Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
WOMEN IN IRAN
When Samira Makhmalbaf's first film
The Apple
(1998) made waves in the West, people
were confused. How could Iran - the land of female oppression and Sharia law - produce
an 18-year-old female film-maker of such vision? Samira Makhmalbaf's answer was
simple: 'Iran is a country where these two contrasts coexist'.
Nowhere are the contradictions in Iranian society more apparent than in the position of
women.
Women Through the Ages
Historically, women have lived in a relatively
progressive society and enjoyed more equality
and freedom than their neighbours. In Iran wo-
men are able to sit in parliament, to drive, to
vote, to buy property and to work. There is a
long precedence for this. Archaeological evid-
ence suggests that in pre-Islamic Iran women
were able to work, own, sell and lease property
and that they paid taxes. Women managed work
sites and held high-level military positions. But it wasn't until the Prophet Mohammed that
women's rights were specifically addressed. Islam recognises men and women as having
different (rather than unequal) rights and responsibilities. Men are expected to provide fin-
ancially, therefore women are not seen as needing legal rights as men are there to protect
and maintain them.
In reality, for Iranian women, the arrival of Islam after the Arab conquest saw a decline
in their position at every level. Most of their rights evaporated, the Islamic dress code was
imposed, polygamy was practised and family laws were exclusively to the advantage of the
male.
Reza Shah started legislating for women in 1931 with a bill that gave women the right to
seek divorce. In subsequent years the marriage age was raised to 15 for girls, girls gained
access to an education equal to that of boys, women were encouraged to work outside the
home and legislation was passed to abolish the veil, a move that polarised opinion among
women. In 1962 Mohammad Reza Shah gave women the vote and in 1968 the most pro-
gressive family law in the Middle East was ratified. Divorce laws became stringent and
polygamy was discouraged. The marriage age was raised to 18.
Many Iranian women were active in the revolution that overthrew the shah, but it's safe
to say that few foresaw how the Islamic Republic, and its adoption of a version of Sharia
The Cypress Tree,
by Kamin Mohammadi, who
contributed to earlier editions of this guide, is the
story of Mohammadi's childhood in Iran, exile to
London following the revolution and return to dis-
cover her family and the strong women among
them.
