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Saturday, December 6, 2008

"دليل شؤون الاندماج" للاتحاد الأوربي: برنامج للاندماج والتكيف يحتذى به


غلاف النسخة الإنكليزية ل 'دليل شؤون الاندماج'
غلاف النسخة الإنكليزية ل "دليل شؤون الاندماج"

عملية اندماج المهاجرين في المجتمعات الأوربية ليست طريقا في اتجاه واحد فقط، إذ ينبغي أن تكون المجتمعات الأوروبية على استعداد لاحتضان المهاجرين. يقدم "دليل شؤون الاندماج" الصادر مؤخرا عن المفوضية الأوروبية شرحا للاستراتيجية المتعلقة بهذه المسألة. بقلم دانييلا شرودر.


يعيش في دول الاتحاد الأوروبي أكثر من 40 مليون مهاجر. كما يبلغ عدد أبنائهم وأحفادهم أكثر بكثير من هذا الرقم. حققت أغلبية المهاجرين بناء على المعلومات الصادرة عن الاتحاد الأوروبي "نجاحا جيدا إزاء الاندماج في المحيط الاجتماعي" للاتحاد. أما بالنسبة للقطاعين الهامين وهما التعليم وسوق العمل فما زالت المرتبة التي أحرزها المهاجرون وذووهم أدنى كثيرا من الوضع السائد لدى المواطنين الأوروبيين أنفسهم.

ولو أبدينا عين الاعتبار للنمو المتنامي لوضع المنافسة العالمية ولتراجع معدلات الولادة في دول الاتحاد الأوروبي لتبين لنا بأنه لا يمكن للاتحاد أن يتعامل بروح عدم الاكتراث حيال هدر الطاقات المهملة المتوفرة للمهاجرين.

كيفية انجاح عملية الاندماج

جاء في الدليل بأن "أوروبا تحتاج في سياق تعزيزها لنهضتها إلى مواطنين فاعلين يعيشون سوية مع بعض داخل مجتمعات مبنية على روح الاندماج. فالمهاجرون الذين يفدون اليوم أو في المستقبل إلى الدول الأوروبية بغرض البقاء فيها سوف يصبحون جزءا من مجتمعات هذه الدول وسيساهمون بأشكال متعددة في صياغة مستقبل اقتصادنا ومجتمعنا".

وورد في الدليل أيضا بأن من العوامل الرئيسية لإنجاح عملية الاندماج توفير المساواة في الفرص وحيازة المهارة الوظيفية. كما أن هناك عوامل أخرى تحتل في هذا الصدد نفس الأهمية كتوفر شروط الإقامة الآمنة والحق في جمع شمل العائلة وتيسير شروط الحصول على جنسية الدولة الأوروبية المعنية ومحاربة التمييز في مجال التعامل مع سلطات ودوائر الدولة الرسمية وتقديم المساعدة للمهاجرين فيما يتعلق بتعلم اللغة الأجنبية واكتساب التأهيل المهني.

أعدت منظمة مستقلة مهمتها تقديم المشورة للمفوضية الأوروبية في المسائل المتعلقة بالهجرة دراسة تحتوي على حوالي 100 صفحة متضمنة الطرق والإجراءات التي أثبتت جدواها في المجال الميداني للاندماج في دول الاتحاد الأوروبي البالغ عددها 25 (قبل انضمام رومانيا وبلغاريا للاتحاد) وفي كل من النرويج وسويسرا.

هذه القواعد المنشورة في كافة اللغات الرسمية للاتحاد الأوروبي موجهة إلى أصحاب صنع القرار والخبراء العاملين في قطاع إدماج المهاجرين في المجتمعات الأوروبية أي على وجه التحديد إلى مؤسسات الدولة على مستوى المحليات والبلديات وعلى المستويين الإقليمي والقومي وإلى أطراف الشراكة المتعلقة بالأنظمة الاجتماعية وإلى المعنيين بشؤون الخدمات واتحادات المهاجرين ومجموعات المساعدات الذاتية والمنظمات الإنسانية.

أمثلة أوربية

يبحث الفصل الأول من الكتاب في آليات تحويل المسائل الخاصة بالاندماج إلى جزء لا يتجزأ من الاستراتيجيات السياسية والعروض المتعلقة بالخدمات. في مدينة شتوتغارت على سبيل المثال يخضع الجهاز المختص بشؤون الاندماج لتعليمات عمدة المدينة مباشرة. بمعنى أن مسائل الاندماج تحتل هناك مرتبة عالية في إطار الأجندة السياسية.

وفي أيرلندا تم إنشاء قسم لخدمات الترجمة تابع للخدمات الصحية نظرا لأن المهاجرين لم يتمكنوا بسبب عدم إتقانهم للغة من الحصول على المعلومات الصادرة عن تلك الجهات وتعذر عليهم بالتالي الاستفادة من العروض الصحية المتوفرة.

يصف الفصل الثاني كيفية تحسين الأوضاع السكنية في المناطق التي يسكنها المهاجرون في الأغلب. تتسم هذه الأوضاع بالنعرة التمييزية لدى الكثيرين من المؤجرين وبارتفاع الإيجارات وطيلة مدة الانتظار للمهاجرين الموضوعة أسماؤهم على لوائح الحصول على مساكن ذوي الدخل المحدود. أسبانيا مثلا تكافح هذه الظواهر من خلال إعداد برامج تضمن لأصحاب المساكن سواء حصولهم على عوائد الإيجار في مواعيد منتظمة ثابتة أو إزالة أي عطل قد يطرأ على تلك المساكن.

وفي إقليمي اومبريا ولومبارديا ( إيطاليا) يكون بمقدور المهاجرين أن يبنوا منازل على أراض تابعة للمحليات. وهناك يقوم الخبراء والاتحادات المحلية بتقديم المساعدات اللوجستية والتقنية اللازمة لعملية البناء بما في ذلك تسهيل الحصول على القروض المصرفية.

أما مدينة شيتشلي الواقعة في صقلية فإنها تتحمل نصف نفقات ترميم وصيانة المساكن في حالة التزام أصحابها بتأجيرها لمهاجرين لفترة خمسة أعوام على الأقل وبالسعر الزهيد المتفق عليه. وفي مدينة هامبورغ الألمانية تقدم البلدية معونة إيجار للطلاب الذين ينتقلون إلى مناطق سكنية يتألف أغلب سكانها من المهاجرين.

الاندماج الاقتصادي

يتضمن الفصل الثالث المسمى "الاندماج الاقتصادي" أمثلة عديدة حول كيفية النهوض بعملية إدماج المهاجرين في سوق العمل. ففي الدانمارك تقوم خمسة "مراكز معرفة" إقليمية بإعداد ما يسمى ببطاقات التأهيل بشأن الكفاءة المهنية للمهاجرين واللاجئين. وفي حالة السويد يتم إعطاء المهاجرين ذوي الكفاءات فرصة للالتحاق بدورات تستغرق ثلاثة أسابيع في مجال عمل المغترب وذلك بغرض جعل المغتربين قادرين على إثبات قدراتهم في مواقع العمل مباشرة.

وفي حالة البرتغال أعطي 100 مغترب سبق لهم دراسة الطب منحا دراسة تضمنت دورة لدراسة اللغة وحلقات دراسية أخرى ودورات خبرة عملية في المستشفيات وأعقب ذلك أداءهم للامتحانات وتأهيلهم لممارسة مهنة الطب مجددا بعد أن عملوا في بداية إقامتهم كسائقي تكسي أو عمال بناء.

هناك بالإضافة إلى ذلك بنك إيطالي يعطي المغتربين فرصة الانخراط في الأعمال التجارية الحرة من خلال تقديم برنامج يمنحهم قروضا صغيرة الحجم. يتناول الفصل الرابع كيفية تنسيق وتمويل وتقييم استراتيجيات الاندماج على المستوى المحلي.

