The Dressmaker of Khair Khan, Essay Example

What would you do if the life you were used to was suddenly changed, largely restricting your freedom and ability to do the things you had been raised doing, just because of your gender? This is what happens to the female characters in Gayle Tzemach Lemmon’s book, The Dressmaker of KhairKhana.This true life story, masquerading as a novel, introduces a heroine in the form of a young woman named Kamila, who is prepared to attend University at the time when the Taliban come to power.Her parents and older brother leave for the North and Kamila, her other brother and sisters remain in Kabul in order to prevent the family from losing the family home.In this novel, the lead character, Kamila, confronts the obstacles that prevent women from exercising any rights or asserting independence from men, which results from the newly imposed Taliban regime.However, by the end, Kamila successfully overcomes this oppression by using the “persistence in the face of setbacks” aspect of the growth mindset.

Although Kamila and her sisters are well educated and raised to believe that they can attend University and work if they choose, once the Talban come to power, this changes and is replaced by a new reality.As they begin to run out of money, Kamila realizes she needs to get a job to keep the house and support the family.After being raised in a society that encouraged the education of women and viewed them as an important part of the economy, Kamila finds herself struggling to find a way she can work.The Taliban have declared it unlawful for women to be employed outside the home with very few exceptions and women found outside the home without a “mahrum,” or male chaperone, faces serious consequences.

Although her brother serves as Kamila and her sister’s mahrum, he cannot help her in her attempt to obtain work.After determining, much to her dismay, that she will be unable to work outside her home and that ever trying to find such work could place her and her family in danger, she decides to take in sewing work for others in the neighborhood.She learns to sew from her oldest sister, a skilled seamstress who joins Kamila in her new endeavor, and before long they are taking in enough sewing to provide an income adequate to support the family.Determined to earn a living that is enough so the family is secure, she focuses on providing the best sewing services available and delivering what is promised by the deadline agreed to.

Kamila is dedicated and driven to succeed in a business she had never considered as a possible vocation until after the Taliban came to power.Despite having other dreams before the Taliban’s rule, pursues what other might view as just a necessary source of income and something below them, as something at which she will succeed and does what it takes to make this happen.After only a few months the skilled services provided by the two sisters become so well respected that they are not able to keep up with the demand.Kamila, determined to help out other women who are in a similar situation to the one she faced, begins to hire employees to help with the increased demand.Her first employee is a woman who is attempting to gain independence for her brother in law.The plot follows Kamila through her struggles to avoid problems with the Taliban while maintaining her business and her commitment to other women who have been placed in hard situations due to the laws passed by the new regime.

The struggle of women to gain rights in Afghanistan over the past century has seen its share of advances.Unfortunately, women’s progress toward the realization of rights and independence has often been reversed by religious regimes committed to the subjugation of women based on religious doctrine.This struggle came to a head in 2009 when then President Hamid Karzai passed a law that allowed marital rape and required women to get the permission of their husbands or other male relatives in order to leave their homes.Women protested this publicly, resenting what appeared to an effort to turn them into property.A larger group of men counter protested, running the women off amidst shouts condemning them as whores.

Before the Taliban, women had exercised a large degree of freedom under the rule of Amir Abdur Rahman Khan in the late 1880’s.Khan tried to modernize the country, raising the legal marrying age for women, and granting women the right to divorce and to own property.The advancement of women’s rights continued with subsequent regimes as schools for both girls and boys were opened, traditional clothes was outlawed, forced marriages were prohibited and Queen Soraya began a women’s journal dedicated to women’s rights, which was followed by the publication of other journals. The mid 1990’s saw these reforms first repealed then slowly reestablished and Universities which accepted women students were opened, women were allowed to work in business and politics and were granted the right to vote under a new constitutions.This progress towards full independence for women and gender equality was suddenly stopped in the late 1970’s when the Taliban came to power (Bar).

Under the protection of the new regime, the Taliban forbid a number of basic activities.These included music, television, the internet, keeping caged birds (bird racing was once a favorite hobby in Afghanistan), kite flying (previously Afghanistan’s national sport), all books other than religious ones, laughing, shouting or clapping in public, photos of women even hanging pictures of women in the home,wedding celebrations, New Years and Labor Day celebrations.Laws specific to women forbid women from doing almost anything outside the home and many things within the home.Under the Taliban, women were banned from becoming employed, pursuing education, leaving their home unless accompanied by a male relative, speaking with males who they were not related to even in their own homes, gathering in public, washing clothes in a river, sitting on their balconies, or being visible through the windows of their home.They were required to wear the traditional burqa which covered them from head to toe at all times and to speak in low tones so no man would hear them.Anyone who breaks these rules will be executed.

