This two-fold study examines the status of women of Afghanistan and the reality of their lives as depicted in their Persian-Dari literature and a few of their autobiographies published in English. It presents several relevant objectives: first, it argues that the highly traditional interpretations of Islam and Islamic law by certain religious authorities in the multi-ethnic, multi-lingual, multi-cultural, and semi-tribal society of Afghanistan, combined with some strong patriarchal system of the states, are the main factors imposing silence on the female population of that country. Second, to enhance this argument, the study provides a brief historical overview, with focus on women's status in Afghanistan since 1919 up to the present. Third, and most pertinent to the main subject of this project, the dissertation substantiates the above arguments by examining the portrayal of sexism, subjugation, segregation, resistance, veiling, and the overall oppression of Afghan women in women's prose, poetry, and autobiographical writings (the latter naturally have been published abroad). Finally, it argues that the absence of a strong Afghan female voice from any global dialog, along with the scarcity of academic study regarding their real status, have opened the way for a number of feminist writers and scholars to approach women's issues in Afghanistan from different perspectives that, in some cases, omit factual and realistic assessments of women's situation in that country. Documentary evidence is integrated into this study to demonstrate the courage, and the gradual awakening of Afghan women to their identity and power in the very complex society of Afghanistan, as well as their growing awareness that having a voice is vital for their survival.

Nineteenth and twentieth century migratory networks had a formative, yet unrecognized, impact in the lead-up to the 1962 establishment of the Yemen Arab Republic. Migrants from Northern Yemen to Aden built discursive spaces for contesting economic and political oppression that served as a foundation for later channels of political dissidents and reformists to oppose the Imamic regime, often walking a tightrope between their own calls for reform and the interests of foreign state actors. Those spaces were preserved in the later development of similar networks after 1962 and paved the way for generations of migrants to contest or advance reigning economic and social orders via labor migration to oil-rich states.

The development of the interwar Egyptian economy resulted from interactions between extra-economic and exogenous factors, normally seen as lying outside the economic sphere in historical accounts. Local economic elites successfully challenged colonial domination of the local economy by utilizing a number of strategies to found locally controlled businesses. The strategy of economic nationalism allowed the local elite to break into the foreign dominated Egyptian economy. By 1927 this strategy was adjusted to facilitate partnerships with foreign firms who sought out partners due to the exigencies of the Great Depression. Foreign powers interested in Egypt began to see colonial control as a detriment to their continued influence in Egypt following their increased economic success in the country. Along with strategic factors this would bring about the diminution of the capitulations in 1937 in favor of bi-lateral trade arrangements.

This dissertation examines excavated jewelry from the Iron Age II Southern Levant, especially the kingdoms of Israel and Judah between 850-580 BCE. This assemblage allows for the identification of social functions of the jewelry in order to give scholars greater insight into an artifact class that has been little studied by archaeologists. Separating different social functions, and finding the criteria that made some jewelry objects apotropaic is also a necessary step in identifying ancient amulets, that being just one of the several possible functions of jewelry.Social functions are addressed by examining various characteristics of the jewelry found in excavations, including colors and materials used, and the terminology used for jewelry and its traits in the Hebrew Bible. Anthropological theory about dress and ornament is then applied to the corpus, focusing on visibility of jewelry, or what another person would be able to see in a social situation. This is useful for whole pieces such as bangles, earrings, and rings, but less so for jewelry elements such as beads, pendants, scarabs, scaraboids, and seals, which are examined together with the ancient texts and in terms of their individual characteristics.Color turned out to be the primary criteria for the choices of materials for beads, pendants, and glyptic objects. The most common colors of stone and synthetic jewelry materials were the same colors of cloth that were called for in ritual settings in the Hebrew Bible, suggesting that these colors were ritually powerful, and that the jewelry was as well. It is not clear whether they were powerful because they were used in the Temple, or vice versa, but the correlation is clear.Color was not the most important trait of earrings, nose rings, bangles, and rings, which were overwhelmingly made of metal. In those cases, size, location of wear, and available wealth appeared to be more important. These objects could, at a minimum, convey information on wealth, social status, and marital status to a viewer.

This study employs Cognitive Linguistics to determine the foundational elements of the ancient Israelitesâ concept of teaching as reflected in the text of the Hebrew Bible (Old Testament) and Ben Sira, a significant post-biblical Hebrew book interested in teaching and wisdom. It analyses four prominent lexemes that comprise a lexical set referring to the act of teaching: ××¨× -H (yrh in the Hiphil stem), ××× -D (lmd in the Piel stem), ×××¢ -H (yd` in the Hiphil stem), and ×סר -D (ysr in the Piel stem). The thesis concludes that, in its most basic form, the concept of teaching in ancient Israel was that a teacher creates the conditions in which learning can occur. The methodology employed in this project is built on a premise of cognitive studies, namely, that because teaching is a universal human activity, there is a universal concept of teaching: one person A recognises that another person B lacks knowledge, belief, skills, and the like (or has incomplete or distorted knowledge, etc.), and person A attempts to bring about a changed state of knowledge, belief, or skill in person B. This universal concept provides the starting place for understanding the concept of teaching that Biblical Hebrew reflects, and it also forms the conceptual base against which the individual lexemes are profiled. The study incorporates a micro-level analysis and a macro-level analysis. At the micro-level, each lexeme is examined with respect to its linguistic forms (the linguistic analysis) and the contexts in which the lexeme occurs (the conceptual analysis). The linguistic analysis considers the clausal constructions of each instantiation and determines what transitivity, ditransitivity, or intransitivity contributes to the meaning. Collocations of the lexeme, including prepositional phrases, adverbial adjuncts, and parallel verbs, are evaluated for their contribution to meaning. The conceptual analysis of each lexeme identifies the meaning potential of each word, as well as what aspect of the meaning potential each instantiation activates. The study then determines the lexemeâs prototypical meaning, which is profiled on the base of the universal concept of teaching. This step of profiling represents an important adaptation of the Cognitive Linguistics tool of profiling to meet the special requirements of working with ancient texts in that it profiles prototype meanings, not instantiations. In the macro-analysis, the data of all four lexemes in the lexical set are synthesised. The relationships among the lexemes are assessed in order to identify the basic level lexeme and consider whether the lexemes form a folk taxonomy. Finally, the profiles of the four prototype meanings are collated and compared in order to describe the ancient Israelite concept of teaching. The study finds that the basic level item of the lexical set is ××× -D (lmd-D) based on frequency of use and distribution. In its prototypical definition, ××× -D (lmd-D) means to intentionally put another person in a state in which s/he can acquire a skill or expertise through experience and practice. In contrast to this sustained kind of teaching, the prototypical meaning of ××¨× -H (yrd-H) is situational in nature: a person of authority or expertise gives specific, situational instruction to someone who lacks knowledge about what to do. The lexemes ×סר -D (ysr-D) and ×××¢ -H (yd`-H) represent the most restricted and the most expansive lexemes, respectively: the prototypical meaning of ×סר -D (ysr-D) is to attempt to bring about changed behavior in another person through verbal or physical means, often to the point of causing pain; the prototypical meaning of ×××¢ -H (yd`-H) is that a person of authority causes another person to be in a state of knowing something from the divine realm or related to experiences with the divine realm. The study determines that while the four lexemes of the Biblical Hebrew lexical set âto teachâ have significant semantic overlap, they cannot be construed in a folk taxonomy because the words are not related in a hierarchical way.

No description available.

No description available.

No description available.

No description available.

No description available.