خطوة جيدة

يعتبر اندرياس هالباخ رئيس الفرع الألماني للمنظمة الدولية للهجرة IOM الدليل الصادر عن الاتحاد الأوروبي حول الاندماج "خطوة أولية جيدة في الطريق نحو الأفضل". كما أنه يرى بأن التوجه السياسي في هذا السياق سليم بحد ذاته وإن اعتقد بأنه بالإمكان اتخاذ خطوات أسرع في ألمانيا في اتجاه تكريس الاندماج.

يضيف هالباخ بأن تبادل النماذج التي أثبتت جدارتها في ميدان الاندماج بين دول الاتحاد الأوروبي يشكل قاعدة ناجحة لسياسة الاتحاد في هذا السياق ثم يستطرد قائلا "على الرغم من الاختلاف القائم على مستوى السياسات القومية فإن هناك أيضا قواسم مشتركة " بين الدول الأعضاء، وهو ما يبينه أول دليل صادر عن الاتحاد الأوروبي حول الاندماج.

صدر الدليل الأزل في 2004 وهو يتضمن دورات تمهيدية للمهاجرين واللاجئين ويشرح لهم الإمكانيات المتوفرة لديهم للمشاركة في المجتمع المدني كما أنه يصف معالم الاندماج الناجحة والتي أصبحت حقيقة واقعة.

لا هذا الدليل ولا الدليل الذي سيصدر لاحقا يزعمان بأنهما يملكان حلولا مطلقة كفيلة بإنجاح عملية الاندماج لا سيما وأن هناك اختلافات قائمة بين الدول الأعضاء في الاتحاد الأوروبي إزاء الهياكل الإدارية وأنظمة الرعاية الاجتماعية والعلاقة بين الدول والمواطن وفيما يختص بعلاقة كل من هذه الدول مع المهاجرين المقيمين فوق أراضيها. يأتي بالإضافة إلى ذلك أن الاختلاف القائم بين المهاجرين أنفسهم يتخذ أشكالا متعددة من دولة إلى أخرى بل من مكان إلى مكان آخر.

إمكانية تخطيط عمليات الاندماج

يأتي إضافة إلى ذلك أن المجتمعات الأوروبية نفسها تجتاز مرحلة تحول حيث تؤثر المتغيرات الشاسعة الواقعة على الصعيدين الاقتصادي والاجتماعي على الميكانيكيات والمؤسسات المجتمعية كالعائلة والتعليم والتربية والأحزاب السياسية والنقابات والمنظمات الدينية والأنشطة التطوعية.

لقد شدد دليل الاتحاد الأوروبي على أنه "ليس من السهل تخطيط عمليات الاندماج مسبقا، نظرا لأنها طويلة الأجل ولا تسير وفقا لمعايير تلقائية ثابتة. إن للاندماج وجوها متعددة وهي تفرض على نطاق واسع يضم أطرافا مختلفة حتمية المقدرة على التكيف مع المستجدات".

بقلم دانييلا شرودر
ترجمة عارف حجاج
قنطرة
http://ar.qantara.de/webcom/show_article.php/_c-471/_nr-543/_cmt-00d69280e14f40b9a547ada7c5a17423/i.html

Parvez Sharma interviewed on CNN International live.

In a time when Islam is under tremendous attack from within and without, "A Jihad for Love" is a daring documentary filmed in twelve countries and nine languages. Muslim gay filmmaker Parvez Sharma has gone where the silence is loudest, filming with great risk in nations where government permission to make this film was not an option.

"A Jihad for Love" is Mr. Sharma’s debut and is the world’s first feature documentary to explore the complex global intersections between Islam and homosexuality. Parvez enters the many worlds of Islam by illuminating multiple stories as diverse as Islam itself. The film travels a wide geographic arc presenting us lives from India, Pakistan, Iran, Turkey, Egypt, South Africa and France. Always filming in secret and as a Muslim, Parvez makes the film from within the faith, depicting Islam with the same respect that the film's characters show for it. "A Jihad for Love" is produced by Sandi DuBowski (Director/Producer of the award-winning "Trembling Before G-d") and Parvez Sharma in association with ZDF-Arte, Channel 4, LOGO, SBS-Australia, The Sundance Documentary Fund and The Katahdin Foundation.

In Western media, the concept of ‘jihad’ is often narrowly equated with holy war. But Jihad also has a deeper meaning, its literal Arabic being ‘struggle’ or ‘to strive in the path of God’. In this film we meet several characters engaged in their personal Jihad’s for love. The people in this film have a lot to teach us about love. Their pursuit of love has brought them into conflicts with their countries, families, and even themselves. Such is the quandary of being both homosexual and Muslim, a combination so taboo that very little about it has been documented.

As a result, the majority of gay and lesbian Muslims must travel a twisting, lonely and often dangerous road. The majority of Muslims believe that homosexuality is forbidden by the Qur’an and many scholars quote Hadith (sayings attributed to the Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him) to directly condemn homosexuality. Islam, already the second largest religion in the world is also the fastest growing. 50 nations have a Muslim majority. In a few of those nations laws interpreted from alleged Qur’anic prohibitions of male homosexuality (lesbianism is allegedly absent from the Qur’an) are enforced by religious, tribal or military authorities to monitor, entrap, imprison, torture and even execute homosexuals. Even for those who migrate to Europe or North America and adopt Western personae of "gay" or "queer," the relative freedoms of new homelands are mitigated by persistent racial profiling and intensified state surveillance after the attacks of 9/11 and train bombings in Madrid and London.

As a result, many gay and lesbian Muslims end up renouncing their religion completely. But the real-life characters of A "Jihad for Love" aren't willing to abandon a faith they cherish and that sustains them. Instead, they struggle to reconcile their ardent belief with the innate reality of their being. The international chorus of gay and lesbian Muslims brought together by "A Jihad for Love" doesn't seek to vilify or reject Islam, but rather negotiate a new relationship to it. In doing so, the film's extraordinary characters attempt to point the way for all Muslims to move beyond the hostile, war-torn present, toward a more hopeful future. As one can imagine, it was a difficult decision for the subjects to participate in the film due to the violence they could face. It took the filmmaker six years to finish this film and he like those who have stepped forward to tell their stories feel that they are Islam’s most unlikely storytellers. All of them feel that this film is too important for over a billion Muslims-and all the non-Muslims in the world-for them to say no. They are willing to take the risk in their quest to lay equal claim to their profoundly held faith.

A Jihad for Love’s characters each have vastly different personal takes on Islam, some observing a rigorously orthodox regimen, others leading highly secular lifestyles while remaining spiritually devout. As the camera attentively captures their stories, the film’s gay and lesbian characters emerge in all their human complexity, giving the viewer an honest rendering of their lives while complicating our assumptions about a monolithic Muslim community. Crucially, this film speaks with a Muslim voice, unlike other documentaries about sexual politics in Islam made by Western directors. In the hope of opening a dialogue that has been mostly non-existent in Islam’s recent history, and defining jihad as a “struggle” rather than a “war,” the film presents the struggle for love.

VIDEOS:

Parvez Sharma interviewed on CNN International live.



Homosexuality in Arabic Middle Eastern Literature


The expression of male homoerotic sentiment is one of the dominant themes in classical Arabic literature from the ninth century to the nineteenth.

In poetry, traditionally considered the supreme art among the Arabs, love lyrics by male poets about males were almost as popular as those about females, and in certain times and places even more popular. But in prose literature as well, including such varied genres as anecdotal collections, vignettes in rhymed prose known as maqamat, shadowplays, and explicit erotica, homoerotic themes, mostly male but also female, are anything but rare.Even though homosexual behavior is condemned in the strongest terms by Islamic law, a position reiterated by numerous legal and pietistic works devoted to the subject, homoerotic love generally appears in poetry and belles lettres as a phenomenon every bit as natural as heteroerotic love and subject to the same range of treatments, from humorous to passionate.

