Download or read book Reconstructed Lives written by Haleh Esfandiari and published by Woodrow Wilson Center Press. This book was released on 1997-07 with total page 252 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Iranian women tell in their own words what the revolution attempted and how they responded. The Islamic revolution of 1979 transformed all areas of Iranian life. For women, the consequences were extensive and profound, as the state set out to reverse legal and social rights women had won and to dictate many aspects of women's lives, including what they could study and how they must dress and relate to men. Reconstructed Lives presents Iranian women telling in their own words what the revolution attempted and how they responded. Through a series of interviews with professional and working women in Iran—doctors, lawyers, writers, professors, secretaries, businesswomen—Haleh Esfandiari gathers dramatic accounts of what has happened to their lives as women in an Islamic society. She and her informants describe the strategies by which women try to and sometimes succeed in subverting the state's agenda. Esfandiari also provides historical background on the women's movement in Iran. She finds evidence in Iran's experience that even women from "traditional" and working classes do not easily surrender rights or access they have gained to education, career opportunities, and a public role.
Download or read book Until We Are Free written by Shirin Ebadi and published by Random House. This book was released on 2016-03-08 with total page 304 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The first Muslim woman to receive the Nobel Peace Prize, Shirin Ebadi has inspired millions around the globe through her work as a human rights lawyer defending women and children against a brutal regime in Iran. Now Ebadi tells her story of courage and defiance in the face of a government out to destroy her, her family, and her mission: to bring justice to the people and the country she loves. For years the Islamic Republic tried to intimidate Ebadi, but after Mahmoud Ahmadinejad rose to power in 2005, the censorship and persecution intensified. The government wiretapped Ebadi’s phones, bugged her law firm, sent spies to follow her, harassed her colleagues, detained her daughter, and arrested her sister on trumped-up charges. It shut down her lectures, fired up mobs to attack her home, seized her offices, and nailed a death threat to her front door. Despite finding herself living under circumstances reminiscent of a spy novel, nothing could keep Ebadi from speaking out and standing up for human dignity. But it was not until she received a phone call from her distraught husband—and he made a shocking confession that would all but destroy her family—that she realized what the intelligence apparatus was capable of to silence its critics. The Iranian government would end up taking everything from Shirin Ebadi—her marriage, friends, and colleagues, her home, her legal career, even her Nobel Prize—but the one thing it could never steal was her spirit to fight for justice and a better future. This is the amazing, at times harrowing, simply astonishing story of a woman who would never give up, no matter the risks. Just as her words and deeds have inspired a nation, Until We Are Free will inspire you to find the courage to stand up for your beliefs. Praise for Until We Are Free “Ebadi recounts the cycle of sinister assaults she faced after she won the Nobel Prize in 2003. Her new memoir, written as a novel-like narrative, captures the precariousness of her situation and her determination to ‘stand firm.’”—The Washington Post “Powerful . . . Although [Ebadi’s] memoir underscores that a slow change will have to come from within Iran, it is also proof of the stunning effects of her nonviolent struggle on behalf of those who bravely, and at a very high cost, keep pushing for the most basic rights.”—The New York Times Book Review “Shirin Ebadi is quite simply the most vital voice for freedom and human rights in Iran.”—Reza Aslan, author of No god but God and Zealot “Shirin Ebadi writes of exile hauntingly and speaks of Iran, her homeland, as the poets do. Ebadi is unafraid of addressing the personal as well as the political and does both fiercely, with introspection and fire.”—Fatima Bhutto, author of The Shadow of the Crescent Moon “I would encourage all to read Dr. Shirin Ebadi’s memoir and to understand how her struggle for human rights continued after winning the Nobel Peace Prize. It is also fascinating to see how she has been affected positively and negatively by her Nobel Prize. This is a must read for all.”—Desmond Tutu “A revealing portrait of the state of political oppression in Iran . . . [Ebadi] is an inspiring figure, and her suspenseful, evocative story is unforgettable.”—Publishers Weekly (starred review) “Ebadi’s courage and strength of character are evident throughout this engrossing text.”—Kirkus Reviews
Download or read book Days of God written by James Buchan and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2013-10-15 with total page 432 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A myth-busting insider’s account of the Iranian Revolution of 1979 that destroyed US influence in the country and transformed the politics of the Middle East and the world. The 1979 Islamic revolution in Iran was one of the seminal events of our time. It inaugurated more than thirty years of war in the Middle East and fostered an Islamic radicalism that shapes foreign policy in the United States and Europe to this day. Drawing on his lifetime of engagement with Iran, James Buchan explains the history that gave rise to the Revolution, in which Ayatollah Khomeini and his supporters displaced the Shah with little difficulty. Mystifyingly to outsiders, the people of Iran turned their backs on a successful Westernized government for an amateurish religious regime. Buchan dispels myths about the Iranian Revolution and instead assesses the historical forces to which it responded. He puts the extremism of the Islamic regime in perspective: a truly radical revolution, it can be compared to the French or Russian Revolutions. Using recently declassified diplomatic papers and Persian-language news reports, diaries, memoirs, interviews, and theological tracts, Buchan illuminates both Khomeini and the Shah. His writing is always clear, dispassionate, and informative. The Iranian Revolution was a turning point in modern history, and James Buchan’s Days of God is, as London’s Independent put it, “a compelling, beautifully written history” of that event.
