Sociology Essay on 'Persepolis'

In the book, Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi she finds herself growing up amid the Islamic Revolution. She talks about her childhood and how at a very young age she had to grow up very quickly. Marjane had witnessed a lot of disaster and tragedy at a young age. The revolution sparked a lot of controversy between the government and the citizens of Iran. Some of the laws that were put into place only affected the women. Marjane and her parents as long as the other citizens find it challenging to follow the new laws that are set into place during the revolution.

The Islamic Republic wanted to declare independence from the Shah. In the year 1979, the Islamic Revolution took place in Iran. Marjane who is the main character in this book went to a French school for boys and girls which was non-religious. When the Islamic Revolution started to take over, this school was closed down so girls and boys were separated into different schools. Rules started to become even stricter women had to wear veils to cover their hair because of how it could elicit men. The women and girls did not know what the veil was representing and did not get why they had to wear it. We are introduced to Marjane's two parents, Mr. and Mrs. Satrapi because Marjane wanted to become a prophet and the school questioned her. Later in the story both of her parents took part in the rebellion against the army. It is revealed to us that Marjane’s father was a communist which always made her worry as a child that he was going to go to prison. It is brought to the reader's attention in the book that there were differences between social classes. You were not allowed to marry outside of your social class. After the Revolution concluded two men were released from prison, Siamak and Mohsen. They were both arrested because they were communists. Both of these men have spoken about the torture they have experienced and the death that they have witnessed. Throughout this book, Marjane had a strong faith and believed in God. She continues to have conversations with God like he is her friend. Marjane gets to a point where she rejects God because Mohsen was assassinated and Siamak leaves the country to escape punishment from the government while Uncle Anoosh is arrested and sent back to jail. Uncle Anoosh could only choose one person to see him for the last time before he was executed and he chose to see Marjane. Later in the book, Marjane’s mom tells her that when she was asked what she does during the day, she had to respond that she prays. Iran was in the midst of another war with Iraq. There was a law that was put into place about the consumption of alcohol. Marjane and her family were stopped and asked if her dad had been drinking. When Marjane and her mom got home they dumped out all of the alcohol that they had inside their house. Only to find out that all Marjane’s dad had to do was bribe the officers and he was let go. The end of book one closes with Marjane being sent to Vienna, Austria because of the freedom it offers and to further her education.

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The book relates to laws in society because it talks about how the government orders the police to take control and enforce the laws that are already put into place. The laws that are put into place create a big inequality gap between men and women in Iran. There was a law put into place that everyone had to pray multiple times a day or there would be a punishment. People were not allowed to drink or have parties but that did not stop people from doing it behind closed doors. The law had a crack in it when Marjane’s dad bribed the patrol that stopped them and asked them if he was drinking alcohol. The rules of society are distinctly shown in this book where the clothing for women changed from being able to wear miniskirts to having to wear veils in school and covering their whole body except for their face. The veil was meant to cover their hair. To justify the dress attire for women they said it is for their protection. If a woman was caught not wearing the proper attire for Islamic women then she would have vulgar comments made towards her or her character would be questioned. The only dress attire men had to follow was to wear long-sleeved shirts to cover the hair on their arms. The government wanted women to be more conservative and follow gender roles. The law put into place was to keep societal norms in place. Men are the protectors and have the power while women are underneath them. This part of the book relates to our society today where women are supposed to dress in a certain attire and there can be ridicule towards them if they do not. Whereas if a man dresses out of his dress attire then there will be little ridicule towards them.

While reading this book there are many legal and social interactions. The first one I want to discuss is how the government made it a requirement for women to wear veils to cover their hair. Like I stated before the reason for women not wanting to wear the veils was because a lot of them did not understand why they had to wear the veil in the first place. There was an incident where Marjane's mom did not wear the veil and there were terrible comments made to her. She was told to wear the veil if she did not want those comments to be said to her. It did not matter what the weather was outside or how the women personally felt. The government mentioned that women had to wear veils to protect themselves from men because men could not control themselves. This places the legal into social interaction because the government is making it a law for women to wear veils. The law is mandatory and women have to abide by it. These laws that were put into place were only affecting the women.

The second legal into social interaction I want to mention is when the war was beginning it brought refugees from the South. These refugees came from Southern Iran and fled up north to Tehran. When this happened the boys were enlisted in the army. The government to show that these boys had died for their nation would give them a plastic key that was painted gold as a symbol of paradise. Marjane and her family were against this and believed that it was a terrible lie to be told. The worst part of it was this was only being told to the poor people. This shows legal social interaction because the government was trying to justify what they were doing by enlisting their refugees into the wrong army. There was no way for these young boys to get out of being enlisted into the war no matter how many people were against the law like Marjane and her family.

The last event that I want to bring to your attention that covers the legal to-social interaction is when I mentioned above about Marjane and her family being stopped by the authorities while driving home. They asked her father if he had been drinking that night and said they wanted to see what he had at his house. When arriving at their house Marjane and her mom ran upstairs to dump all of the alcohol that they had. After all the alcohol was dumped out Marjane’s dad walked in and said that all he had to do was bribe the authorities and they left. This represents legal to social interaction because it was against the law to drink alcohol but it was still done in private to rebel. It only took a little bribe for the authorities to leave and not even check inside their house for the alcohol.

In closing, at a young age, Marjane had to experience a lot of change and misfortune in his life. Iran was in a war that had caused a lot of disaster to its citizens. People were being put into jail and executed because they believed in a different kind of government. This caused Marjane to not believe in her faith in God and turn away from him because of everything bad that was happening to her family and the people around her. She had to follow laws because of the Islamic Revolution that was taken over. Not all the laws that were put into place Marjane and her family agree with but they still had to abide by them to avoid punishment.