Gender and the Writing of Yemeni Women Writers Al-Mutawakel, A.M.A
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Tilburg University Gender and the writing of Yemeni women writers Al-Mutawakel, A.M.A. Publication date: 2005 Document Version Publisher's PDF, also known as Version of record Link to publication in Tilburg University Research Portal Citation for published version (APA): Al-Mutawakel, A. M. A. (2005). Gender and the writing of Yemeni women writers. Dutch University Press. 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Download date: 25. sep. 2021 BW FSW Al-Mutawakel 09-12-2004 12:05 Pagina 1 Gender and the Writing of Yemeni Women Writers BW FSW Al-Mutawakel 09-12-2004 12:05 Pagina 2 BW FSW Al-Mutawakel 09-12-2004 12:05 Pagina 3 Gender and the Writing of Yemeni Women Writers proefschrift ter verkrijging van de graad van doctor aan de Universiteit van Tilburg op gezag van rector magnificus, prof.dr. F.A. van der Duyn Schouten, in het openbaar te verdedigen ten overstaan van een door het college voor promoties aangewezen commissie in de aula van de Universiteit op woensdag 26 januari 2005 om 14.15 uur door antelak mohammed abdulmalek al-mutawakel geboren op 1 december 1960 te Sana’a, Yemen BW FSW Al-Mutawakel 09-12-2004 12:05 Pagina 4 Promotores: Prof.dr. T.M. Willemsen Prof.dr. M.J.H. Meijer © Antelak Al-Mutawakel, 2005 Cover design: PuntSpatie, Amsterdam DTP: Offsetdrukkerij Haveka bv, Alblasserdam All rights reserved. Save exceptions stated by the law, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system of any nature, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, included a complete or partial transcription, without the prior written permission of the publishers, application for which should be addressed to the publishers: Dutch University Press Bloemgracht 82hs 1015 TM Amsterdam, The Netherlands Telefoon: + 31 (0) 20 625 54 29 Fax: + 31 (0) 20 620 30 95 E-mail: [email protected] www.dup.nl Dutch University Press in association with Purdue University Press, West Lafayette, Ind. U.S.A & Rozenberg Publishers, The Netherlands isbn 90 3619 122 x nur 740 BW FSW Al-Mutawakel 09-12-2004 12:05 Pagina 5 Acknowledgments First and foremost I would like to thank Prof. dr. Tineke M. Willemsen and Prof. dr. Maaike Meijer, my supervisors, without whose guidance, help and encouragement I would not have succeeded in completing this dissertation. This study would not have possible without the support of many people who have helped me at various stages of my dissertation. I feel that they have the right to share part of my success. I thank the Yemeni women writers for providing me with all data and information about themselves and their writings and allowing me to attend their gatherings. I thank the poet and novelist Nabilah al-Zubair for her time, for her frankness in narrating her life story, and for her acceptance of its publication in my book. I owe special thanks to my tutors Dr. Hatem al-Saker, Prof. Harsharan Singh Ahluwalia and Manorama Trikha. Special thanks to Dr. Raufah Hassan – the Chairperson of the Empirical Research and Women's Studies Center – for her support, encouragement and her great belief in women's power and rights. I also thank Prof. D. Thakur – the Chairperson of the English Department – who has been of a great support through my study for the MA or the PhD. I owe thanks to my father who provided me with references, information and advi- ce through out my work and to my friends Rawiya al-Kumaim, Kathleene Hindle and Afke Bordat for proof-reading my drafts and to Ingrid Beerens for providing me with recent references throughout my research. Many thanks to the friendly support of Prof. Margot Badran and Ms. Amany Roy. I must thank my friends who made my visits to Holland cheerful: Sabria, Alkeline, Robert, Marloes, Annelies, Martina, Mr. and Mrs. Meerburg, and Mr. and Mrs. Brouwer. BW FSW Al-Mutawakel 09-12-2004 12:05 Pagina 6 This study was made possible by the grants from the Netherlands Embassy in Sana'a and the cooperation of Nuffic and Tilburg University whom I should thank. I appre- ciate the kindness and helpfulness of people in charge: Ms. Joke Buringa, Nuha `Aqlan, Ms. Irma van Dueren, Mr. John Pracht, drs. Robbie Servais, Mariette Rozen and many others. At the end I'm greatly indebted to my two families: my Dutch family Miss and Mrs. Beerens and my Yemeni