Thursday, November 19, 2009

Are Women Naturally Wives?!

Are Women Naturally Wives?!
Ali Abdi

“Women are naturally children educators.”
Mahmood Ahmadinejad, Iranian President


In this essay I will examine the intertwining relation of the three concepts of woman, wife and human nature in the three non-contemporary texts of Emile (1762) by Rousseau, A Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1792) by Mary Wollstonecraft, and The Subjection of Women (1861) by John Stuart Mill. In other words, I will explain how Rousseau, Wollstonecraft, and Mill’s analysis of human nature provided them a framework on which they made their assumptions about the appropriate position of a woman in the society. I will argue that despite the apparent differences in their arguments they all eventually interwove the two concepts of woman and wife, as if all today women are future wives. Such prescription even exists in the policy makers’ words of the 21st century.

Mary Wollstonecraft, the English white middle-class writer of the 18th century, wrote her essay in 1792, just three years after the French Revolution. At that time, the exalting values of the Age of Enlightenment were spreading across Europe. That was the time of debates, contradictions and ambiguities Thinkers and philosophers of the time, including Jean Jacques Rousseau, were theorizing about different controversial concepts concerning human beings such as freedom, justice, reason, individuality and, more specifically, human nature.

Rousseau elaborated in his work Emile that nature of man and woman is not, and should not be constituted the same, “either in character or in temperament”. He strongly suggested that in order to stay in-line with nature and preserve the social order, men and women should not be educated in the same manner and women must preserve “emotionality” – a word in contrast to reasoning within the given context of the late 18th century – and they must “please and be useful to us (which he means men)” because “these are the duties of women at all times”. Marriage contract for Rousseau was a basis on which an ordered civil society could be constructed. Rousseau believed that if a woman wants to make a positive contribution to maintaining the social order, she must follow the indications of her “nature” and learn early in life how to play the role of an appropriate wife in her future family (Rousseau 1762). Through Rousseau’s eyes, women were naturally wives.

Wollstonecraft dedicated the fifth chapter of her essay, A Vindication of the Rights of Woman, to criticizing Rousseau’s assumptions of the nature of men and women, in particular Rousseau’s claim about the natural incapability of women in reasoning. She regarded reasoning as “the simple power of improvement … of discerning the truth” and more notably as an “emanation of divinity” which “connects the creature with the Creator” and “distinguishes human beings from animals” (Wollstonecraft 1793: 111, 134, 154). Having said that, she entertained that since men and women are both “creatures” of God and since God doesn’t discriminate between its creatures, so “nature of men and women are of the same kind” and “the nature of reason must be the same in all” (Wollstonecraft 1793: 111).

Unlike Rousseau, who prescribed two different modes of education for women and men because of their presumed different nature, Wollstonecraft argued for an identical education and blamed men for preventing women from having a proper education, which had resulted in the ostensible natural defect of the latter. She questioned the idea advocated by Rousseau that the “emotional” habits of girls are their nature, but rather claimed that “their (girls’) minds are corrupted” and “weakened” because of the improper education they receive (Wollstonecraft 1793: 180). Since men and women have the same intellectual abilities, Wollstonecraft strongly argued that women should be educated “rationally” in order to give them the opportunity to contribute to society.

But what I see problematic in Wollstonecraft’s argument is that for her the ultimate goal of identical education was to make “virtuous” and, at the same time, “reasonable” women (wives) who can be better “companions” to their husbands, which looks contradictory. How can an identical education lead women just to this boundary of being a virtuous wife and lead men to be the active subjects of the public life? Wollstonecraft was actually trying to make non-object wives. She argued then that should men want happiness and more “faithful wives”, it would be an intelligible decision of them to “snap the chains” of women (wives) in order to provide them the same education (Wollstonecraft 1793: VI, 201, 342).

This slippage in meaning/word usage between women and wives is found many times through the pages of her essay. For instance, where she wrote about the effects of improper education on girls’ behavior, she stated that “… females [and young girls] … are made women of when they are children”, and by women she meant wives, who lack “reasoning”, and whose minds are “weakened” because of their inappropriate education (Wollstonecraft 1793: 262, 319).

I believe that such slippage occurs for two basic reasons. First, at the time in which Wollstonecraft was writing, the mainstream and dominant trend of thought was to transform the disordered nature into an ordered one. The aim was to hold nature as the foundation of a robust civil society. In the eyes of late 18th century thinkers, conjugal rights within the marriage contract were crucial to preserve the stability of social order which claimed to survive on the basis of an ordered nature. Wollstonecraft didn’t distance herself from this dominant discourse. Even for her, women’s main role was identified to be educating the future free men of the realm of public, that is to say republic, within family structure.