This striking affirmation of homosexuality does not, however, go back to the earliest period of Arabic literature. In the extant poetry from the sixth, seventh, and early eighth centuries--from a generation or two before the advent of Islam through its first century--there are virtually no references to homosexuality at all.

It was during this period that love poetry developed into an independent genre, or rather two, one playful and teasing, the other, known as udhri verse, passionate and even despairing; but both were initially uniformly heteroerotic.

Abu Nuwas and Pederastic Love

Then, quite abruptly in the late eighth century, in the cosmopolitan atmosphere of the newly founded capital at Baghdad, a generation of poets began to celebrate the illicit joys of wine and boys, in verses whose sparkle and charm have made the most famous of them, Abu Nuwas (died ca 815), one of the glories of Arabic literature.

The pederastic love celebrated by Abu Nuwas is of a type familiar from ancient Greece. The objects of his affection are adolescent boys, whose charms are conventionally described in terms virtually identical to those for women: wide hips, a narrow waist, languid eyes, and so forth.

The sexual goal, implicitly understood in his chaster poems but graphically described in the more licentious ones, is anal intercourse, with the poet taking the active role. The boy is presumed to submit, if he does, out of mercenary rather than sexual motives, while the poet, as penetrator in the sexual act, retains his masculinity intact.

An interest in boys was fully compatible with an interest in women, and even Abu Nuwas wrote a number of love poems directed at the latter. Besides their physical attractions, boys and women also shared a subordinate status in society; in poetry about boys this subordination is often further emphasized by making the boy a member of the lower classes, or a slave, or a Christian.

Since drinking wine is forbidden by Islam, taverns were normally run by Christians, and one of Abu Nuwas's favorite themes is the seduction of a Christian boy serving as cupbearer during a night of revelry in one of these taverns.

Convention stated that a boy lost his allure once he became adult, the transition being marked by the growth of his beard. The first down on the cheeks was universally considered an enhancement of the boy's beauty, but also heralded its imminent termination.

This crucial transition became an extremely popular topos for poetry and soon enough generated a response defending the unspoilt beauty of a fully bearded young man. Both points of view continued to find advocates for centuries, resulting eventually in anthologies of "beard poetry" devoted exclusively to this debate.

Nevertheless, the age differential between active and passive partners in a male homosexual relation remained crucial since the sexual submission of one adult male to another was considered a repugnant idea in this society and assumed to be the result of a pathological desire to be penetrated.

The adult passive homosexual was an object of derision, and not normally a subject for poetry, an exception proving the rule being the licentious poet Jahshawayh (ninth century) who flaunted his passive homosexuality and wrote panegyrics on the penis.

The Two Genres of Erotic Verse

Explicitly sexual poetry such as Jahshawayh's fell under the generic rubric "licentious" (mujun) and was distinguished from the chaster love lyric (ghazal). From the time of Abu Nuwas, both of these genres were cultivated in both heteroerotic and homoerotic varieties, and the speed with which the homoerotic love lyric, in particular, became established in the normal poetic repertoire is astonishing.

Such famous ninth-century poets as Abu Tammam, al-Buhturi, and Ibn al-Mu`tazz composed both homoerotic and heteroerotic love poems, but far more of the former. Homoerotic poetry was certainly not unwelcome at the caliphal court, and some caliphs actively encouraged it.

The libertine caliph al-Amin (reigned 809-813), in particular, who patronized Abu Nuwas, was notorious for his fondness for the court eunuchs, and in particular the black eunuch Kawthar. According to a famous story, his mother attempted to lure him away from the eunuchs by dressing up the court slave girls in boys' clothing, bobbing their hair, and painting artificial mustaches on their faces.

The ploy succeeded in deflecting al-Amin's attention but also initiated an extraordinary vogue among the aristocracy for these "boy-girls" (ghulamiyat) that was to persist for several generations.

There is no evidence that these ghulamiyat were identified in any way with lesbianism--they were, after all, meant to appeal to men. A few of them, however, were said to have had lesbian affairs, as were some of the slave girls in general, particularly some of those who were trained in poetry and song and commanded high prices--and considerable prestige--among the upper classes.

Lesbian Love Poetry

A certain amount of lesbian love poetry is preserved, but though the anthologists, uniformly male, evince little bias against lesbianism, they also display strikingly little interest in it, and most of the female poets we know of are represented as fully heterosexual in both their lives and their art.

Ninth-Century Court Wits

Some years after al-Amin, under the caliph al-Mutawakkil (reigned 847-861), homoerotic poetry again found favor at court, amid an atmosphere of general hedonism and libertinism. Al-Mutawakkil also offered encouragement to the mukhannaths, passive homosexual male transvestites who served as musicians and court jesters, and particularly the celebrated Abbada, whose witticisms were faithfully reported by anthologists for centuries.

Other court wits devoted their talents to composing scandalous essays with titles such as Lesbians and Passive Male Homosexuals, The Superiority of the Rectum over the Mouth, and Rare Anecdotes about Eunuchs. All these works are unfortunately lost, but we find extensive quotations from them in later Arabic works of erotica, the earliest surviving of which dates from the late tenth century.

Al-Jahiz's Prose Discussions of Homosexuality

Extant prose discussions of homosexuality are in any case not lacking for the ninth century, most notably in the works of al-Jahiz (died 868), one of the greatest prose writers in the history of Arabic literature.

In his role of objective observer of the human scene, al-Jahiz broaches the topic frequently, remarking, for example, that "you will find among women some who prefer women, others who prefer men, others who prefer eunuchs, and yet others who like them all without distinction, and the same holds true with men's preferences for men, women, or eunuchs."

Elsewhere, however, he shows himself quite hostile to homosexuality in either sex, declaring it unnatural and shameful. He also remarks on the abruptness with which male homoeroticism has become a public, and literary, phenomenon, and offers an interesting, if not entirely convincing, explanation.

The revolutionary troops from eastern Iran who installed the Abbasid dynasty of caliphs in 750, he tells us, were forbidden to take their wives with them on campaign and resorted for sexual satisfaction to their pages; they then brought this newly acquired taste to Baghdad, where it has since flourished.

Besides its inherent implausibility, this explanation fails to account for an obvious continuity with both sexual and literary patterns known from the pre-Islamic eastern Mediterranean, and one that is deducible, although evidence is largely lacking, for the pre-Islamic Iranian world as well.

Al-Jahiz would not have known much about these earlier traditions, but, ironically, his own work reflects them. Certainly his most extended discussion of male homosexuality is to be found in his well-known Maids and Youths, a debate between proponents of the love of boys and the love of women (won by the latter, which is not surprising, given al-Jahiz's own views).

The advocate of boys lists such advantages as their not menstruating or getting pregnant and their generally greater availability, whereas the advocate of women points out that boys are attractive for only a very short period--until their beards grow--but women can retain their allure into their forties.

What is striking is that the form of this debate, as well as many of its arguments, parallels similar debates in the Greek literature of late antiquity. Similarly, poems on the beard topos look almost like--but are not--translations of Greek poems preserved in the sixth-century Greek Anthology.

How these apparent continuities are to be reconciled with the discontinuity we find in Arabic literature is a puzzle that remains unexplained.

Anal Intercourse and Islamic Law

One of the arguments put forth by the advocate of women in al-Jahiz's debate is that sex with boys is forbidden by Islamic law, whereas sex with women is licit under conditions of marriage or concubinage.

In fact, Islamic sanctions against anal intercourse, considered the male homosexual act, are extremely harsh. In contrast to the societal attitudes that are reflected in literature, both the active and passive partners are in law considered equally culpable.