family: my husband, my parents, my children, my sisters and my brother. december 2004 antelak mohammed abdulmalek al-mutawakel BW FSW Al-Mutawakel 09-12-2004 12:05 Pagina 7 Contents Preface 11 Chapter 1 Introduction: Yemeni Women's Historical Background 13 The Situation of Women in Yemen 13 Concise Historical Overview 13 Developments in Legislation 18 Women and Education 20 Women and Decision-Making 21 Women and the Economy 22 Conclusion 23 Chapter 2 Theoretical Background and Framework 25 Introduction 25 The concept of gender 25 The concept of gender in the Arab World 29 Gender in Yemen 31 Feminism and Its Debates 32 A Room of One's Own and Literary Criticism 35 The Approach of A Room of One's Own 38 Chapter 3 The history of Poetry, the short story, and the novel 51 Women Poets and Literary History Books 51 Overview of Women's Poetry 56 The Pre-Islamic Period 56 The Islamic Period 56 The Renaissance & Revolutionary Period 61 The Post-Revolution Period 62 Contemporary Poetry 66 BW FSW Al-Mutawakel 09-12-2004 12:05 Pagina 8 Yemeni Literary History Books and Women Short Story Writers 73 Historical Overview of Women's Short stories 75 Justice 81 Transformation 81 Yemeni Women Novelists and Literary History books about Novels 82 A Historical Review of Yemeni Women's Novels 83 Conclusion 92 Chapter 4 Self-Liberation and National Struggle in Early Yemeni Women’s Short Stories 93 Contexts, Conventions, and Conditions; Gender and literary Production 93 Liberating the Self through Story-Telling 95 Southern Writers 95 Northern Writers 98 Telling Stories of Gender and National Liberation 100 Southern Writers 101 Northern Writers 104 Conclusion 106 Chapter 5 Gender and the Process of Writing 107 Introduction 107 Education and Work 114 Genre and Gender 116 Literary Identity 116 Constraints during the Process of Writing 122 Family 122 Self-Censorship 126 Political Censorship 127 Segregation 128 Publishing 130 Literary Criticism 131 Conclusion 132 Appendix to Chapter 5 136 Chapter 6 A Woman Writer’s Life Story: Nabilah al-Zubair 137 Nabilah al-Zubair as a Child and a Young Wife 138 Nabilah al-Zubair, the Young poet 141 Building Relationships with Male Colleagues 143 Nabilah al-Zubair as a Well-Known Poet and the Current Literary Environment 143 BW FSW Al-Mutawakel 09-12-2004 12:05 Pagina 9 Nabilah al-Zubair's Second Marriage 145 Nabilah al-Zubair and Politics, Cultural Life and Gender 147 Nabilah al-Zubair’s Writings 148 Nabilah al-Zubair and Literary Women's Gathering (Louqa) 151 Chapter 7 Conclusions and Implications 153 Appendix 1 Bibliography and Biographical Sketches of Yemeni Women Writers 163 Appendix 2 Transliteration Note 189 Summary 191 Samenvatting 197 Arabic Summary 203 BW FSW Al-Mutawakel 09-12-2004 12:05 Pagina 10 BW FSW Al-Mutawakel 09-12-2004 12:05 Pagina 11 11 Preface Perusing books on the literary history and literary criticism of Yemeni literature, one is struck by the near silence of these books on Yemeni women’s writings. This is despite the fact that the names of several women writers occur in the general Arab and Yemeni history and that there are also some anthologies of famous Yemeni women, including writers. Yemeni social history has not always been in favour of women, who had to face backward social ideologies that have led to the restriction of women to limited socially constructed roles and responsibilities, and to narrow definitions of relations between men and women. With the hypothesis that the compilers of literary history books have probably ignored women writers, I directed my study to answer the question, are there Yemeni women writers? And if there are, as one would expect, to investigate how and why these women writers came to be neglected. I investigated whether gender has an impact on the lives and writings of Yemeni women writers. Apart from some articles about some Yemeni women writers, my thesis represents the first academic attempt to investigate seriously Yemeni women’s literature. Thus, I attempted to restore, as much as possible, these women’s unknown corpus of texts, names, and lives. Looking for a theoretical framework that would fulfil my requirements and do justice to the Arab-Yemeni cultural parti- cularities, I found that the approach to women writers, using gender as an analytical tool, with a concern for gender issues that affect the writing and reading of texts, was applicable.