The impact of this unstable progress for women is demonstrated in the novel through the actions Kamila.Kamila had benefited from the history of reform in Afghanistan.As the story begins, she has received her teaching certificate and is preparing to begin University when the Taliban take over.She goes from being a young women pursuing an education and career to being forced to hide in a full burqa behind the closed doors of her home.Although there are women in the community who cannot survive without earning an income, women are forbidden from working without exception.Kamila must struggle with the freedom she took for granted before the Taliban and learning how to adjust to her new reality which limits practically all her options other than marriage.She demonstrates the strength found in many Afghan women, who, when faced with the adversity put in place by the Taliban, found ways within the system to succeed and thrive.

In the article Forms of Oppression, the author describes five types of injustice, which are distributive injustice, procedural injustice, retributive injustice, moral exclusion, and cultural imperialism.Through the account of Kamila the reader can see how women are oppressed through all of these types of injustice.In addition to the obvious financial related injustice, Kamila demonstrates the degree to which other types of injustice also affect the women in her so society.For example, under distributive injustice, there are different types of capital. Skill capital is ”the specialized knowledge, social and work skills, as well as the various forms of intelligence and credentials that are developed as a result of education and training and experiences in one’s family, community, and work settings” (Deutsch).Kamila is clearly intelligent and wants to pursue her education, social world and establish a career, all forbidden under Taliban rule.Social capital is social resources, friends, families, contacts, those who help provide access to jobs and education as well as those who provide emotional support.As the Taliban impose their rules upon the women in the society, Kamila, loses the ability to connect with those outside her home.The ability to freely interact with and learn from others was taken away along with her ability to more freely through the city.

A quote in the story that emphasizes how oppression influenced and limited the lives of the women is:

“But of all the changes the Taliban brought, the most painful and demoralizing were the ones that would fundamentally transform the lives of Kamila, her sisters, and all the women in their city. The newly issued edicts commanded: Women will stay at home. Women are not permitted to work. Women must wear the chadri in public.” (Lemmon).

This quote can be examined through Deutsch’s formulation of oppression.Distributive injustice is fundamental to this quote as it point out how Kamila suddenly means being cut off from others, limited in her ability to find employment to support her family, and the ability to retain a level of wealth that would be similar to what a man could earn and save.Procedural injustice suggest that fair procedures which determine outcomes and how certain people are treated are critical in avoiding oppression.In this quote it speaks of what transforms Kamila’s life and the lives of all women in the city.This show that procedures used to determine outcomes for men and women after the Taliban take over are not fair.Moral exclusion is also relevant to the quote since unfair procedures lead to unfair treatment of Kamila and the other women who are excluded from taking part in defining how women should be treated morally.

Kamila uses “persistence in the face of setbacks” aspect of the growth mindset.When the Taliban come to power Kamila’s world is turned upside down and everything she had been raised believe she could obtain has been taken away from her.Instead of becoming bitter, however, she resets her dreams and begins a business, which she’d never previously considered.Instead of holding on to what was impossible and mourning her fate, she overcame the obstacles put in her way by the Taliban and created a new life in which she found satisfaction and happiness.

Sources Cited

Barr, Heather. Women’s Rights in Afghanistan Must be Steadfastly Respected. Jurist. 20 March 2014 Print.

Deutsch, Morton. “Forms of Oppression.” Beyond Intractability. Eds. Guy Burgess and Heidi Burgess. Conflict Information Consortium, University of Colorado, Boulder. Print March 2005.

Dweck, Carol. Mindset: The New Psychology of Success. New York: Random House. 2006. Print.

Lemmon Gayle Tzemach, The Dressmaker of KhairKhana; Five Sisters, One Remarkable Family, and the Woman Who Risked Everything to Keep Them Safe.New York: Harper, March 2011. Print.

Levi, Scott. The Long, Long Struggle for Women’s Rights in Afghanistan.Origins, Current Events in Historical Perspective, 2.12.September 2009. Print.