The various legal schools differ on the appropriate punishment, some of them making sodomy a capital crime, others reducing the sentence to one hundred lashes for the unmarried offender, in analogy with the penalty for heterosexual fornication, and even the most lenient prescribing a discretionary punishment by the judge for which a reduced number of lashes and imprisonment are suggested.

As with heterosexual fornication, however, the rules of evidence are made almost impossibly stringent: Conviction is permitted only on the basis of repeated confession or the eyewitnessing of the act of penetration by four (in some schools two) male witnesses of established probity.

In general, the jurists treat (active) homosexuality in a manner strictly analogous to heterosexual fornication--as a natural temptation but a grievous (if apparently seldom prosecuted) offense.

This conception is echoed not only in al-Jahiz's debate (in which the advocate of boys retorts to the advocate of women that heterosexual fornication is more harshly and explicitly condemned by the law than homosexual sodomy), but also in the numerous later debates composed in the same spirit over the following centuries (one of which turns up in the Arabian Nights).

Dying for Love

Another argument advanced by the advocate of girls in al-Jahiz's debate is that no one is known ever to have died of love for a boy, whereas the famous lovers who have perished from unfulfilled passion for their unobtainable female beloveds are legion.

The reference here is to the udhri tradition of poet-lovers, whose equally devoted beloveds were married off to another man or otherwise separated from them, and who either went mad or died from their frustrated, chaste passion.

In al-Jahiz's day, there was indeed no homoerotic poetry that took itself this seriously; but this deficiency was soon to be remedied. Already in al-Jahiz's own old age, a bureaucrat named Khalid al-Katib was producing a long series of plaintive laments on an unobtainable boy, and in the following generation a prominent jurist was to codify a form of chaste homoerotic passion just as intense as that of the heteroerotic udhri tradition.

Ibn Dawud and The Book of the Flower

Muhammad ibn Dawud al-Zahiri, the son and successor of the founder of a conservative Islamic law school which has not survived, is best known for his anthology of poetry, The Book of the Flower, whose first half deals with love poetry and is considered the prototype of the "theory of love" genre in Arabic literature, of which we have dozens of exemplars extending into at least the eighteenth century.

Ibn Dawud's book tracks the progress of the stereotypical love affair, illustrating each stage with both heteroerotic and homoerotic verses, the latter mostly from his own pen. Central to his idealizing view is a statement transmitted from the Prophet Muhammad that "He who loves passionately, remains chaste, hides his love, and then dies, dies a martyr," and thus enters Paradise directly, without awaiting the Last Judgment.

According to several accounts of dubious historicity, Ibn Dawud cited this tradition on his deathbed, explaining that he was dying from his chaste passion for a younger man named Ibn Jami`.

The transmitter of these anecdotes, Ibn Dawud's friend and colleague Niftawayh, himself composed chaste homoerotic love lyrics, and numerous later poets also pursued this genre.

The "Permitted Gaze"

Also particularly associated with the name of Ibn Dawud, although not explicitly attested in his book, was the doctrine of the "permitted gaze," according to which looking on a boy's beauty, without physical relations, was allowed under Islamic law.

The primary advocates of this doctrine, however, were not legal experts such as Ibn Dawud, but Sufi mystics, who began sometime in the ninth century to practice such "gazing" as a religious exercise, seeing in the beautiful boy a "witness" to God's beauty and creative power.

Such exercises were often associated with spiritual "concerts," and songs and verses celebrating the beauty of and love for a boy as a metaphor for God's beauty became a significant subgenre of mystical Arabic poetry, though it was to achieve far greater popularity in Persian. Religious conservatives, however, continued for centuries to attack both the "permitted gaze" and the martyr tradition.

Al-Khubza'aruzzi and Ibn Waki'

In the century following Ibn Dawud, two poets stand out for their particular contributions to the homoerotic lyric.

The first, al-Khubza'aruzzi (died ca 938), was an illiterate baker of rice-bread in Basra, in lower Iraq, whose delicate lyrics on the beautiful young men of the city attracted the admiring attention of the aristocratic court poets, who would visit his bakery in order to hear him declaim his verses.

Two generations later, in the city of Tinnis in Egypt, Ibn Waki` al-Tinnisi (died 1003) charmed his contemporaries with his poetic evocations of gardens, wine, and boys, recalling both the waggishness of Abu Nuwas and the elegance of Ibn al-Mu`tazz.

The Anthologies of al-Tha'alibi

Extensive selections from the poetry of both al-Khubza'aruzzi and Ibn Waki` are preserved in several works by the indefatigable anthologist al-Tha`alibi (died 1038). Among al-Tha'alibi's collections the one entitled The Book of Boys is unfortunately lost, but it was of considerable influence in later centuries, when a series of literary figures compiled similar "beauty" anthologies, beginning with al-`Adili's (mid-thirteen century) A Thousand and One Boys and its heteroerotic companion A Thousand and One Girls.

Ibn Hazm

The parallel popularity of heteroerotic and male homoerotic love poetry (with lesbian poetry a rare anomaly) was as true of Islamic Spain as of elsewhere in the Arabic-speaking world.

Of particular interest in Andalusian literature is the best known of the "love theory" books, The Ring of the Dove by the jurist Ibn Hazm (died 1064), which eschews the anthology form, previously standard, for a mixture of the author's own verse with prose anecdotes about his contemporaries and their affairs, both heterosexual and homosexual.

Aside from its final moralizing chapters condemning the evils of heterosexual fornication and sodomy, this work offers in its matter-of-fact way a valuable picture of love among the aristocracy and in the Andalusian courts.

Turkish Dominance: The Post-Classical Period

The classical period in Arabic literature closes with the twelfth century. The subsequent post-classical period is much less well known but remained at least as rich in homoerotic literature as the preceding centuries.

The increasing domination of Turks and Circassians in Arabic-speaking lands resulted in a perceptible shift in the canons of beauty, narrow "Turkish" eyes, for example, coming into fashion for both sexes.

The increasingly prevalent system of military slavery, which culminated in the Mamluk (slave) sultanate in late medieval Egypt, seems to have encouraged the cultivation of homosexual attachments in the barracks, and the young Turkish slave soldier, perhaps a bit older than his classical counterpart, became the ideal love object.

These developments are reflected in the encyclopedias and anthologies that this age of literary systematization produced in prodigious quantities, including regular series of "beard" books, "beauty" books, and general erotica, the best known example of the last of these being The Perfumed Garden by al-Nafzawi (fifteenth century).

Ibn Daniyal and al-Safadi

The range of homoerotic literature produced in the late medieval period, much of which remains to be discovered, is perhaps best illustrated by two works from fourteenth-century Egypt.

The Cairene eye physician and poet Ibn Daniyal (died 1310) exploited the popular art of the shadow play (in which translucent figures held against a backlighted screen served as characters for a kind of Punch and Judy show) to produce three extraordinary scripts virtuosic in style and licentious in genre.

The third of these plays, The Lovelorn (al-Mutayyam) mocks romantic convention by portraying an affair between the sex-obsessed title character and a standoffish Turkish slaveboy, which degenerates into an orgiastic banquet at which a series of characters representing a variety of sexual tastes declaim poetry before passing out from intoxication.

At the opposite extreme, al-Safadi (died 1363) composed a romantic maqama, comprising some seventy-five pages in elegant rhymed prose, in which a narrator tells of his falling in love with a young Turkish soldier whom he encountered hunting in a pleasure park, and of their subsequent tryst, whose physical consummation is left tantalizingly ambiguous.

Modern Attitudes toward Homoeroticism

The expression of homoerotic sentiment, in various forms, remained a constant of Arabic literature into the nineteenth century. In modern times, and in particular with the impact of the Victorian mores of colonizing Europeans, respectable society in the Arab world has on the whole become hostile to homosexuality and embarrassed by its prominence in the literary tradition. Recent conservative religious movements have only reinforced this negative stance.

