I'm reading _Lipstick Jihad_ for my reading group. I put it off for awhile, preferring to read another book I'd ordered, Deborah Gray White's _Too Heavy A Load_ which is a history of the black women's social uplift movement from 1894-1994. I finished it, so I had to move on to Azadeh Moaveni's memoir. I'd been reluctant because, not sure why it was selected (I'd missed that meeting), I worried that it'd be yet another opportunistic memoir.
There's a passage, where Moaveni's talking about life in iran v life in the u.s. where I thought she nicely illustrated foucauldian concepts of power, resistance, and the potentially generative character of power. I thought it interesting because dossbomber said something about how people don't think of things this way (as Foucault puts it), not in the real world at any rate:
"Ignorance of this culture made you a victim, marooned at home with bad Islamic television. Knowing how to navigate its rules gave you freedom, to choose a lifestyle as sedentary or riotous as you pleased. As newcomers, Daria and I were only familiar with a simple, American sort of freedom. Confronted with an oppressive system, we instinctively viewed the Iranians around us as victims, because armed with only our knowledge of Caliornia highways and the mall, we had not the slightest idea how to exercise freedom., Theran-style. We couldn't conceive of a life where you forcibly *took* your rights, through adept arguments and heaps of attitude. Where you lived 'as if' the rules didn't exist, and took the skirmishes for granted.
Life in American came with its own set of frontiers, but they were familiar, and from the vantage point of Tehran, seemed more subtle, more bearable. As for a Middle Eastern person (in the u.s. --my addition), they were symbolic barriers placed between you and your culture, in the Islam-bashing and prejudice that seeped into everyday life, ephemeral barriers between you and your peace of mind, as you had to work to disregard the slights and political slander and ignorance that presented themselves so routinely, in so many guises. There were walls and partitions, dour billboards and angry-looking pasdars , around at all times to enforce them. I wasn't sure which ones I preferred, or perhaps better, which ones I despised least. In America, I hadn't learned, really, how to scale the barriers. They were political and amorphous, and often I felt they existed only in my head, that I created and carted them about myself. For now, these Iranian barriers frightened me. They produced incessant confrontations between people itching to scream at one another, escalate, and let loose the brew of anger and resentment inside.
[After relating how young people undermine the regime's rules by using holy days as a way to engage in public flirtations and the exchange of mobile phone numbers. Her cousin has informed her that "the candlelight vigil marking its final night (called shame-e ghariban) was by far the most excellent night of the year to pick up guys."
She then talks about getting drunk at her family's Norouz party and deciding, at 2 a.m., she would just take the 20 minute walk to her home by herself -- "a dangerous proposition in Iran." Her boyfriend won't let her go alone, so he risks the danger to escort her. But she is too drunk to walk, and to hold her up would be to draw attention and danger. He flags down a garbage truck for a ride down the hill.]
"[Dariush] grabbed my arm and hauled me onto the edge of the truck, our toes shoved perilously close to the wheels. We occupied the stinking, one-foot gap between the trash and the cabin, commanded by Afghan workers. Do. You. Realize. What. You've. Done. I screamed. This is garbage! I'm being transported with refuse! This is madness. Why don't you people revolt or something?
...
Throughout the jolty ride, through my concern for my shoes and my entertainment at Dariush's uncharacteristic gravity ..., I felt a warm sense of security. With someone who knew the gaps in the rules, there was adventure to be had behind the grim, rigid facade of the Islamic Republic.
pp. 55-56, 63-64 _Lipstick Jihad_ Azedeh Moaveni
"let's be civil and nice, but not to the point of obeying the rules of debate as defined by liberal blackmail (in which, discomfort caused by a challenge is seen as some vague form of harassment)."
-- Dwayne Monroe, 11/19/08
-- http://cleandraws.com Wear Clean Draws