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The United States has maintained a heavy military presence in Afghanistan for a little more than a decade however; the US has been involved in Afghanistan on and off for over three decades. The 2001 ‘war on terror’ in Afghanistan became framed around the goal of saving Afghan women. In order to understand how this framing came about and what the impact of this framing was I study US congressional documents, speeches and other public rhetoric by government officials in the 1980s and early 2000s. Analyzing rhetorical language and reoccurring themes helps us understand what major framing devices and narrative techniques were in play during these time periods. Ultimately I conclude that women’s safety was a post-facto justification for intervention; the framing techniques used during the 2001 were utilized in order to create a clear, coherent narrative that selectively ignores the impact of US involvement in Afghanistan during the Cold War.

Approved for public release, distribution unlimited / Women are potent symbols of identity. They signify a vision of society that identifies a nation. The Middle East provides a perfect example of this. It has one of the highest rates of population growth in the world, yet maintains one of the lowest literacy rates and labor force participation among women. This has a direct impact on their ability to be seen as modern states. Furthermore the Middle East has come under attack for having one of the poorest records of human rights, particularly in reference to women. Contrary to this implication Middle Eastern women have taken extremely active roles in the gender debate and the socio-political struggles within their societies. The results of this participation have yielded a number of different interpretations of what it means to be a feminist and if this title is even something that Muslim women want. It has also created a very complex relationship between the west and western feminism which has deep implications in contemporary gender politics.

The purpose of this work is to bring better understanding into the problematic of negotiation of veiling behaviour among young Muslim women. In the current world they face many challenges caused by stereotypical images that are being spread about them through various media platforms. One of those stereotypes is the misuse of the veil as a symbol and taking it out of the context. Main goal of this work is therefore to observe the role of media, new media in particular, within diverse socio-political contexts in the lives of young Muslim women, especially on the negotiation of their veiling behaviour. Misinterpretation and misuse of the symbol of the veil by the media within diverse socio-political contexts will be investigated from the perception of these young women, with help of the qualitative approach, namely in-depth interviews with the sample of seven Muslim women between the ages of 22 and 36 living in Czechia, Lebanon, Netherlands and Switzerland. To put this issue into perspective of the researcher's home country, Czechia, additional and supportive data was collected among 100 respondents from Czech non-Muslim public. This survey investigated the perception of Islam and veiled women by the Czech public to prove or disprove the hypothesis that the Islamic tradition of veiling is perceived...

Bakgrunden till denna studie var att det fanns ett behov av att se över hur den svenska arbetsmarknaden behandlar kvinnor med slöja (hijab). Detta då det svenska arbetslivet i vissa fall kan ses som etniskt ojämlik. Syftet med studien var att ge kvinnorna en röst i ämnet samt att lyfta deras upplevelser med hjälp utav ett sociologiskt perspektiv. För att ta del av deras upplevelser gjordes en kvalitativ studie med en hermeneutisk ansats och tematisk innehållanalys. Det utfördes åtta semistrukturerade intervjuer med kvinnor som bar slöja i arbetet. Från intervjuerna framkom fyra teman: upplevelser, bemötande, samhällets påverkan samt reaktion. Resultatet visade att slöjan är en viktig del i kvinnornas identitet samtidigt som samhället och arbetsmarknaden har svårt att acceptera deras slöjbärande. Kvinnornas arbetstillfredsställelse samt deras psykosociala arbetsmiljö påverkades då de utsattes för fördomar och diskriminering i sina arbetsliv.

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The objective of these oral histories was to examine, explain and reveal the success of a small group of Saudia (female Saudis) whose studies at a mid-Western American university through the medium of English (their second or third language). Four students were randomly selected from a group of volunteers, based on their successful completion of the English as a Second Language (ESL) program, plus a year of other academic classes in the university. One student, who had not completed the ESL program, was admitted to the master of English program having passed the Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) test at the required level. The student participants were interviewed a number of times in the course of the study and after the completion of the writing to check the evidence. The interviews were semi-structured to allow the participants to expand as they desired. The data was analyzed using the theories of Islamic feminism and intersectionality to discover how the students were able to succeed in a profoundly different school and social culture as an English Language Learner (ELL) where many other ELLs fail to complete a degree program. Attention was focused on the participants explanations of their successes, failures and challenges.

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This thesis explores both limits and possibilities. It reflects on processes of appropriation, re-signification and critique as practiced variably by African American Muslim women. I situate these processes within the concept of multiple critique, for specifically three moments-Sherman Jackson's Third Resurrection, the black feminist tradition, and Islamic feminisms.

The purpose of this thesis is to understand the experiences and meanings of tourism employment for Muslim women in the Middle East, including the positive and negative aspects of this form of employment. The study was conducted in Oman, which was the research site and cultural setting for this study. The theoretical paradigm that guided this study was social constructionism. A constructivist grounded theory methodology was also used for this study in order to interpret and analyze the collected data into themes. A combination of convenience sampling and snowball technique was used to recruit participants for the interviews, resulting in a total of 9 interviews being conducted with local Muslim women working in the Oman tourism industry. The data were collected through open-ended interviews conducted face to face, using a semi structured interview format. The analysis process led to the development of seven themes. The seven main themes related to finding work in the tourism field, facing negative attitudes, challenges of tourism work, dealing with negative attitudes and challenges, the importance of tourism work in women lives, an expanded vision of tourism work, and implications for social change. The study revealed that the idea of women’s tourism work as exploitation is complex and multi-layered in Oman. Although there were some indicators of exploitation for the Omani tourism workers in this study, this form of work was also shown to be a source of benefits and form of empowerment for women. Further, the study revealed that tourism employment could also be seen as a site for women’s resistance, particularly for Muslim women seeking to change attitudes towards women, and to create a new society.