23077.Pdf (588.6Kb)
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
Acknowledgment A number of people have influenced me in the process of writing this thesis. First of all I have to thank my supervisors at the Institute of Social Anthropology University of Oslo who have helped me throughout my work. A special thanks goes to professor Unni Wikan and Eduardo Archeti, who have read and commented on the early draft of this thesis. I am especially indebted to Dr. Øyvind Fuglerud, my current supervisor, who has patiently followed my stages of development. I am grateful to him for providing me with advice that helped me to meet the required demands of profundity and accuracy necessary to an endeavor like this. I would like to thank my informants for believing in this project and for spending time with me and letting me into their lives. Also thanks to my friends, whom through their interest and enthusiasm in this project, have been able to convince me that fulfillment of this dissertation was necessary for them and for myself. Apart from that, some persons in my social surroundings have engaged eagerly in this endeavor, by reading various drafts and by showing me the relevant but unread literature. Of these, Jørn Hening Lien, Alireza Ebrahimi and Jørn deserve and receive my sincere gratitude for their enthusiasm concerning my topic and for their time and advice. In addition, thanks to my friends in the study group, Anne, Anne Karin, Ester, Guri , Jens, Stina and Sissel for their comments on the early drafts of this thesis. I am also grateful to my friend Dr. Amir Moghaddam, who has found time in his busy schedule to help me with my English language. A special thank you also goes to my fellow students at the Department of Social Anthropology in University of Oslo. Oslo, October 2003 Mohamad Ali Azad Samiei 1 Table of contents: Table of contents:................................................................................................................ 1 We are not watermelons.......................................................................................... 4 CHAPTER ONE:................................................................................................................ 5 INTRODUCTION .......................................................................................................... 5 The Focus of the Project and Research Questions...................................................... 5 Methodological Approach ............................................................................................ 13 Doing fieldwork in your own culture.................................................................... 13 Difficulties in finding Informants ......................................................................... 16 Production of data................................................................................................. 18 Theoretical Framework................................................................................................. 20 Discursive positioning .......................................................................................... 25 Content and structure of the chapters.................................................................... 30 CHAPTER TWO: ............................................................................................................. 33 Social organization of Iranian refugees in Norway ...................................................... 33 The impact of Islamic Revolution on Iranian society........................................... 34 The impact of Iran-Iraq (1980-1988) war............................................................. 39 Representation of key informants ......................................................................... 42 Lack of community among the Iranians in Norway ............................................. 47 Ethnic, Linguistic and Religious Variation among Iranians................................. 49 The important of political affiliation on group organization ................................ 53 Apolitical Iranians and their relation to political activists.................................... 57 Education; a category for social organization?..................................................... 58 Chapter Three: .................................................................................................................. 65 The notion of ”Public Sphere”...................................................................................... 65 “A comparative perspective between Iran and Norway”.......................................... 65 The notion of Public sphere in Iran....................................................................... 67 2 The contemporary notion of public sphere ........................................................... 73 Analysing the media discourse ............................................................................. 77 Immigrants as swindlers ....................................................................................... 79 Immigrants as criminals........................................................................................ 80 Elderly immigrants as a problem group................................................................ 82 Unemployment and immigrants............................................................................ 83 Analysing the news............................................................................................... 84 Islam, Muslims and the media .............................................................................. 87 Misleading Representations of Islam.................................................................... 88 Norway: A different picture?................................................................................ 91 Iranian revolution and western media coverage of Iran........................................ 94 The Salman Rushdie affaire.................................................................................. 98 Not without my Daughter ................................................................................... 102 Chapter Four: .................................................................................................................. 105 The Romance Market.................................................................................................. 106 Informant’s relationships with the opposite sex ..................................................... 106 Islamic approaches to sexuality .......................................................................... 107 The Socio-cultural Dimension ............................................................................ 108 The Importance of Marriage ............................................................................... 110 Segregation and its effect on cross-sex relationships ......................................... 113 Relationship with the opposite sex in the early stages of their lives in Norway 116 The impact of Norwegian media’s representation on cross-sex relationship ..... 121 Male informants and their experience in cross-sex relationship......................... 131 Female informants and their experience with cross-sex relationship ................. 138 Final Remarks ................................................................................................................. 153 Summery of the essential issues in each chapter ................................................ 153 Connecting the core issues of each chapters....................................................... 159 REERENCES.................................................................................................................. 169 3 We are not watermelons We are not watermelons one of the informants answered when I asked him about the way the public discourse discuss the issue of immigrants in Norway - public debate in Norwegian media and the society. He said nothing more, not even a single word and left. I had no idea what he meant by that phrase and I became almost obsessed to find out what “ we are not water melons " signifies. After many discussions with close friends I found that; in Iran, watermelon is a national fruit as strawberry is in Norway. When one goes to the bazaars, all the groceries sell watermelons and it is the custom that every one of these shopkeepers shout and claim that his watermelon is the best in the whole bazaar. On the other hand, it is very common that the customers bargain on the price. The only way to do that is to argue about the quality of the goods – the watermelon in this case. The interesting point is that the main focus of this anecdote - the watermelon – is of no importance in the larger picture. Nobody considers the watermelon to make a difference in his own future. If we consider the power relation, then the watermelon is the part with no power (at all) to represent his views. My informant was telling me in an indirect way that nobody cares about what immigrants themselves have to say in relation to the majority’s attitude and their own future. According to the informant it is not important to ask how emigrants feel in relation to the ways that the Norwegian media discusses issues that so strongly concern emigrants and their future lives. 4 CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION The Focus of the Project and Research Questions I started the postgraduate degree in social anthropology with the aim of doing a fieldwork in Iran. My research proposal was approved in spring 1999 and I traveled to Iran the following summer. Even though I had a written letter