Download or read book Revolutionary Iran written by Michael Axworthy and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2016-03-10 with total page 535 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Revolutionary Iran, Michael Axworthy offers a richly textured and authoritative history of Iran from the 1979 revolution to the present.
Download or read book Guardians of the Revolution written by Ray Takeyh and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2011-05-05 with total page 321 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For over a quarter century, Iran has been one of America's chief nemeses. Ever since Ayatollah Khomeini overthrew the Shah in 1979, the relationship between the two nations has been antagonistic: revolutionary guards chanting against the Great Satan, Bush fulminating against the Axis of Evil, Iranian support for Hezbollah, and President Ahmadinejad blaming the U.S. for the world's ills. The unending war of words suggests an intractable divide between Iran and the West, one that may very well lead to a shooting war in the near future. But as Ray Takeyh shows in this accessible and authoritative history of Iran's relations with the world since the revolution, behind the famous personalities and extremist slogans is a nation that is far more pragmatic--and complex--than many in the West have been led to believe. Takeyh explodes many of our simplistic myths of Iran as an intransigently Islamist foe of the West. Tracing the course of Iranian policy since the 1979 revolution, Takeyh identifies four distinct periods: the revolutionary era of the 1980s, the tempered gradualism following the death of Khomeini and the end of the Iran-Iraq war in 1989, the "reformist" period from 1997-2005 under President Khatami, and the shift toward confrontation and radicalism since the election of President Ahmadinejad in 2005. Takeyh shows that three powerful forces--Islamism, pragmatism, and great power pretensions--have competed in each of these periods, and that Iran's often paradoxical policies are in reality a series of compromises between the hardliners and the moderates, often with wild oscillations between pragmatism and ideological dogmatism. The U.S.'s task, Takeyh argues, is to find strategies that address Iran's objectionable behavior without demonizing this key player in an increasingly vital and volatile region. With its clear-sighted grasp of both nuance and historical sweep, Guardians of the Revolution will stand as the standard work on this controversial--and central--actor in world politics for years to come.
Download or read book The Face of Iran Before written by Dennis Briskin and published by . This book was released on 2020-06-30 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Black and white 35mm art-photography portraits of Iranians in daily small-town life before the Islamic Revolution and modern technology.
