Research Papers / Articles

*All names have been changed * This interview occurred before the Trump presidency. It’s 5pm on an April afternoon and somewhere in deep Alabama I’m being driven into the woods by the Ku Klux Klan. Two ‘Loyal White Knights of the Klan’ are clad in all-black. They are my guards. My eyes have seen the...

Just like there was a code of silence in Hollywood regarding Harvey Weinstein’s sexual abuse and harassment, there is a code of silence in the left-wing media such as The Guardian when it comes to left wing activists and politicians who abuse and harass women. Just like there is a code of silence within the...

At the foot of Sabalan mountain, in Northern Iran, deep in the valley, by the famous ski resort, is a bubbling mineral hot spring gushing calcium, potassium and us.  Tonight under the stars, we all sink into the natural hot waters, aching joints melting in the thick soup of the water that fizzles on our…

‘The process of Othering has everything to do with knowledge, and power acting through knowledge to achieve a particular political agenda in its goal of domination’ (Said 1978: xiii).   The non-Western woman (and more recently since 9/11, the Muslim woman), has been produced as a singular monolithic subject within academic frameworks, and in Left...

SEXUAL POLITICS IN MODERN IRAN: Sex outside marriage: punishable by 99 lashes or stoning Showing hair or wearing makeup, even though very common: punishable by lashings Hymenoplasty: re-storing the hymen so that the woman is a virgin on wedding night Temporary Marriage: anything from 1 hour to 99 years; woman gets financial reward depending on...