Saba Mahmood: Agency, Gender and Embodiment

In Saba Mahmoods' article she is informing us that Agency, Gender and Embodiment is very important to understand when it comes to Mosque participants. In the beginning of her article, she gives us three questions she wants us to keep in mind while reading her piece. In order to understand the Orthodox Islamic traditions, we have to really keep in mind agency, gender and embodiment. I think it is very important to have a strong ethical background because then it is easier for someone to understand certain ideas and rules in society. She states that Muslim women carry a burden of judgement because of all the assumptions that the Western imagination creates. One interesting thing I found in this article was when Saba Mahmood spoke about veiling. She said that women would get the wrath of Allah if they did not wear their Burkas and she also said that fathers would call their daughters whores if they didn't abide by the veiling rules. Women in Islamic cultures are being stripped of their agency, gender and embodiment from the men in their lives and their own government. I think Saba Mahmood is teaching us to try and understand someones culture and religion before putting forth judgement. I think it is important too look at these issues from an outsiders perspective and incorporate learning about agency, gender and embodiment.

Posting this on behalf of Stacie who is having a hard time with the blog page

Decolonizing Culture

    In the article "Decolonizing Culture - Beyond Orientalist and Anti Orientalist Feminism's" by Nadine Naber she examined the stereotypes of what Arab women thought of American women. Nadine gave insight on her way of growing up in america within Muslim culture. She explained that although she lived in a small community of consisting of Muslims and Christians the feelings there were mutual. She wrote: "We seemed to share a tacit knowledge that al Amerikca was the trash culture, degenerate, morally bankrupt, and sexually depraved. In contrast, all Arab (Arabs) were morally respectable - we valued marriage, family, and close relationships."

    Also in contrast of the reading "Reflections of a Genderqueer Palestinian American Lesbian Mother", Huda Jadallah touched upon life in a Muslim community as a lesbian mother with two young boys. In the first reading Nadine described in great detail about being raised with these specific morals whereas Huda described raising two young boys of her own in a American society. It was rather interesting that both readings also reflected the lives of LGBTQ people and what their lively hoods were looked at especially with kids. It's good to have to different view points of something. 

Week 13

The article "Turning the Gendered Politics of the Security State Inside Out?" by Paul Amar analyzes sexual Egypt Egypt politics in the global south as a crucial harassment for testing and reformulating the mix of emancipatory and repressive governance practices that constitute contemporary gender-sensitive ‘human security’ regimes. In Egypt, between 2003 and 2010, internationalist feminist campaigns advocated anti-harassment projects that demonized working-class youth masculinities as well as ‘disreputable’ public femininities in an attempt to intensify the policing of the city and discipline public sociability.  He explained that women activist were subjected to violence due to their demands of protecting human rights. A reason why women wanted protection was due to cultural effects impacted the Egyptian Egyptian Egyptian. Amar talks about protests that were going on in Egyptian Because of the uprising of many protests and movements during this time the security state decided to intervene by sending out their own men “to attempt to delegitimize, intimidate and blur both the image and message of these movements by infiltration and surrounding them with plain-clothes thugs, deputized by police and paramilitary security forces” (Amar 308). 

Paul introduces three significant innovations: 1. he upsets the assumption that forms of gender politics always flow from the international to the local (or from the North to the South); 2; he offers a “socio-historical contextualization of the women’s movement in Egypt” that does not reduce it to a distinction between a public men’s realm and a private women’s domain; 3; he refuses to dump women’s (and men’s) efforts to transform gender politics in Egypt into either a liberal, progressive box or an illiberal, backward box. It is also shown that the media tries to cover up what is actually going on. And they did not expect women to even involve themselves in these protests. Growing up as a muslim women its really hard because there is so much expectations you must have and follow. You must be pious and if you are not the men in the society will put you down. And that is something that is not fair to women and is really sad.