Second, the way she looked at the concept of virtue and its relation to human nature actually shaped her argument. Wollstonecraft argued that all human beings are equal in nature and they all have the same ability of reasoning, which distinguishes them from animals. She then praised virtues as the “offspring of reason” which means everybody, either man or woman, must stay virtuous in the society. As I found through the pages of her book, she once respected marriage as the “foundation of almost any social virtue” (Wollstonecraft 1793: 155,181). So for her, as I clarified, reasoning women of today are naturally virtuous and better wives of future.

Wollstonecraft, if she can talk from her grave now, may not agree with my interpretation. She criticized Rousseau unequivocally and tried to show that what looks like s nature is just a convention. She didn’t follow exactly the same footsteps of Rousseau, but as I see she actually finished in quite a similar destination. It seems as if just two new terms of reasoning and virtuous were added to Rousseau’s claim of the natural status of women as wives in society.

Although Wollstonecraft’s argument doesn’t seem revolutionary for a twenty-first- century reader, it affected some of the thinkers after her time, including John Stewart Mill, an influential liberal anti-slavery thinker of the 19th century. Mill, under the influence of his companion Harriet Taylor, wrote one of the earliest essays on women’s liberation, The Subjection of Women in 1869, more than seventy years after Wollstonecraft’s essay.

Like Wollstonecraft, Mill believed that reason distinguishes human beings from animals. Hence, every person, man or woman, naturally has the capacity of reasoning. He also joined Wollstonecraft in holding inappropriate education and “forced repression” responsible for the “apparent” natural inferior status of women in society, by which women were brought up in the belief that their ideal character is “submission” and “yielding to the control of others” (Mill 1869: 232).

Yet, Mill, unlike Wollstonecraft, asserted that the “nature” of two sexes is not known to anyone because “they (two sexes) have only been seen in their present relation to one another” so anything which is now called the nature of women is an “artificial” thing (Mill 1869: 236). Rejecting the perceptions associated with nature of women, Mill believed in the importance of education in building women’s characters. Nevertheless the goal of education was quite different for him. In the eyes of Mill, since the “natural” vocation of a “reasoning woman” was not that of “virtuous wives”, the aim of education should not be based upon such a false claim either (Mill 1869: 244).

But what mainly distinguishes Mill’s work from that of Wollstonecraft, and what distinguishes Mill from many of the thinkers of his time, is his passionate argument for the principle which he believed had separated modern life from those of times long past: human beings were no longer “born” to their “place” in life and each individual is “free” to “use” her/his abilities to “achieve” what appears to her/him “the most desirable”; Mill argues that if somebody is born “black” or “white”, it doesn’t mean that she/he is “slave” or “master” anymore. Yet, as Mill claimed, there was an “isolated fact”, a “solitary breach”, a “discrepancy”, which was an “exception” to this principle: “women” were still born to their apparently natural inferior places and were prevented from following their abilities and desires (Mill 1869: 233, 243).

I didn’t see any indication for the indispensability of freedom for women to follow their tendencies in Wollstonecraft’s text. Although she believed that women must be “autonomous”, she presumed that “the ideal woman is less interested in fulfilling herself”. But Mill undermined such claim and instead suggested that the “fruits of a thousand years of experience” clearly showed that “individuals are better judges of their own abilities” and, since different men and women have different tendencies, they must have the freedom to “give … their nature free play” (Mill 1869: 234, 235).

Despite the fact that Mill Insisted on the vitality of “independency” and “having freedom to assure self-fulfillment” for women, he asserted that women still would be more willing to marry to become wives. Also he predicted that if marriage contract was an “equal” one, and if “separation on just terms” was available for couple, then women would stay at home after their marriage, rather than working “outdoors”. He didn’t mention the “nature of women” as the reason of such choices, but rather indicated that this is what would happen for any woman “in reality” (Mill 1869: 245).

Doubtlessly, that was beyond Wollstonecraft’s argument. Mill tried to put nature off the board, that is to say he didn’t argue for the natural interchangeability of the two concepts of woman and wife. But he actually introduced two other problematic concepts of consent and choice. He believed that women still would “choose” to become wives and they “attentively agree” to perform the ordinary functions of a mistress of a family to sacrifice their other interests until their families were grown (Mill 1869: 260). For him, today reasoning women are not naturally but are voluntarily wives of the future.

Yet, Mill didn’t question why women would choose to become wives, why they would be willing to stay at home, and why they voluntarily prefer to maintain the interests of social body at the cost of their individual failure. He didn’t question the political, cultural and social forces which affect women’s choices. It’s clear to me that Mill took the unequal status of men and women for granted. As long as the economical and social conditions of women and men are not equal, talking about voluntarily choices of women to be wives is meaningless.

