Sexual Politics in Modern Iran
Janet Afary
(Author)
Description
Janet Afary is a native of Iran and a leading historian. Her work focuses on gender and sexuality and draws on her experience of growing up in Iran and her involvement with Iranian women of different ages and social strata. These observations, and a wealth of historical documents, form the kernel of this book, which charts the history of the nation's sexual revolution from the nineteenth century to today. What comes across is the extraordinary resilience of the Iranian people, who have drawn on a rich social and cultural heritage to defy the repression and hardship of the Islamist state and its predecessors. It is this resilience, the author concludes, which forms the basis of a sexual revolution taking place in Iran today, one that is promoting reforms in marriage and family laws, and demanding more egalitarian gender and sexual relations.
Product Details
Price
$121.00
Publisher
Cambridge University Press
Publish Date
April 27, 2009
Pages
444
Dimensions
6.0 X 9.0 X 1.0 inches | 1.76 pounds
Language
English
Type
Hardcover
EAN/UPC
9780521898461
BISAC Categories:
Earn by promoting books
Earn money by sharing your favorite books through our Affiliate program.
Become an affiliate
About the Author
Janet Afary holds the Mellichamp Chair in Global Religion and Modernity at the University of California, Santa Barbara, where she is a Professor of Religious Studies and Feminist Studies.
Reviews
Janet Afary's Sexual Politics in Modern Iran ... meticulously details the historical evolution of gender and sexuality, and of the roles and customs of women and same-sexers, from pre-modern Persia (500 to 1500 AD) right through the sexual revolution that began in Iran seven decades ago ... [It] is an invaluable landmark, a signpost on the road to an end of gender discrimination and sexual liberation for all.
In These Times
The East-West battle over gender is brilliantly described by Janet Afary in her groundbreaking survey Sexual Politics in Modern Iran.
The New York Review of Books
Afary does a spectacular job explaining, as well as detailing, sexual attitudes and practices from the nineteenth to the twenty-first centuries. Her account gives an excellent feel for how Iranian society works and how that has changed under the impact of modern times. Plus, her detailed research makes the account much more credible than some of the highly readable stories from Iranian-Americans about personal life in modern Iran.
Foreign Policy
Highly recommended.
Choice
This is a welcome contribution to work on modern sexual politics in Iran ... As Afary brilliantly shows, the gender and sexual revolution in Iran is unfinished, unfolding and ultimately unstoppable.
Against the Current
... Afary's book should be of interest to anyone who is looking for an in-depth overview of discussions about sex in nineteenth- and twentieth-century Iran, and to those who are interested in understanding the pervasive anxiety about the lack of, and desire for, a set of ideals (consent, intimacy, equality) that constitute the normative ground of much contemporary debate about the history, politics, and gender relations of modern Iran.
Setrag Manoukian, H-Net Reviews (h-net.org/reviews)
In These Times
The East-West battle over gender is brilliantly described by Janet Afary in her groundbreaking survey Sexual Politics in Modern Iran.
The New York Review of Books
Afary does a spectacular job explaining, as well as detailing, sexual attitudes and practices from the nineteenth to the twenty-first centuries. Her account gives an excellent feel for how Iranian society works and how that has changed under the impact of modern times. Plus, her detailed research makes the account much more credible than some of the highly readable stories from Iranian-Americans about personal life in modern Iran.
Foreign Policy
Highly recommended.
Choice
This is a welcome contribution to work on modern sexual politics in Iran ... As Afary brilliantly shows, the gender and sexual revolution in Iran is unfinished, unfolding and ultimately unstoppable.
Against the Current
... Afary's book should be of interest to anyone who is looking for an in-depth overview of discussions about sex in nineteenth- and twentieth-century Iran, and to those who are interested in understanding the pervasive anxiety about the lack of, and desire for, a set of ideals (consent, intimacy, equality) that constitute the normative ground of much contemporary debate about the history, politics, and gender relations of modern Iran.
Setrag Manoukian, H-Net Reviews (h-net.org/reviews)