Nevertheless, a few writers have broached the topic in their fiction, and though they tend to treat it more as a psychological and societal problem than as a cause for celebration, they do depict the survival of traditional attitudes alongside the more recent puritanism in their societies.

Particularly noteworthy are two novels with homosexual subplots by the Egyptian Nobelist Naguib Mahfouz, Midaq Alley and Sugar Street. Instances of homosexual themes in the extensive Arab Francophone literature include The Seven-Headed Serpent by Ali Ghanem and The Great Repudiation by Rachid Boudjedra, both Algerians, and Proud Beggars by the Egyptian Albert Cossery.

http://www.glbtq.com/literature/mid_e_lit_arabic.html


Gay Africans and Arabs come out online


Photo
KHARTOUM (Reuters) - When Ali started blogging that he was Sudanese and gay, he did not realize he was joining a band of African and Middle Eastern gays and lesbians who, in the face of hostility and repression, have come out online.

But within days the messages started coming in to black-gay-arab.blogspot.com.

"Keep up the good work," wrote Dubai-based Weblogger 'Gay by nature'. "Be proud and blog the way you like," wrote Kuwait's gayboyweekly. Close behind came comments, posts and links purporting to be from almost half the countries in the Arab League, including Egypt, Algeria, Bahrain and Morocco.

Ali, who lists his home town as Khartoum but lives in Qatar, had plugged into a small, self-supporting network of people who have launched Web sites about their sexuality, while keeping their full identity secret. Caution is crucial - homosexual acts are illegal in most countries in Africa and the Middle East, with penalties ranging from long-term imprisonment to execution.

"The whole idea started as a diary. I wanted to write what's on my mind and mainly about homosexuality," he told Reuters in an e-mail. "To tell you the truth, I didn't expect this much response."

In the current climate, bloggers say they are achieving a lot just by stating their nationality and sexual orientation.

"If you haven't heard or seen any gays in Sudan then allow me to tell you 'You Don't live In The Real World then,'" Ali wrote in a message to other Sudanese bloggers. "I'm Sudanese and Proud Gay Also."

His feelings were echoed in a mini-manifesto at the start of the blog "Rants and raves of a Kenyan gay man" that stated: "The Kenyan gay man is a myth and you may never meet one in your lifetime. However, I and many others like me do exist; just not openly. This blog was created to allow access to the psyche of me, who represents the thousands of us who are unrepresented."

NEWS AND ABUSE

That limited form of coming out has earned the bloggers abuse or criticism via their blogs' comment pages or e-mails.

"Faggot queen," wrote a commentator called 'blake' on Kenya's 'Rants and raves'. "I will put my loathing for you faggots aside momentarily, due to the suffering caused by the political situation," referring to the country's post-election violence.

Some are more measured: "The fact that you are a gay Sudanese and proudly posting about it in itself is just not natural," a reader called 'sudani' posted on Ali's blog.

Some of the bloggers use the diary-style format to share the ups and downs of gay life -- the dilemma of whether to come out to friends and relatives, the risks of meeting in known gay bars, or, according to blogger "...and then God created Men!" the joys of the Egyptian resort town Sharm el-Sheikh.

Others have turned their blogs into news outlets, focusing on reports of persecution in their region and beyond.

The blog GayUganda reported on the arrests of gay men in Senegal in February. A month earlier, Blackgayarab posted video footage of alleged police harassment in Iraq.

Kenya's "Rants and Raves" reported that gay people were targets in the country's election violence, while blogger Gukira focused on claims that boys had been raped during riots. Afriboy organized an auction of his erotic art to raise funds "to help my community in Kenya".

There was also widespread debate on the comments made by Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad last September about homosexuals in his country.

The total number of gay bloggers in the region is still relatively small, say the few Web sites that monitor the scene.

"It is the rare soul who is willing to go up against such blind and violent ignorance and advocate for gay rights and respect," said Richard Ammon of GlobalGayz.com which tracks gay news and Web sites throughout the world.

"There are a number of people from the community who are blogging both from Africa and the diaspora but it is still quite sporadic," said Nigerian blogger Sokari Ekine who keeps a directory of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender blogs on her own Web site Black Looks.

WAYS TO MEET

The overall coverage may be erratic, but pockets of gay blogging activity are starting to emerge.

There are blogs bridging the Arabic-speaking world from Morocco in the west to the United Arab Emirates in the east. There is a self-sustaining circle of gay bloggers in Kenya and Uganda together with a handful of sites put up by gay Nigerians.

And then there is South Africa, where the constitutional recognition of gay rights has encouraged many bloggers to come wholly into the open.

"I don't preserve my anonymity at all. I am embracing our constitution which gives us the right to freedom of speech ... There is nothing wrong that I am doing," said Matuba Mahlatjie of the blog My Haven.

Beyond the blogging scene, the Internet's chat rooms and community sites have also become one of the safest ways for gay Africans and Arabs to meet, away from the gaze of a hostile society.

"That is what I did at first, I mean, I looked around for others until I found others," said Gug, the writer behind the blog GayUganda.

"Oh yes, I do love the Internet, and I guess it is a tool that has made us gay Ugandans and Africans get out of our villages and realize that the parish priest's homophobia is not universal opinion. Surprise, surprise!"


http://www.reuters.com/article/technologyNews/idUSL0830007120080218?rpc=28&sp=true
By Andrew Heavens
(Editing by Andrew Dobbie and Sara Ledwith)


اختيار التقنية المناسبة لتفادي الرقابة + كيف التدوين مع الحفاظ على المجهولية؟


http://www.rsf.org/rubrique.php3?id_rubrique=629

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Handbook for bloggers and cyber-dissidents

Blogs get people excited. Or else they disturb and worry them. Some people distrust them. Others see them as the vanguard of a new information revolution. Because they allow and encourage ordinary people to speak up, they’re tremendous tools of freedom of expression.
Bloggers are often the only real journalists in countries where the mainstream media is censored or under pressure. Only they provide independent news, at the risk of displeasing the government and sometimes courting arrest.
Reporters Without Borders has produced this handbook to help them, with handy tips and technical advice on how to to remain anonymous and to get round censorship, by choosing the most suitable method for each situation. It also explains how to set up and make the most of a blog, to publicise it (getting it picked up efficiently by search-engines) and to establish its credibility through observing basic ethical and journalistic principles.

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The Turkish Soap Opera "Noor" - More Real than Life

From Saudi Arabia to Morocco: Every evening the Turkish series "Noor" draws millions of people to their television sets. The show is about love, intimacy and equality; no social taboo is ignored. Some see in "Noor" proof of social change, others only fiction.
| Posters of 'Noor' character (photo: picture alliance/dpa)
Photographs depicting the lead characters of Turkish TV soap 'Noor' are being arranged in a factory in the West Bank city of Hebron
|


Kivan Tatlitug is tall, blue-eyed, and extremely good-looking. For four months now the 24-year-old Turkish actor has been bewitching female TV viewers from Saudi Arabia to Morocco as Mohannad in the TV series "Noor".

It is an enthusiasm that has allegedly prompted a few husbands in the Gulf states to file for divorce. They found Mohannad photos on their wives' cell phones. In Saudi Arabia a large-scale farmer sold her herds of sheep so she could spend her evenings in front of the television, undisturbed.

The enthusiasm, however, is not first and foremost about the attractiveness of the Turkish ex-model. Kivan Tatlitug plays Mohannad, a man who treats his wife as an equal, who supports her in her professional career as a fashion designer, and is loving and understanding. He brings her flowers after a quarrel, surprises her with presents and a romantic vacation.

Against God and His prophets

This is male behavior that women here only know from Western film productions and that does not occur in Arab TV productions. For many female viewers gentle Mohannad is a male ideal.

"Our society", explains the Vice President of Bahrain's Women's Union, Fatima Rabea, "is not accustomed to such intimacy and love. We are so busy with our everyday lives that a loving relationship takes a back seat. The TV series 'Noor' has now awakened the desire for this."