It’s now about 150 years after Mill wrote his essay. One may expect that the recognition of voluntary tendencies of women to become wives is not acceptable anymore. But it seems to me that even now, in the beginning years of the 21st century, in some parts of the world, if not everywhere, politicians are still setting policies, members of the parliaments are giving speeches, people are making assumptions, social institutions are indoctrinating values, and families are educating their children, in a way implying that women are not even voluntarily but rather naturally wives. Not Mill, and even not Wollstonecraft, but this is Jean Jacques Rousseau, the founder of the social sexual contract, who is becoming alive again.

References:
Wollstonecraft, M. (1791) A Vindication of the Rights of Woman. Boston: Printed by P. Edes.
Rousseau, J. J. (1783) Emilius and Sophi. London: Printed by H. Baldwin.
Mill, J. S. (1869) The Subjection of Women. London: Faust’s Statue

Monday, November 9, 2009

برای آن هایی که در صدد تحصیل در رشته ی مطالعات زنان و جنسیت در مقطع کارشناسی ارشد هستند


زمانی که ایران بودم تعدادی از دوستانم ابراز تمایل می کردند که می خواهند برای رشته ی مطالعات زنان و جنسیت درخواست پذیرش بدهند. از من می خواستند که اطلاعاتم را در اختیارشان بگذارم. فکر می کنم در این دو ماهی که از خروجم از ایران می گذرد در منتشر کردن این اطلاعات سستی کرده باشم. البته این اطلاعات را همه ی کسانی که برای پذیرش اقدام کرده اند دارند. با این حال شاید مطلب درباره ی رشته ی مطالعات جنسیت کمتر نوشته شده باشد. این دوماه، سنگینی درسها فرصت کافی در اختیارم قرار نداد تا در این مورد بنویسم. امیدوارم مطالبی که در پی می آید به کارِ دانشجویانی که علاقه مند به ادامه ی تحصیل در این رشته هستند بیاید.

می خواستم این دو نکته را در انتهای متن بیاورم اما به نظرم آمد این دوتا از باقی مطالب مهم تر است و باید ابتدا خوانده شود:

1- من بسیار بسیار بسیار (و باز هم بسیار) خوشحالم که دارم این جا در دانشگاه سی ای یوی بوداپست مطالعات جنسیت می خوانم. فکر می کنم یکی از بهترین انتخاب هایی بوده که تا حالا کرده ام. چیزهایی که می خوانم همان هایی است که پیش از این فکرش را کرده بودم. درس ها جذاب و دوست داشتنی اند. آدم ها هم همین طور. درس های این ترم من این ها هستند:

Foundation in Gender Studies I

Anthropological Sexualities: Sex, Culture, Power

The Politics of Reproduction

Gender and International Development; Theory, Practice, and Responses

Academic Writing

ادبیات دانشگاه های ما در ایران در رشته ی مطالعات جنسیت فقیر یا بسیار فقیر است. یک دلیلش بر می گردد به نوپا بودن این رشته در ایران و دوم سانسور گسترده ای که حکومت اعمال می کند. به همین خاطر درس خواندن در این رشته در خارج از کشور شوق مضاعفی دارد. این جا چیزهایی می خوانی و آدم هایی می بینی که در ایران امکان خواندن و برخورد با آن ها را نداشته ای.


2- اما عشق به این رشته کافی نیست. من عاشق بودم و هستم اما هنوز کمیتم خیلی جاها لنگ می زند. دانش بالا در زبان انگلیسی از اهم واجبات است. رشته های علوم انسانی در همه جای دنیا یعنی خواندن، نوشتن و صحبت کردن. من تا وقتی که در ایران بودم تصور می کردم که تسلط کافی روی زبان دارم اما این جا، با وجود این که زبان مادریِ اکثر دانشجوها انگلیسی نیست، با مشکل مواجهم. قرار است شما در محیطی قرار بگیرید که به طور مدام، پانزده ساعت در یک روز، با زبان انگلیسی سر و کار داشته باشید. مغز فرصتی برای استراحت ندارد. رشته های مهندسی این مشکل را ندارند. آن ها واژه های ثابتی دارند که در متن های علمی شان تکرار می شود. مهندس ها برای نوشتن مقاله نیز مشکل چندانی ندارند. آن ها بسیاری از صفحات را با فرمول های ریاضی پر می کنند!

