In the Eye of the Storm: Women in Post-Revolutionary Iran

The conservative clergy of the Islamic republic may wish that the modernization and the Westernization of the Pahlavis (1925-1979) never happened, but it did. As the essays in this collection point out time and again, no amount of veiling will return women to their status quo ante . But neither, the writers seem to agree, are Iranian women likely to find (indeed, seek) the same roles as their Western counterparts anytime soon. ``The emotional attachment to Shiism and the recognition that it is unlikely for women to achieve meaningful human rights within its compass make for intellectual schizophrenia,'' notes Mahnaz Afkhami. Women continue to have the right to vote and they have made gains in education in part because of the policy of gender separation--women must have their own doctors, girls their own teachers. But education, nutrition, freedom of movement, literature--in short, all things that affect their lives--are seen against the backdrop not of what is best for her as a woman but as an Islamic woman, which usually translates as a good mother and wife. Based partly on talks given at a 1991 conference, there is some inevitable duplication of material, even of tables, and the tone can occasionally run dry; but, nonetheless, In the Eye of the Storm is a many-faceted look at the real problems of women set firmly within their context. (Apr.)