"Satanic and immoral," is how the Grand Mufti of Saudi Arabia described the Turkish television series "Noor" while demanding that TV stations immediately cancel this "attack on God and his prophets".

In the Palestinian city of Nablus a member of the parliament and preacher from the radical Islamist party Hamas warned against the series, which violates "religion, values, and tradition".

The criticism from both conservative dignitaries is not directed solely at the liberal TV role model of man and woman. The Turkish soap opera has broken other social taboos in conservative Muslim societies, which has also contributed to the success of the series.

Premarital sex and abortion

Between three and four million Saudis follow the life and love of Noor and her husband Mohannad every evening. Streets in the Palestinian Gaza Strip and the West Bank are empty when the show is being aired.

And if the power goes out, people set their alarms so they won't miss the rerun early in the morning. Even in other Arab countries such as Syria, Bahrain, and Morocco large families gather in front of their TV sets every evening to watch their heroes.

The TV series depicts a panorama of reality in Arab societies that cannot be seen anywhere else. Before marrying Noor Mohannad had premarital sex and fathered a child; a cousin has an abortion; and alcohol is consumed at dinner.

"We all do things in our lives that are shown in the series," says Syrian actress Laura Abu Sa'ad, who lends her Arab voice to the female leading character "Noor".

"Many girls, for instance, get pregnant and have abortions, but nobody talks about it. It is a relief to see on TV what is typically swept under the rug."

For Laura Abu Sa'ad the success of the series is a sign that "Arab Muslims want to follow a moderate Islam and not the extremists."

Ideal for tourism
Turkish girls playing in a park (photo: AP)

Other than in Turkish every day life religion is not a main subject in "Noor". The female characters are acting unveiled
|
Religion plays a subordinate role in the series. The marriage between Noor and Mohannad was arranged by grandfather, and they fast during the month of Ramadan. But none of the leading characters are shown at the five daily prayers, nor do the women wear religious headscarves.

"I think this series portrays a very unrealistic image of Turkey," criticizes Professor Khalid Amine of the Moroccan University in Tetouan. "As if the Islamist Party were not in the government and there were no conflicts between religion and secularism. The production conveys an idealization that is good only for tourism."

"My family from Belgium," continues the university professor, "is not returning home to Morocco for the summer holidays, but is traveling to Turkey."

The children want to see the setting of "The Lost Years", another popular Turkish series for youth, the parents want to see the country of Noor and Mohannad. In Istanbul the Turkish production company of "Noor" has turned the villa, the fictional home of Mohannad, into a museum for Arab tourists. From Saudi Arabia alone 100,000 visitors are expected, 70,000 more than last year.

A make-do becomes a hit

The cult status of the series came as a total surprise for the pan-Arab satellite station MBC. In Turkey the series "Noor", launched in 2005, was not a commercial success. According to MBC President, Sheik Walid al-Ibrahim, MBC was scouting abroad for inexpensive products because Arab TV series are outrageously expensive.

The Turkish make-do, synchronized not with classic Arab but with the spoken dialect of the region, has become the biggest hit for the station with its headquarters in Dubai. More Turkish series is scheduled to follow.

Alfred Hackensberger Qantara.de 2008 Translated from the German by Nancy Joyce

(P.S
Kivan Tatlitug happens to be openly gay)

"A Jihad for Love" – a documentary by Parvez Sharma

Islam's Most Unlikely Storytellers

Parvez Sharma spent six years traveling throughout the Muslim world, Europe and North America documenting the lives of gay and lesbian Muslims – many of them devout – who struggle to reconcile their faith with their sexuality. Marianna Evenstein caught up with the Indian filmmaker

| Bild: Film poster: 'A Jihad For Love'
Bild vergrössern Because homosexuality is still a taboo subject in most of the Islamic world, Parvez Sharma shot much of his material undercover
|
Parvez Sharma identifies himself as both gay and Muslim. He moved to the United States in 2000, but it was only after the September 11 attacks in 2001 that Sharma felt compelled to "come out" as a Muslim in the US.

"Everything in the world had changed in some ways, and my Islam made me very visible in the West" he says. At the same time, Sharma was frustrated with the negative ways in which Islam was being portrayed in Western media post 9-11. The making of "A Jihad for Love" allowed him to tell the "story of Islam through its most unlikely storytellers – gay and lesbian Muslims."

The subjects of Sharma's film represent the various and diverse worlds of Islam – Sunnis and Shi'ites, traditional and modern, orthodox and more secular. They include an openly gay imam in South Africa, an Egyptian who was imprisoned and tortured for being gay before fleeing to France, a lesbian couple in Turkey, and four young gay men who escaped Iran and now live in Canada.

What all of these individuals share is a continued and intense devotion to their faith. Despite the ordeals they go through, none of them chooses to abandon their beliefs.

Sharma spent a great deal of time developing a relationship of trust with his subjects, which enabled them to open up about the intensely private experiences of faith and sexuality. This in turn had a tremendous impact on Sharma personally.

Lessons about faith

"I have definitely gone through a long journey of reclaiming my faith and reclaiming my Islam through this film. I feel like I went on a journey through the many worlds of Islam. I have suffered the anguish my subjects suffered, and they taught me every day about faith."

According to traditional interpretations of the Qur'an, homosexuality is considered sinful and is strictly forbidden. As a result, same-sex activities are outlawed in most Islamic countries. Because Sharma knew that he would never be granted permission from Islamic governments to make a film on such a taboo subject, he often shot his material undercover. "I pretended to be a tourist," he explains. "I was able to get remarkable access because I looked like everybody else."

Sharma's own religious identity enabled him to create a film from an insider's perspective and with a tremendous amount of respect for the faith. "In many ways, being a Muslim enabled me to film with a Muslim lens and a great deal of understanding of Islam," says Sharma. "It would have been easy to make a film that was just critical of my religion. But I worked very hard together with my subjects to make sure that the beauty of the faith they hold so dear is documented with absolute honesty and integrity."

Jihad as an internal, spiritual struggle

The film's title, "A Jihad for Love", was a very deliberate choice. In the West, the concept of "jihad" has come to be associated primarily with "holy war". But "jihad" in Islamic tradition is also understood as an internal, spiritual struggle.

| Bild: Parvez Sharma (photo: Steve Rhodes)
Bild vergrössern "A Jihad for Love" reveals homophobia and persecution in the Muslim world, but Parvez Sharma has stated that the purpose of the film is not to vilify Islam
|
As Sharma explains: "We are laying claim to one of the most contested and divisive words in our vocabulary today, and saying that what the violent minority within Islam presents as jihad is certainly not what the Prophet Mohammed was talking about. Because he was talking about the greater jihad, the struggle within the self."

It is this kind of struggle that the subjects of Sharma's film are engaged in – a personal, spiritual struggle for acceptance, and ultimately for love. While there is much anguish in each of their stories, there is also a sense of hope. As the film's characters strive to reconcile their beliefs with the innate reality of their being, they succeed in negotiating a new, personal relationship to Islam. And by doing this, they offer both Muslims and non-Muslims everywhere a different kind of perspective – one that focuses on a shared humanity and bridges religious divides.

Bringing change into mosques, communities

"A Jihad for Love" has already sparked a tremendous response from audiences at film festivals in Canada, Brazil, Mexico, South Africa and the UK. While most of the reaction has been overwhelmingly positive, Sharma admits that he has received a number of angry and threatening emails. But this has not deterred him from his goal of bringing the film to Muslim audiences in the Muslim world.

"Seeing the audience response and how people are embracing this film, I realize that in the next few years the film will turn into a movement," says Sharma. "We are launching a Muslim dialogue project with this film, which will be transformative and create change. I will take this film into mosques, into communities where it really matters most."