اما موفقیت در رشته های علوم انسانی در گرو درست صحبت کردن، درست نوشتن و درست خواندن است. اگر مصمم هستید از همین حالا شروع به خواندن متن های انگلیسی کنید. متأسفانه کتاب های رشته ی مطالعات جنسیت به زبان انگلیسی در ایران به ندرت یافت می شود. اما می توانید روی اینترنت دنبال کتاب بگردید یا اگر فامیل خارج از کشور دارید از او بخواهید تا کتاب های مورد علاقه تان را برای شما بفرستد. اخبار فمینیستی را هر روز از این جا دنبال کنید. سعی کنید که هر هفته دست کم یک مقاله از یکی از مجله های معتبر فمینیستی (+ +) بخوانید.

ممکن است دانش شما در علوم انسانی زیاد باشد اما به خاطر ناتوانی در ابراز این دانش به زبان انگلیسی در مقایسه با دیگران کم سوادتر به نظر بیایید. همین عامل شما را سرخورده می کند. این جا، در دانشگاه محل تحصیل من، شما باید هر روز دست کم صد صفحه به زبان انگلیسی بخوانید. هر هفته دست کم چند صفحه به زبان انگلیسی بنویسید و هر چند هفته یک بار یک ارائه ی درسی به زبان انگلیسی داشته باشید؛ و این ها کار آسانی نیست. من آرزو دارم که سال آینده چند نفر از ایران به این جا بیایند. هر کمکی از دستم بربیاید هم برایشان می کنم. تنها می خواهم بدانید که راه دشواری پیش روست. اما اگر مصمم هستید مطمئن باشید که موفق می شوید.

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مطالعات جنسیت در باور اکثر دانشگاهیان یک رشته ی میان رشته ای (interdisciplinary discipline) است. با این که دانشجویان در بسیاری از دانشگاه ها بعد از تمام کردن دوره ی دبیرستان می توانند این رشته را در دوره ی لیسانس (undergraduate) آغاز کنند، اما اکثر دانشجویان از مقطع کارشناسی ارشد (graduate) وارد این رشته می شوند. زمینه ی تحصیلی دانشجویان در مقطع لیسانس، و پیش از آغاز تحصیل در رشته ی مطالعات جنسیت در مقطع کارشناسی ارشد، بسیار گسترده است؛ مثلاً دانشجویان مطالعات جنسیت در دانشگاهی که من در آن تحصیل می کنم از رشته هایی نظیر روان شناسی، ادبیات انگلیسی، علوم سیاسی، مطالعات آمریکا، روابط بین الملل، فلسفه، اقتصاد، ادبیات آلمانی، حقوق، مطالعات خاورمیانه و جامعه شناسی وارد این رشته شده اند. [البته به جز من، که مهندسی مکانیک خوانده ام، هیچ کس در مقطع لیسانس چیزی جز علوم انسانی نخوانده است.]

دانشگاه های زیادی در دنیا هستند که این رشته را ارائه می دهند. در آمریکا و کانادا به سختی می توانید دانشگاهی را پیدا کنید که رشته ی مطالعات جنسیت، مطالعات زنان یا مطالعات فمینیستی نداشته باشد. در اروپا تعداد دانشگاه هایی که این رشته را ارائه می دهند نسبت به تعداد کل دانشگاه های این قاره، و نسبت به قاره ی آمریکا، کمتر است. بهترین دانشگاه ها در زمینه ی علوم انسانی در رده بندی جهانی همان طور که انتظار می رود در آمریکا و کانادا هستند اما دانشگاه های معتبر در اروپا نیز یافت می شوند. این جا و این جا می توانید لیست مناسبی از کشورها و دانشگاه هایی که مطالعات زنان و جنسیت ارائه می دهند پیدا کنید؛ این جا می توانید نگاهی به رده بندی دانشگاه های دنیا در علوم انسانی بیندازید. البته دانشگاه هایی که رتبه ی بالایی در این رده بندی دارند، لزوماً رشته ی مطالعات جنسیت در مقطع کارشناسی ارشد ندارند و یا لزوماً برنامه ی مناسبی در رشته ی مطالعات جنسیت ارائه نمی دهند.

دانشجویان برای انتخاب دانشگاه آینده ی خود معیارهای زیادی را در نظر می گیرند. از جمله جایگاه آن دانشگاه در رده بندی جهانی، کشور و شهرِ محل دانشگاه، هزینه ی زندگی، هزینه ی تحصیل و احتمال دریافت بورس تحصیلی از طرف دانشگاه، درس های ارائه شده در رشته ی مطالعات جنسیت، حضور یا عدم حضور اعضای فامیل در آن شهر یا کشور، تعداد دانشجویان خارجی آن دانشگاه، سرد یا گرم بودن هوا، دور یا نزدیک بودن به ایران و مواردی دیگر. عواملی که ذکر کردم در انتخاب هر فرد تأثیر مستقیم یا غیرمستقیم دارند. به همین خاطر برای من سخت است که پیشنهاد دهم کدام دانشگاه برای تحصیل مناسب تر است.

