chai boy’ Lecture 15:  Republic of Indonesia  Jakarta (Capital)  Islam (Major religion)  Suharto (Former Indonesian President)  State Ibuism (mother)  Novalia:  Men and women have equal rights  Parents gave her a choice whether she wants to stay in Islamic school or state university       She chooses her work as a researcher  She chooses the man she wants to marry – not whether she can marry or not?  Wearing hijab up to choice – confident, looking beauty  Codrat – men cannot do – daughter, sister, mother – biology, not construct Women: Pioneers of Democratision?  Suara Ibu Peduli (Voice of Concerned Mothers) – formed to protest negative effects of 1997 monetary crisis on women and children  21 May 1998 – peaceful ‘milk demonstration’ at Hotel Indonesia roundabout  1st time since 1966 – women’s group had staged public protest against government Women in NGOs  High level of involvement of women in Indonesian NGOs  Diverse range of non-profit organizations have become involved in grass-roots activism  Organizations with a particular focus on rights of women e.g. Indonesian Women’s Association for Justice Anti-pornography legislation  Leading women activists from NGOs such as these have become important public figures in Indonesia  Part of that outspokenness in the last few years has been in response to the anti-pornography bill (now law) What drove it? – Other possibilities  Islamic Defenders Front (FPI) campaigns for Islamic law and mobilises protestors against perceived violators of Islamic rules  Putu Gede Indriawan Karna: ‘The RUU appears to be an effort to include Islamic law into the Constitution’ The Response by Women  International Women’s Day 2006 marked by widespread protests against bill    Many Indonesian women saw the bill as systemic discrimination by the state against women  Many women believe the law will increase violence against women  Indonesian feminists angry that implicit in the legislation is the notion that women are the prime cause of national moral decay  Women’s organization Srikandi Demokrasi Indonesia: the bill had at its heart the commodification of women as objects that need to be legally contained Pre-emptive strike: Case of Tangerang  Local council implemented laws (under regional autonomy provisions) banning prostitution and the sale and distribution of alcohol  Incredulity by women’s groups that “a community’s morality & crime rate hinge so crucially on the appearance & decorum of women, that they must be placed under a curfew & their attire regulated.” Tangerang by-law  ‘Anyone who by virtue of their suspicious attitude/behaviour creates the impression that he/she/they are prostitutes are forbidden from being in public streets, squares, places of accommodation, hotels, boarding houses, rental accommodation, coffee shops, places of entertainment, performance venues, street corners…’ ISLAM:  Fikh – body of Islamic jurisprudence, comprises interpretations of classical Muslim scholars of the Qur’an, Sunnah and Hadith  Indonesian Islam has been characterized by a highly interpretive approach which stresses analysis of Fikh  Indonesian Islam has also been influenced by Islamic modernism, a movement that arose in early 20th century Egypt, and which rejected authority of texts other than the Qur’an and the Hadiths GENDER:  Fatayat women blame gender inequality on (mis)interpretations of Islamic texts POLITICS:  Wanita – connotations of domesticity because of government-sponsored women’s group Dharma Wanita Bidang Kewanitaan – Women’s Division WEEK 9: The Gender of Brazilian Transgendered Prostitutes by Don Kulick  Men who enjoy being anally penetrated by other males are the ones being classified and named, not the males who penetrate them (often called “men”) - They are an object of special cultural elaboration - The penetrators doesn’t make them homosexual - The penetrated are considered homosexual - Conception of manhood that involves maleness, masculinity, sexual activity narrowed down to penetration – straight men - They are attracted to travesti (men at young age do what they can to appear more feminine – getting injected by industry grey silicon) - Cultural pressure on feminine and beauty - Travesti are not interested in being transgender (sex change operation) - Boyfriends must not show any interests in the travesti’s penises, if not they will not be considered men anymore but travestis