"If I can prevent a young man in Tehran or a young woman in Cairo from feeling completely isolated and alone, from contemplating suicide… (if I can) give them a sense of hope to be able to exercise their sexuality but also stay true to their faith… if one person's life is changed by the film, I think I would have been victorious in some way."

Marianna Evenstein

© Qantara.de 2008

"A Jihad for Love" is directed and produced by Parvez Sharma, co-produced by Sandi DuBowski (Director/Producer of the award-winning "Trembling Before G-d") in association with ZDF-Arte, Channel 4, LOGO, SBS-Australia, The Sundance Documentary Fund and The Katahdin Foundation.

The film will be screened in the Panorama documentary section of the Berlin International Film Festival. For exact screening times, visit the festival's official website. www.berlinale.de

From:
http://www.qantara.de/webcom/show_article.php/_c-310/_nr-523/webcom/show_article.php/_c-310/_nr-500/i.html

Artists Without Frontiers!

Become an Artist Without Frontiers, TODAY!

Dear Artist,
Do you want to connect with others?
Do you believe your work can and should make a difference?


THEN READ ON:

As artists we gather under one roof, whatever field we are in, whatever culture we come from. We may not all be exposed to poverty or censorship, but many are. If we come together to share our vision, our passion and our problems we can change things, for the better.

If our aims speak to you, join us.

We aim to:

  • Use the power of the web to bring together artists around the world, advance human rights, particularly of artists suffering from imprisonment, censorship or cultural isolation.
  • Promote cross-cultural understanding and build a network of mutual help.
  • Further the education of young and potential artists and help them advance their careers.

BECOME A MEMBER OF AWF: We are open to people who work in the creative arts anywhere in the world.

Membership is FREE and will allow you to:

Have your own web page and gallery. You can use this to talk about your work and background. Show current examples of your work. Your page will be published in conjunction with a WEB Magazine.

Sell your work at an on-line shop. This shop will sell members' work only. Have access to funds. As a registered charity, AWF will raise funds for projects. You will be eligible for these when available and appropriate.

With the editor's approval, you can have your work reviewed in the Magazine, and be included in performance events.

Become an AWF member, join us now.

American hit song been banned from radio stations in Dubai for containing lyrics that “depict sexuality, lesbianism and promiscuity”



United Arab Emirates:
American hit song banned

An American hit song receiving airplay in the United Arab Emirates provokes controversy and has been banned from radio stations in Dubai for containing lyrics that “depict sexuality, lesbianism and promiscuity”, reported the daily newspaper Gulf News

In 2007, American singer Katy Perry’s debut single, ‘UR So Gay’, generated some online buzz with its socalled ‘mischievous lyrics’, and her audience grew accordingly. In 2008 her debut album, ‘One of the Boys’, was released, and her current single ‘I Kissed a Girl’ has put the 24-year-old singer on the international stage by topping the USA, United Kingdom, Canada and Australia charts while so far reaching Number 4 on the WorldWide Charts. The music video for the song has been viewed more than six million times on YouTube.com.

In the United Arab Emirates, however, the girl-kiss song was reported to have been blacklisted by some radio stations because of its lyrics that go,

    “I kissed a girl and I liked it
    the taste of her cherry chap stick
    I kissed a girl just to try it
    hope my boyfriend don't mind it”

The Emirati sociologist Dr Mouza Ghubash expressed her concern at the song’s arrival in the United Arab Emirates, saying it formed part of a wider problem facing youth culture in the Arab world.

She told Gulf News: “This song reflects the kind of relationship and behaviour that is common in Western societies and that can also be found as a new phenomenon in Arab culture. Of course, we refute such ideas and songs but at the same time we cannot avoid them. We must ensure our youngsters concentrate on their education — with the help of their families, teachers and lecturers, to protect them from imitating other Western cultures. United Arab Emirates society is so open these days and great pressure is placed on the country’s decision-makers, such as the Ministry of Education, to preserve our national identity.”

Deemed offensive
Fiona Winterburn, head of music at Gulf News Broadcasting, was quoted by Gulf News as saying:

“We’ve listened to the song but have so far decided against playing it because we realise the lyrics are quite sensitive to local culture and could offend some of our listeners.”

Abdullah Julfar, an undergraduate student of United Arab Emirates nationality, told Gulf News he found the song very offensive towards his cultural and religious values:

“I think there should be some sort of social responsibility in the media to stop such ridiculous songs from being played,” he said.

On a webpage of Arabian Business.com, Alaa Banna from Jordan commented:
“I haven't heard this song yet, but thanks for the censors, I will download the song and promote for it myself.”

Amira from Dubai commented:
“I believe this song does contravene the Islamic culture and radio and tv stations should be more sensitive. I heard this song last night on the radio and it occurred to me it was very controversial and wondered why they were playing it.”

Child of two pastors
The British paper Daily Record reported that the singer’s mother, Mary Hudson, an evangelical Christian preacher, is ‘deeply ashamed’ of her daughter and says, “I hate the song. It clearly promotes homosexuality and its message is shameful and disgusting.”

Katy Perry (real name: Katy Hudson) insists her parents are supportive of her career — despite reports they do not approve of her lyrics. She says, “I’m sure they opt out of singing ‘I Kiss a Girl’ or ‘Ur So Gay’, but they’re singing along to every other song.”

Born in 1984 in Santa Barbara, California, the middle child of two deeply traditional pastors, Katy Perry told EW.com that when she was a child she wasn’t allowed to listen to any kind of non-religious music, and Madonna videos were definitely a no-no. “MTV and VH1 were permanently blocked on our television,” Katy Perry said.







Katy Perry






























The single cover for 'I Kissed a Girl'






















Music video
YouTube:

youtube.com/user/KatyPerryMusic?ob=1

Muslim rap is developing a large following in the US and UK, yet female artists trying to break into the scene are often intimidated, or even threaten


n the male-dominated world of hip-hop, female rappers have always had it tough. But, as Neelo fer Mir will testify, it's even tougher if you are a devout Muslim woman. Mir, a 27-year-old south Londoner, is a huge fan of artists such as Jill Scott and Alicia Keys, and has long held dreams of emulating their success as a rapper and spoken-word poet. As she established a following on the open-mike circuit, won an award for her work and attracted offers to collaborate with the likes of the Mercury Prize-winning DJ Talvin Singh, it seemed that her dream was coming true.

Unfortunately, her family and other Muslim friends and acquaintances don't share her vision. Mir has had to battle their suspicion that she is just using her love of rap and performance as a cover to behave in what they feel are un-Islamic ways: going to nightclubs or meeting men.

"Baring your soul on stage is hard," she says, "so when you're leaving your family home to go and perform, you want to feel support. Instead, you feel as if you're two inches tall. There is an old-school mentality, very much alive today, that women really don't belong in performing arts - they should remain in the domestic arena. And me being a strong-minded, very opinionated female from a Muslim family, it's difficult for me, because I'm seen as going against the grain. The criticism I get is hurtful and it's really difficult to be who I want to be, both as an individual and as an artist."

Mir is not alone in wanting to break into an industry that is seen by the more conservative elements in Muslim communities as highly undesirable for young women. She is one of more than a dozen artists whose work is featured on Sisterhood, an online mixtape of previously unreleased songs by up-and-coming female Muslim rappers, MCs and poets from the UK, US and Europe. Their music deals with a range of issues that each has been affected by on some level.

For example, 18-year-old Lady Dizzla, a rapper and dancer of Yemeni and Indian descent who is based in London, contributes a track called "I Won't Cry", about the physical and emotional scars of rape. "Open Soul Closed", by Angel MC Shay, a Sheffield-based rapper and writer who has been creating lyrics since the age of 12, was written at the time when the British government was debating the merits of going to war in Iraq. Lyrical Lailah, from Bradford, addresses the silence surrounding violence against women.