با این حال تعدای از دانشگاه های اروپا که به نظرم برنامه های مناسبی دارند این ها هستند: دانشگاه های اوترخت هلند، سواس انگلیس، سی ای یو مجارستان، برگن نروژ و لوند سوئد در اروپا و دانشگاه های یو بی سی، اوتاوا، تورنتو در کانادا. پیشنهادی برای آمریکا ندارم چون اولاً اطلاعاتم ناقص است و دوماً تصور می کنم به خاطر بزرگ بودن قاره و زیاد بودن تعداد دانشگاه ها عواملی جز مناسب بودن برنامه ی آن دانشگاه در انتخاب دانشجوها دخیل باشد. لیست دانشگاه های آمریکایی در دو لینکی که پیش از این گذاشتم آمده است.

در اروپا دو برنامه ی پربار در رشته ی مطالعات زنان وجود دارد که اتحادیه ی اروپا از آن حمایت می کند و به دانشجویانی که عضو اتحادیه ی اروپا نیستند کمک مالی مناسبی ارائه می دهد: جما و ماتیلدا (GEMMA & Matilada). لیسانس من در مهندسی مکانیک باعث شد که نتوانم از این دو برنامه پذیرش بگیرم. هر کدام از این دوره ها دوساله است. اطلاعات مربوط به این دوبرنامه را این جا و این جا ببینید.

به توضیحات من اکتفا نکنید. اگر می خواهید برنامه های مناسب پیدا کنید و با چند و چون پذیرش گرفتن آشنا شوید باید وب سایت های دانشگاه های مختلف را بِجَوید! ببینید هر دانشگاه از شما چه چیزهایی می خواهد، چه ویژگی هایی باید داشته باشید، چه دروسی ارائه می دهد، اساتیدش چه کسانی هستند، مهلت ارسال مدارک برای هر دانشگاه چه زمانی است و آیا بورس تحصیلی ارائه می دهد یا نه.

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مراحل گرفتن پذیرش:

زمان انجام مراحل هفت گانه ی زیر: شهریور، مهر، آبان، آذر و دی ماه سال 88 برای اخذ پذیرش برای مهرماه سال 89

من این مراحل را به ترتیب شماره گذاری کرده ام. البته فرد متقاضی لزوماً نباید مراحل زیر را یکی پس از دیگری طی کند. بعضی از مراحل با یکدیگر هم پوشانی دارند و در بازه ی زمانی یکسان انجام می گیرند.

1- آماده شدن و شرکت در آزمون تافلTOEFL iBT (و آماده شدن و شرکت در آزمون جی آر ای GRE برای متقاضیان آمریکا)

برای آمادگی برای آزمون تافل کتاب های بارونز و لانگمن مناسب است و برای آزمون جی آر ای کتاب های بارونز و کاپلان. البته هر فرد بنا به دانش زبان انگلیسی که در خود سراغ دارد برنامه ی متفاوتی برای آمادگی انتخاب می کند. در ایران دست کم هر دوهفته یک بار آزمون تافل برگزار می شود. سازمان سنجش هر ماه یک بار آزمون تافل را برگزار می کند. مؤسسات دیگری نیز در تهران هستند که این آزمون را برگزار می کنند. از سایت اصلی ای تی اس نیز می توانید ثبت نام کنید.

هیچ آزمونی به اندازه ی تافل آی بی تی در دنیا اعتبار ندارد. هیچ دانشگاهی در دنیا وجود ندارد که آزمون تافل آی بی تی را قبول نداشته باشد. اما دانشگاه های زیادی هستند که آزمون آیلتس یا تافل پی بی تی را قبول ندارند. دورِآیلتس و تافل پی بی تی را لطفاً از همین حالا خط بکشید!

متقاضیان دانشگاه های آمریکایی باید در هر دو آزمون تافل آی بی تی و جی آر ای شرکت کنند.

2- نوشتن SOP یا Statement of Purpose

فرد متقاضی می بایست در یک متن پانصد تا هشتصد کلمه ای از انگیزه ی خود از ادامه ی تحصیل در رشته ی مطالعات جنسیت بنویسد. یادتان باشد که شما در حال رقابت با متقاضیان دیگر هستید. پس این متن باید تا جایی که می تواند روی کمیته ی پذیرش دانشگاه مقصد تأثیرگذار باشد. توضیح بدهید که چه طور پیش زمینه ی درسی، کاری، یا تجربیات شخصی و زندگی روزمره ی شما باعث گرایش شما به رشته ی مطالعات جنسیت شده است. از آینده ای که پس از پایان این رشته برای خود متصورید نیز بنویسید. توضیح بدهید که چرا ادامه ی تحصیل در رشته ی مطالعات جنسیت برای شما اهمیت دارد.