Week 13 Securitization

In Paul Amar's reading, he discussed during his career as a journalist, sexual harassment imposed on women activists and violence against women. He explained that women activist were subjected to violence due to their demands of protecting human rights. One reason women wanted protection was due how cultural effects impacted Egyptian society. because of Egypt's beliefs and ways of life, such as genocide, honor crimes, etc. and how they been repeated with each generation, the West viewed human rights as " divorced from global struggles for economic and social rights, and unconscious of the racial, colonial, religious and cultural prejudices embedded within the Western legalities and identities". That means that human rights is seen as a separate sphere which is unable to modernize.

 He also mentioned how the securitization is used to dehumanize Egyptian citizens. Foe example, the media view women as objects of sex relating to prostitution and the police view abusive men as inhuman as hyper visible beings who are invisible in others eyes. Women were viewed not as complex or legitimate subjects; based on his article, working class women were seen as third world (ignorant, uneducated, etc.). The media even covers up what was really going on and rewrite protesters as the terrorists using a tactic called the baltagi-effect. An example was the 2006 protests. Amar mentioned that the practice was used to " terrorize the protesters, but also generated new images for domestic and international media and criminological narratives for international security agencies and local law enforcement".     

Week 13: Turning the Gendered Politics of the Security State Inside Out?

         Paul Amar in his piece Turning the Gendered Politics of the Security State Inside Out scrutinizes the sexual harassment happened in Egypt protests from 2003 until the recent 2011 Egyptian Revolution. Originally the harassments are victimized working-class and impious women (often prostitutes) and demonized working-class young male while in fact there were a role of the authority (police) in assuring security state. As an effort to create change to the situation, a women movement called El Nadeem performed intervention by putting middle-class honorable women which has been hypervisiblized as pious and respectable to the street and do protests.   

    Focusing on the concepts of parahuman subject, hypervisibility and politics of respectability, Amar threaded out how El Nadeem successfully shifted the “campaigns against torture in custody and sexual harassment in the street into a political movement against the repressive policing practices of the security state” (Amar, 313), by turning the gendered politics of the security inside out, and gained their victory through the case of Nuha Rushdi.

          This piece fascinated me in a way of the horrifying threats women has endured in the activism space such as protesting in the street. In another way, I am also amazed by the fact that women movements such as El Nadeem can be so persistent in critiquing the practice of security state instead of focusing on other agendas like other women organizations which may have been influenced by the UN doctrines. It makes me think about how many NGOs which are focused on women and gender issues can really be free and true to their own mission instead of ending up serving interests of bigger parties? How pure is the motives of the NGOs we have now in the society for the purpose of social justice and gender equality?

Week 13 - Turning the Gendered Politics of the Security State Inside Out?

             In Paul Amar’s reading, “Turning the Gendered Politics of the Security State Inside Out?” Amar talks about the protests in Egypt during the 1990’s to the 2000’s. Because of the uprising of many protests and movements during this time the security state decided to intervene by sending out their own men “to attempt to delegitimize, intimidate and blur both the image and message of these movements by infiltration and surrounding them with plain-clothes thugs, deputized by police and paramilitary security forces” (p.308, Amar). These men would mix in with the protesters and disrupt their protesting by shouting extremist slogans, damaging properties and harassing other protestors in order to look like ‘terrorists’. This tactic was used to create scenes to terrorize the media in order to sway viewers from participating in these events and also to portray Middle Eastern countries as ‘terrorizing’ in an international level. Because of this many negative stereotyping surrounded Middle Eastern countries.

            What they did not expect was for women to involve themselves in these protests. The image of women protesting on T.V. changes the message it’s portraying because these women were suppose to be pious meaning they should be reserved in situations like these. But now what does it mean to see “reserved” women protesting on T.V.? It sends out a message that women too are also believe in fighting for what’s right and encourages other people to join instead of deeming them as ‘terrorists’. However the women who protest were sexually harassed and arrested by the same men who where undercover. It was women who suffered more with the consequences because they were able to represent so much more than men during protests, they represented the image of change.