Download or read book Iran Before written by Dennis Briskin and published by . This book was released on 2019-10 with total page 56 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Black and white photographs of traditional Iran before industrialization and the Islamic Revolution. 56 pages hardcover
Download or read book German Foreign Policy Towards Iran Before World War II written by Rashid Khatib-Shahidi and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2013-03-19 with total page 240 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Early twentieth-century Iran had been dominated by the competing influences of the two great imperial powers of the time - Russia and Britain - making it difficult for a third power to establish a foothold. But an emergent, highly industrialised and assertive Germany in the 1930s became an attractive ally through which Iran could cut loose from domination by Britain and the Soviet Union, allowing it to seek modernity outside the constraints of old imperial interests. This led to the development of close commercial ties between Reza Shah's Persia and Hitler's Germany in the interwar period, an aspect of German foreign policy that is often overlooked. It was the National Bank of Persia, established in 1927 under German management, and with Kurt Lindenblatt as its governor, that was to be the vehicle for Germany's commercial expansion into Iran. The Bank was a vital engine driving industrialisation, even after Lindenblatt retired and was followed by Gholam Reza Amir-Khosrari and a board of directors including Hossein Ala and Abdul Hossein Hazhir. By the mid-1930s, a new German foreign policy approach of active diplomacy fortified initial inroads into the Iranian economy, building upon the foundations laid by individual entrepreneurs, the National Bank and the construction of the Trans-Iranian Railway. Iran evolved into an attractive country for international trade and, at the outbreak of World War II, Germany was Iran's largest trading partner - surpassing both the Soviet Union and Britain. These close ties reveal a complex relationship between Germany and Iran, and an admiration of the Nazi's brand of industrial, scientific and organisational progress. It was, however, a relationship that came to an abrupt end with the Allied invasion of Iran in 1941 that deposed the Shah. Khatib-Shahidi delves into previously untapped German primary sources to explore the nature of German involvement in Iran between the wars, examining how it came to be moulded by a handful of individuals. This book is a revealing resource on the historical ties between Iran and Germany, making it indispensable for students and researchers of European Imperialism and Colonialism in the Middle East as well as of Iranian Political and Economic History.
Download or read book The Age of Aryamehr written by Roham Alvandi and published by Gingko Library. This book was released on 2018-07-15 with total page 451 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The reign of the last Shah of Iran, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi (1941–79), marked the high point of Iran’s global interconnectedness. Never before had Iranians felt the impact of global political, social, economic, and cultural forces so intimately in their national and daily lives, nor had Iranian actors played such an important global role – on battlefields, barricades, and in board rooms far beyond Iran’s borders. Iranian intellectuals, technocrats, politicians, workers, artists, and students alike were influenced by the global ideas, movements, markets, and conflicts that they also helped to shape. From the launch of the Shah’s White Revolution in 1963 to his overthrow in the popular revolution of 1978–79, Iran saw the longest period of sustained economic growth that the country had ever experienced. An entire generation took its cue from the shift from oil consumption to oil production to dream of, and aspire to, a modernized Iran, and the history of Iran in this period has tended to be presented as a prologue to the revolution. Those histories usually locate the political, social, and cultural origins of the revolution firmly within a national context, into which global actors intruded as Iranian actors retreated. While engaging with that national narrative, this volume is concerned with Iran’s place in the global history of the 1960s and ’70s. It examines and highlights the transnational threads that connected Pahlavi Iran to the world, from global traffic in modern art and narcotics to the embrace of American social science by Iranian technocrats and the encounter of European intellectuals with the Iranian Revolution. In doing so, this book seeks to fully incorporate Pahlavi Iran into the global history of the 1960s and ’70s, when Iran mattered far beyond its borders.
Download or read book Shahnameh written by Abolqasem Ferdowsi and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2016-03-08 with total page 1041 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The definitive translation by Dick Davis of the great national epic of Iran—now newly revised and expanded to be the most complete English-language edition A Penguin Classic Dick Davis—“our pre-eminent translator from the Persian” (The Washington Post)—has revised and expanded his acclaimed translation of Ferdowsi’s masterpiece, adding more than 100 pages of newly translated text. Davis’s elegant combination of prose and verse allows the poetry of the Shahnameh to sing its own tales directly, interspersed sparingly with clearly marked explanations to ease along modern readers. Originally composed for the Samanid princes of Khorasan in the tenth century, the Shahnameh is among the greatest works of world literature. This prodigious narrative tells the story of pre-Islamic Persia, from the mythical creation of the world and the dawn of Persian civilization through the seventh-century Arab conquest. The stories of the Shahnameh are deeply embedded in Persian culture and beyond, as attested by their appearance in such works as The Kite Runner and the love poems of Rumi and Hafez. For more than sixty-five years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,500 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.
Download or read book Beyond the Islamic Revolution written by Amir Sheikhzadegan and published by Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG. This book was released on 2017-06-12 with total page 188 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The volume contributes to a better understanding of Iranian history since 1953, with a focus on societal change and its reflection in intellectual discourse. The papers explore the attitudes of Iranians toward modernity and tradition before and after the Revolution of 1979. With insights from Oriental studies, history, sociology, literature and social anthropology, the volume offers a cross-disciplinary perspective on the intellectual, political, and social history of Iran.