هر کس خواست ایمیل بزند تا SOP خودم را برایش بفرستم.

3- درخواست از اساتید دوره ی کارشناسی برای نوشتن توصیه نامه یا Letters of Recommendation

به طور متوسط هر دانشگاه از شما دو نامه ی پیشنهادی می خواهد. مثلاً اگر شما برای پنج دانشگاه درخواست پذیرش بدهید دست کم ده نامه ی پیشنهادی نیاز دارید. می توانید از سه تن از اساتید خود که از آن ها نمره ی بالایی گرفته اید بخواهید که هر کدام سه نامه ی پیشنهادی برای شما بنویسند (یک نفر چهارتا بنویسد!) تا در مجموع این ده نامه را داشته باشید. متن توصیه نامه هایی که هر استاد برای دانشگاه های مختلف می نویسد می تواند مشابه باشد. بعضی از دانشگاه ها از شما می خواهند که توصیه نامه ها را برایشان پست کنید یا از اساتید شما می خواهند که توصیه نامه ها را آنلاین پر کنند.

4- تهیه ی آخرین کارنامه ی انگلیسی مقطع کارشناسی (یا کارشناسی ارشد)

5- نوشتن رزومه CV

باید رزومه تهیه کنید. این که شما کی هستید، چه خوانده اید، سابقه ی کاری تان چسیت، مقاله هایتان کدام هاست، چه تجربه هایی دارید، نمره های آزمون زبانتان چه شده است و ...

هر کس خواست ایمیل بزند تا رزومه ی خودم را برایش بفرستم.

6- پر کردن فرم Application برای هر دانشگاه.

هر دانشگاه علاوه بر موارد پنج گانه ی فوق از شما می خواهد که فرم Application آن دانشگاه را نیز پر کنید.

7- فرستادن مدارک

هر دانشگاه مقررات خاص خود را دارد. بعضی از آن ها می خواهند که مدارک را برایشان پست کنید و بعضی تمام مراحل را اینترنتی انجام می دهند. به deadline فرستادن مدارک توجه لازم را مبذول بفرمایید!

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دانشگاه های مقصد چه معیارهایی برای انتخاب افراد و اعطای بورس تحصیلی دارند؟

1- لیسانس دانشجو در چه زمینه ای بوده است

2- معدل دوره ی لیسانس

3- فعالیت های اجتماعی متقاضی (فعالیت های داوطلبانه، عضویت در سازمان های غیردولتی، ...)

4- نمره ی تافل (و جی آر ای برای متقاضیان دانشگاه های آمریکا)

5- متن SOP

6- توصیه نامه

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اگر سؤالی به ذهنتان رسید بپرسید؛ در خدمتم.

Friday, November 6, 2009

A lesbian in Oslo was in a heterosexual marriage that didn't work, so she started taking tranquillizers and ended up at the health sanatorium for treatment and rehabilitation ... The moment she said in a family group that she believed she was a lesbian, the doctor told her she was not. He knew from "looking into her eyes," he said. She had the eyes of a woman who wanted sexual intercourse with her husband. So she was subjected to a so-called "couch therapy." She was put into a comfortably heated room, naked, on a bed, and for an hour her husband was to ... try to excite her sexually ... The idea was that the touching was always to end with sexual intercourse. She felt stronger and stronger aversion. She threw up and sometimes ran out of the room to avoid this "treatment." The more strongly she asserted that she was a lesbian, the more violent the forced heterosexual intercourse became. This treatment went on for about six months. She escaped from that hospital, but she was brought back. Again she escaped. She has not been there since. In the end she realized that she had been subjected to forcible rape for six months.

Rich, Adrienne. 1980. Compulsory Heterosexuality and Lesbian Existence

Sunday, October 25, 2009

Is Motherhood a historically and culturally changing Concept?

M. Ali Abdi

In this essay I want to argue that motherhood is not a fixed concept over different periods of time and within different cultures, but rather is a historically and culturally changing concept, and is closely tied to notion of femininity. I try to show how meanings of motherhood and roles of mothers have changed over time, and how different factors such as capitalism, patriarchy, nationalism, politics and even technology have affected this concept historically. Besides, I try to illustrate that motherhood cannot be analyzed in isolation from its context: class, race and gender also play roles in shaping it.