            

Week 13

In the reading “Turning the Gendered Politics of the Security State Inside out” by Paul Amar we are introduced to the gendered sexual harassment regimes in Egypt and the complacency of some Egyptian officers. He discusses the mass protest that occurred January 25- February 11 as well to highlight the work and commitment women activist have in battling against sexual assault. Amar starts the article by giving us an example on how western media pins these sexual harassment problems within the “culture” and not the institution. A woman reporter from the U.S who was a victim of sexual harassment was saved by young Egyptian political activist, yet Fox news in particular left this important point out. Instead, they focused on emphasizing Egypt was not yet ready for modernity or a real democracy. This western viewed rhetoric is continuous. Another important issue is hypersensibility. Amar explains hypersensibility with women and how that is dangerous for their safety, “ Paradoxically, when subjects are hypervisibilized, they remain invisible as social beings: they are not recognizable as complex, legitimate, participatory subjects or citizens” (305).  This means that women compared to the institutional system are seen as objects therefore there safety isn’t a priority. Women started unifying and expressing their demands for safety and to expose the corrupt system. The security state responded by trying to dismantle the work of these women by portraying these women were terrorist. They had people dress in plain colored clothing and yell and act extremely against these women in order to blur and take the attention off of the seriousness of the protest. This was another example of the gendered politics controlled not by a culture but by the institution of the security state. Overall this article introduced the problematic way women were hypersexualized and targeted.  If a woman protested she would immediately be sexualized and juridically be categorized as a prostitute, meaning the system was trying to prevent these women from organizing and having their voices heard.

Week 13

In our reading, "Turning the Gendered Politics of the Security State Inside Out" by Paul Amar he talks about women who have been sexually assaulted by the police and how that it is something that they should not even take anymore. Women are standing up trying to start anti-harassment projects, by they have taken legal gender doctrines and have used them to start campaigns that fight for equality for all. 

These women are taught to stand up to their attackers and take them to court if possible, like Nuha Rushdi who was the first women to get a sexual assault case in court. She and her lawyers got the Sheriff who pulled her over, three years in prison, as well as a fine. This is a large step forward for the movement as laws are still attempted to be more strict. There are new framing being pushed by Rushdi and El-Nadeem Center that critiques "masculinist prerogative" and promotes anti-harassment. 

For this change to happen more attention needs to be drawn to it. At the end of the article the UN suggest a march on Women's Day and I think that would help draw international attention and bring more support and attention from all over the world especially here in the United States. The more attention drawn, I think we will then see more progress towards equality. 

Week 13: Turning the Gendered Politics of the Security State Inside Out

In the article Turning the Gendered Politics of the Security State Inside Out, Paul Amar shines light on the efforts by women subjected to assault by police officers to sue and protest against them for sexual harassment.  Throughout his piece he takes a gentle approach to investigate the complications of feminist activities in Egypt as well as their complex interlocking with many diverse Egyptian social institutions. There is a common framework that women are trying to seize their human rights against the “illiberal” Middle-Eastern state (and man) and Amar makes sure not to feed into such a foundation.

One quote in the opening of Amar’s article is said by Asmaa Mahfouz, who is a young woman leader who leads a protest in Tahrir Square. She steers away from the “woman-victim” role to decry human rights and plead police protection. Instead she describes herself as an “Egyptian on fire” who has a burning rage for a revolution to bring peace among woman. Asmaa Mahfouz and many other Egyptian individuals are tired of being harassed (especially sexually) by those in higher state positions, and they are fed up with their revolutionary passion being labeled as hysterical and crazy. The baltagi-effect was prevalent during many of the protests, and it is characterized by “plain-clothed thugs” and deputized police flooding the area of protests and wreaking havoc to create inner conflict within the protest. Not only did this terrorize protestors, but it also generated new negative images for domestic and international media. This fed into the already common belief that protestors were “crazed mobs of brutal men, vaguely ‘Islamist’ and fiercely irrational” (Amar 308).

Amar’s article attempts to undermine the classic framework by which Western scholars have viewed gender in the Middle East, similar to Abu-Lughod and Saba Mahmood’s articles. I think if the West is so committed to helping those in Muslim countries then we first need to take a deeper look into what real problems are taking place within the Muslim community instead making assumptions of the problems based on what we hear/see in media.