Download or read book Pictorial History of Iran written by Amini Sam and published by . This book was released on 2001 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The Last Shah written by Ray Takeyh and published by Yale University Press. This book was released on 2021-01-26 with total page 332 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The surprising story of Iran's transformation from America's ally in the Middle East into one of its staunchest adversaries "An original interpretation that puts Iranian actors where they belong: at center stage."--Michael Doran, Wall Street Journal "For the clearest view of Iran for the last 100 years, this book is it."--Marvin Zonis, author of Majestic Failure: The Fall of the Shah Offering a new view of one of America's most important, infamously strained, and widely misunderstood relationships of the postwar era, this book tells the history of America and Iran from the time the last shah, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, was placed on the throne in 1941 to the 1979 revolution that brought the present Islamist government to power. This revolution was not, as many believe, the popular overthrow of a powerful and ruthless puppet of the United States; rather, it followed decades of corrosion of Iran's political establishment by an autocratic ruler who demanded fealty but lacked the personal strength to make hard decisions and, ultimately, lost the support of every sector of Iranian society. Esteemed Middle East scholar Ray Takeyh provides new interpretations of many key events--including the 1953 coup against Prime Minister Mohammad Mossadeq and the rise of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini--significantly revising our understanding of America and Iran's complex and difficult history.
Download or read book Iran written by Abbas Amanat and published by . This book was released on 2019 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A masterfully researched and compelling history of Iran from the sixteenth century to the twenty-first
Download or read book My Part of Her written by Javad Djavahery and published by Restless Books. This book was released on 2020-02-11 with total page 240 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In exiled Iranian author Javad Djavahery’s captivating English debut, a youthful betrayal during a summer on the Caspian sea has far-reaching consequences for a group of friends as their lives are irrevocably altered by the Revolution. For our unnamed confessor, the summer months spent on the Caspian Sea during the 1970s are a magically transformative experience. There, he is not the “poor relative from the North,” but a welcome guest at his wealthy cousin Nilou’s home and the gatekeeper of her affections. He revels in the power of orchestrating the attentions of her many admirers, granting and denying access to her would-be lovers. But in a moment of jealousy and youthful bravado, he betrays and humiliates an unlikely suitor, setting into motion a series of events that will have drastic repercussions for all of them as the country is forever transformed by the Iranian Revolution a few short years later. Over the next twenty years, the lingering effects of that betrayal set the friends on radically different paths in the wake of political, religious, and cultural upheaval. Their surprising final reunion reveals the consequences of revenge and self-preservation as they each must decide whether and how to forget the past. Urgent and gorgeously written, My Part of Her captures the innocence of youth, the folly of love, and the capriciousness of fate as these friends find themselves on opposing sides of the seismic rifts of history.
Download or read book America and Iran written by John Ghazvinian and published by Knopf. This book was released on 2021 with total page 688 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "A history of the relationship between Iran and America from the 1700s through the current day"--
Download or read book Popular Iranian Cinema before the Revolution written by Pedram Partovi and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2017-07-14 with total page 389 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Critics and academics have generally dismissed the commercial productions of the late Pahlavi era, best known for their songs and melodramatic plots, as shallow, derivative ‘entertainment’. Instead, they have concentrated on the more recent internationally acclaimed art films, claiming that these constitute Iranian ‘national' cinema, despite few Iranians having seen them. Film discourse, and even fan talk, have long attempted to marginalize the mainstream releases of the 1960s and 1970s with the moniker filmfarsi, ironically asserting that such popular favorites were culturally inauthentic. This book challenges the idea that filmfarsi is detached from the past and present of Iranians. Far from being escapist Hollywood fare merely translated into Persian, it claims that the better films of this supposed genre must be taken as both a subject of, and source for, modern Iranian history. It argues that they have an appeal that relies on their ability to rearticulate traditional courtly and religious ideas and forms to problematize in unexpectedly complex and sophisticated ways the modernist agenda that secular nationalist elites wished to impose on their viewers. Taken seriously, these films raise questions about standard treatments of Iran's modern history. By writing popular films into Iranian history, this book advocates both a fresh approach to the study of Iranian cinema, as well as a rethinking of the modernity/tradition binary that has organized the historiography of the recent past. It will appeal to those interested in Iranian cinema, Iranian history and culture, and, more broadly, readers dissatisfied with a dichotomous approach to modernity.