In colonial days in most of the Anglo-Saxon countries, nursing children was mother’s “sacred duty” and “a great blessing and privilege” (Blum 1999: 19). Since family life, before the rise of industry in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, was that of “economically independent” and “commodity producing” unit, a good mother and wife was a major “economic asset”, whose work, skills and nursing was crucial to the family’s “standard of living” (Crittenden 2001: 46; Zaretsky 1986: 38).

Through the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, however, as the “cash economy” spread, women’s work at home as mothers and wives was devalued. Families were no longer the production units of the society. Men began to collect money through “commercial transactions” and “work became synonymous [with wage-labor and] … with men’s work” (Crittenden 2001: 47). Good “mothers” were encouraged, and at the same time exalted, to stay at home and educate the future free men of the “republic” (Blum 1999: 19; Zaretsky 1986: 52).

In the early years of the twentieth century, American mothers’ duties at home were considered to be major contributions to the U.S. “global dominance” (Blum 1999: 22). Some white middle class women of the time, whom historians call “maternalists”, reinforced state policies by arguing that mothers must be “educated” to stop their “waged-work”, to stay at home, and not to “cause labor unrest”. For maternalists of the early twentieth century, “… motherhood was sacred only without $” (Blum 1999: 22-24).

Later, through the twentieth century, physicians also joined maternalists in regulating lives of mothers at home. They took over the supervision of “infant-care” and “feeding” (Blum 1999: 29). Although the work of these two groups, physicians and maternalists, contributed to a noteworthy drop in “infant death” by 1930, it also controlled and restricted motherhood (Blum 1999: 28). According to physicians’ prescriptions mothers must “exercise regularly”, “eat a bland diet” and “avoid becoming nervous” in order to have a “healthy” child (Blum 1999: 28, 29). In the early years of the twentieth century “… the physician’s word was law” which changed the characteristics of motherhood impressively.

Besides, motherhood and child rearing had direct relations to “population quality”, “vigor of nation” and “race betterment” in that period of time in American history (Blum 1999: 22, 23). Such notions were not linked to motherhood only in the early 20th century in U.S., but also in post socialist countries in recent years (Gal & Kligman 2000: 21). As Theodore Roosevelt, the 26th U.S. president, compared motherhood to “military service” which intensifies the strength of a nation, politicians of the post socialist countries also valorized motherhood by exemplifying women as “national identities” or “spiritual representatives of the nation” (Kligman 2000: 24, 26). Hence, in the eyes of post-socialist men politicians, just some specific forms of reproduction were defined as the “legitimate” means of “national reproduction”, which forced mothers to reproduce less or more under different state policies. (Kligman 2000: 25)

With the rise of capitalism through the 20th century, implications associated with the concept of motherhood extended. Although motherhood, in parts of the world, is still considered to be a “sacred duty” and a major contribution to the “nation’s strength” and “national identity”, new meanings are added to it under capitalism. Two of the basic assumptions of capitalism are that everything is for sale and greed is the natural desire of people; so people want to make and accumulate as much capital as possible; therefore, individuals are looking for cheaper laborers who can produce more valuable products. Besides, from the standpoint of capitalism, “workers do not own or control the products of their labor”. (Rothman 1989: 39) So mothers, in the eyes of capitalism, are cheap “laborers” who can produce “precious” products (babies) for their employers (husbands) (Rothman 1989: 39).

Also, the outburst of technology, along with the growing capitalism, changed the concept of motherhood (Rothman 1989). Use of new technologies such as replacement tools for disabled body limbs, “breast pumps” for women to store their milk, and “surrogacy” as a way to produce baby for an infertile couple in the body of a fertile woman, changed, and is still changing, how people think of themselves (Rothman 1989: 49; Blum 1999: 55). These forms of technology dehumanize and “disembody” people by encouraging a mechanical self-image (Blum 1999: 52). Mother’s bodies become factories or “… resources out of which babies [or milk] are made” (Rothman 1989: 39, 41). This expunging of the maternal body might lead to new forms of social control, as proved in recent “fetal right cases”, because the body of a “disembodied mother” doesn’t exist anymore (Blum 1999: 60).

On the one hand, capitalism allows a mother to think of her “body” as her own, as her “individual property”, but on the other hand it doesn’t assure that the baby produced in mother’s body is her “own” baby (Rothman 1989: 44, 45). The products of these factories belong to men as “from the standpoint of the ideology of patriarchy it’s men’s babies that are being made” (Rothman 1989: 39). In patriarchal ideology the child is an “extension” of a man not a “property” of a woman (Rothman 1989: 45). So patriarchy also joins capitalism and technology in “commodifying” children, “proletarizing” wives, “disembodying” mothers, and changing our understandings of the concept of motherhood accordingly (Rothman 1989: 39; Blum 1999).

