Roundabout Dubai

About UAE Women

Since my first test post Summer has arrived in Dubai with vengeance. And with that, it seems posts on local blogs (many are here) dealing with hot local topics (labor, women, politics, etc.) are getting hotter! Bloggers are battling it out, mostly with pure opinion versus pure opinion. Nothing of course is wrong with that, as long as all remember that what they have to say is just a freaking opinion and not the final truth of the matter. Yet, the lack of factual support for personal perspectives (occasionally with hysterical fixation or abusive vehemence) is, to say the least, quite surprising. It’s not only the dearth of reliable literature on local issues that is to blame, but also the intellectual laziness of many fellow bloggers. This means both lack of facts and lack of willingness to question one’s preconceived ideas and skewed theories. Some recent posts on local women have generated debate and controversy. Trying to look for more reliable information on this issue, I came across an interesting study from two years ago. The author is Sara Sayed and the title is, “Women, Politics and Development in the United Arab Emirates.” It’s rather long (100 plus pages) and can be too academic, but it’s worth reading. No time to read the whole thing, I’d say at a minimum read the conclusions; some very interesting and debatable results. This is the link to the study.

And here are two teasers (from the conclusions section):

“Women overall, are segregated but not isolated as they are surrounded by a large social support network…mainly family members…Families protect their female members from what they consider to be a predatory environment. This protectionism is strongly supported by interview participants as well as survey participants.” p. 88.

“Women are generally content with their status within the family. They overwhelmingly agree that the actions of women within the family are unconstrained as long as these actions do not jeopardized the health of the family unit. They do not feel devalued by the patriarchal system, and they support its protective function” p. 89.

posted by bandicoot @ 1:44 PM