The Politics of Women's Rights in Iran

In __The Politics of Women's Rights in Iran__, Arzoo Osanloo explores how Iranian women understand their rights. After the 1979 revolution, Iranian leaders transformed the state into an Islamic republic. At that time, the country's leaders used a renewed discourse of women's rights to symbolize a shift away from the excesses of Western liberalism. Osanloo reveals that the postrevolutionary republic blended practices of a liberal republic with Islamic principles of equality. Her ethnographic study illustrates how women's claims of rights emerge from a hybrid discourse that draws on both liberal individualism and Islamic ideals. Osanloo takes the reader on a journey through numerous sites where rights are being produced--including Qur'anic reading groups, Tehran's family court, and law offices--as she sheds light on the fluid and constructed nature of women's perceptions of rights. In doing so, Osanloo unravels simplistic dichotomies between so-called liberal, universal rights and insular, local culture. __The Politics of Women's Rights in Iran__ casts light on a contemporary non-Western understanding of the meaning behind liberal rights, and raises questions about the misunderstood relationship between modernity and Islam. Osanloo Arzoo Presents An Ethnographic Study That Explores How Conceptions Of Liberal Entitlements Fused With A Discourse Of Equality In Islam In The Post-revolutionary Era To Inform & Shape Women's Perceptions Of Rights. Introduction: Human Rights And Cultural Practice -- A Genealogy Of Women's Rights In Iran -- Producing States: Women's Participation And The Dialogics Of Rights -- Qur'anic Meetings: Doing The Cultural Work -- Courting Rights: Rights Talk In Islamico-civil Family Court -- Practice And Affect: Writing/righting The Law -- Human Rights: The Politics And Prose Of Discursive Sites -- Conclusion: Women's Rights As Exhibition At The Brink Of War. Arzoo Osanloo. Includes Bibliographical References (p. [231]-250) And Index.