However, these are not the only factors which affect the concept of motherhood. “Subordinated groups”, in different class and racial contexts from that of dominant ones, might see motherhood in a way which is inexplicable by the dominant discourse (Collins, 1994: 48). For example, in a Chicago neighborhood, called The Flats, in which most of the residents are living in poor black communities, the content of “rights” and “duties” in relation to children differs from that of white middle-class (Stack 1974: 73).

In these communities, motherhood is a “social position” and owns some distinctive “behavior patterns”. Thus, not necessarily (and not only) the biological mother of the child, but “anybody” can occupy this social position, and more than one person can occupy it at the “same time” (Stack 1974: 83). As a result, rights and duties of biological mothers “… can be shared or transferred to other individuals”, which is not a common practice among white middle-class women (Stack 1974: 63).

What determines the eligibility of a person to be entitled to assume the social position of motherhood in The Flats is directly related to “residential patterns”, “interpersonal relationships” of adults, and “daily exchanges” and “distributions of the limited resources” available to poor people in The Flats (Stack 1974: 64, 83). Therefore, “close friends” and “kin” who are “active participants in domestic networks”, or are needed for future exchange of “goods and services”, are likely to possess “parental roles”, and “discipline”, “train”, “provide”, “cure” and “groom” each other’s children (Stack 1974: 66, 78, 84, 86).

Other subordinated groups in US, like “African-American”, “Asian-American”, “Hispanic” and “Native American” communities, which are framed by the intersection of race and class, also have different perceptions from the notion of motherhood and mothering (Collins 1994: 45). “Motherwork” at home, such as nursing, nurturing and socializing the next generation, is understood as work “on behalf of the family as a whole” and a struggle to preserve “family integrity”, rather than “benefiting men” exclusively (Collins 1994: 47).

This type of “motherwork”, in these communities, is seen as a means to maintain “physical survival” of children, to strengthen the “power” of community, and to foster a “meaningful racial identity” in a society which discriminates against people of color (Collins 1994: 47, 49, 57). Actually, without racial ethnic women’s motherwork such communities would not “survive” because mothers are the ones who “make preparations for their babies to live” in extremely unpleasant conditions (Collins 1994: 50). They struggle for “maternal empowerment” in order to have “control” over their bodies, to keep those children that are “wanted”, and to prevent dominant groups from controlling their children’s “minds” (Collins 1994: 53, 54). They also try to provide their children the necessary skills required to “confront” and “challenge” the systems of racial oppression (Collins 1994: 58). So survival, power and identity shape motherhood, especially for marginalized women of color, who are illustrative examples of culturally changing concept of motherhood.

Lastly, I want to re-emphasize that the main argument that I wanted to follow through the text was that the concept of motherhood is not immutable but rather is changing through time and has different perceptions and roles affiliated to within different social, cultural and economical contexts. Its implication extends from a sacred duty to the vigor of nation, to a proletariat, to a valuable commodity, to a practical tool in the hands of nationalist politicians, even to a powerful means to oppose poverty. So one might predict that the notion of motherhood would acquire new indications in future and, as a matter of fact, this text is a proof for this prediction.

Wednesday, October 21, 2009

Gender and nation are social constructions which intimately participate in the formation of one another: nations are gendered, and the topography of the nation is mapped in gendered terms (feminized soil, landscapes and boundaries, and masculine movement over these spaces). National mythologies draw on traditional gender roles, and nationalist discourse is filled with images of the nation as mother, wife and maiden. Efforts at nation-building which seek to "recover" the unique character and purity of the nation and celebrate its ancient roots and historical continuity generally describe the nation as timeless and changeless, as a "natural" set of bonds binding people to one another. Thus, "the nation" naturalizes constructions of masculinity and femininity: women physically reproduce the nation, and men protect and avenge it. At the same time, this notion of nation collectivizes and naturalizes the sexuality of female (and, to some extent, male) members of the nation.

Mostov, Julie. 2000. Gender Ironies of Nationalism. London: Routledge.

Friday, October 16, 2009

The more you talk about sexuality, the more threat you have for power relations.

Wednesday, October 14, 2009

And what is "sex" anyway? Is it natural, anatomical, chromosomal, or hormonal, and how does a feminist critic assess the scientific discourses which purport to establish such "facts" for us? ... if the immutable character of sex is contested, perhaps this construct called "sex" is as culturally constructed as gender; indeed, perhaps it was already gender, with the consequence that the distinction between sex and gender turns out to be no distinction at all.

Butler, Judith. 1990. Gender Trouble