Judging by the success of the recent Dangerous Ideas tour of leading MCs and rappers, there is a big audience for Islamic hip-hop in the UK. Artists from all over the world played to sold-out venues during the tour, the aim of which was to showcase contemporary Islamic culture and encourage young British Muslims to express themselves through the arts. Both here and in the United States, Muslim rap artists are gaining popularity among young Muslims, who want a form of entertainment that reflects both their mainstream musical tastes and their religious beliefs. The internet has fuelled the market for Islamic hip-hop, building an international fan base for Muslim acts such as Native Deen, from the US, and the UK's Mecca2Medina.

Within this growing scene, however, female rappers are facing a tough time. "In many Muslim communities, there is virtually no support for young women who want to express themselves as creative artists," says Deeyah, the singer who founded the Sisterhood project from the hundreds of songs submitted to her through her MySpace page. "It's not one of the professions expected of a woman.

"Many are actively discouraged from expressing their thoughts and dreams through music. A big part of the problem is the cultural expec tations placed upon women. There is the association of music with sexuality and a westernised form of expression. The main aim I had in putting together the Sisterhood project was to let young Muslim girls know they are not alone in their struggles to get their music out there."

Deeyah's own experiences show just how bad it can get for a Muslim woman who insists on freedom of artistic expression. Born in Norway, she was dubbed "the Muslim Madonna" after the release of her first album, a mix of classical Pakistani music, jazz and folk. The record was a huge commercial success, and Deeyah went on to work with internationally renowned artists such as Jan Garbarek and Don Cherry.

However, her act alienated her from Norway's Muslim community. Following the release of her self-titled second album, the opposition grew louder. Norwegian Muslims claimed she was a bad role model after promotional videos for the album showed her with her back exposed and dressed in what was deemed to be sexually alluring western attire. Deeyah received verbal threats against herself and her family. And during one concert in 1995 she was attacked onstage.

The following year she came to London, hoping that things would be different, but the problems were soon to return. When the video for her single "Plan of My Own" was aired on an Asian music channel, featuring the singer dancing seductively with a man, the death threats and harassment started again. She is now based in the US and needs the constant protection of bodyguards. "People have said to me, 'If you wore more modest attire, toned your act down a little, you'd be OK.' Well, you know something? I've tried wearing traditional costumes onstage and I'm still the whore. I'm still the person who's wrong."

Muneera Rashida, of the leading London rap act Poetic Pilgrimage, agrees that wearing more conventional attire such as the hijab when performing often does little to appease critics. "I personally want to wear the hijab," she says, "but that's got nothing to do with what you think of me onstage or how you think I should look. That's between me and my Lord and it should be the same with Deeyah. But when we perform as Poetic Pilgrimage we face people who say: 'You're a Muslim, you're wearing the hijab and you're mixing your religion with this type of music. How dare you?' Whichever direction we turn in, there will be someone with something to say.

"Those opinions are not necessarily the majority," she stresses; "they're just the more vocal opinions, often expressed by the people who own the mosques and the publishing companies. They feel this gives them the right to shout louder than anybody else."

Dr Daud Abdullah of the Muslim Council of Great Britain argues that the traditionalists have a point. "If you look at the case of Janet Jackson, who caused such a furore a few years ago when she exposed her nipple during her performance at that year's Superbowl, it shows that even among non-Muslims, there are clearly understood ideas of decency," he says. "Many Muslim women do perform to audiences of other women at weddings, for example, because the sexes are strictly segregated. Those performers enjoy a good career. It's when women perform for wider, mixed audiences that differences of opinion emerge.

"These objections are based on the Islamic view that women should not draw unnecessary attention to themselves, because of the impact this will have on a male audience. The moral framework of Islam has already been laid down and women should not push beyond its boundaries for the sake of commercial gain."

Ishmael Yasin, a rapper with Mecca2Medina, believes that opposition to artists such as Neelo fer Mir and Deeyah is slowly losing ground. "Many of the Islamic arts programmes which have sprung up in the past few years need government funding, which clearly stipulates that you can't discriminate on the grounds of race or gender. So, organisations putting on events now include women performers where they would never have thought of doing so before. That has opened up the doors for acts like Pearls of Islam and Poetic Pilgrimage.

"People like myself and others I work with understand that you need to encourage this. In Asian and Arabian cultures, from which many Muslims in this country originate, women are not really prominent in the life of society. Often a minority of men from that cultural background share a chauvinistic mentality and try to use Islam to mask it."

"Sisterhood" is available at www.myspace.com/deeyahpresents

Friday, December 5, 2008

Pressure on Muslim women to stay out of music

Within a growing scene for Islamic hip-hop in the United Kingdom, women rappers are facing a tough time. When a woman tries to break into the scene she is often intimidated, or even threatened, reported the New Statesman magazine.

During 2007–2008, the Norwegian Muslim singer and human rights activist Deeyah set up a project for Muslim women in music in a bid to change attitudes towards women artists. As a result of the hundreds of songs which were submitted to her from women rappers and singers through her profile-page on the internet music community MySpace.com she organised an online mixtape of previously unreleased songs written by young up-and-coming women Muslim rappers, singers and poetesses from the UK, Europe and US, and named the project ‘Sisterhood’.


Click on photo to go to MySpace profile

“In many Muslim communities, there is virtually no support for young women who want to express themselves as creative artists. Many [Muslim women] are actively discouraged from expressing their thoughts and dreams through music. A big part of the problem is the cultural expectations placed upon women. There is the association of music with sexuality and a westernised form of expression. The main aim I had in putting together the Sisterhood project was to let young Muslim girls know they are not alone in their struggles to get their music out there,” the 30-year-old singer told the New Statesman magazine.

Dreams and hopes
“This is just the first small step towards encouraging these artists and others like them out there to pursue their dreams and hopes, and a way to let them know they are not alone. Female Muslim artists face a tough time. There‘s very little support for them. But they are not alone as this first collection proves... they have something to say and they deserve to be heard. Hopefully we can help create a platform to have their voices and opinions heard as both artists and Muslim women living in Western societies,” Deeyah is quoted as saying on the Myspace profile of the project, myspace.com/deeyahpresents.

“I wanted to give these young women the support and encouragement I never had — as I've had to learn myself, no one will do anything for us which is why we have to help each other and create the change ourselves. I don’t want these women feeling the same isolation and difficulties I had to through the years simply because of my background and choice of career which is why it was essential for me to create this project in an attempt to build a sense of community and a network of support for my fellow sisters and artists. My aim is to continue supporting and working with up and coming female artists as well as doing what I can to promote the right to freedom of choice and expression,” Deeyah told Freemuse.

Stepped away from pop music
Throughout her career Deeyah has received death threats by members of her religious community, basically because they disapproved of her music career. She is now based in the US and has since 2006 completely stepped away from commercial mainstream pop music due to the years of this harassment and abuse. She does continue to work on some music, but she has moved away from pop music and from the public eye in the last couple of years.



Deeyah

Deeyah's story, in short, is the story of a singer and songwriter who is passionate about human rights, and especially about women's rights. Most of her life she has found resistance and constant disapproval of her career choice which is music. She told Freemuse in an email interview in August 2008:

“This is because in my culture music is considered an unacceptable career choice. It is not viewed as a respectable profession for a woman to have. The resistance to me grew with the years and with my success. The more attention I started getting for my music, the more attention I also started getting from people within my community who did not wish for me to be as outspoken and visible in the national media as I became. Some told me to my face on several occasions that I was providing a ‘bad example for their young daughters’ — that I ‘might make their daughters think it’s OK to do what I do’ — and that it ‘would make their daughters think that they should do this too’.

With the growing attention came also harassment, intimidation, warnings and death threats. After several incidents and constant barrage of violent threats and warnings Deeyah left Oslo for the United Kingdom. Years on, but following the exact patterns from Norway, only now in the United Kingdom as her music and her person started receiving more attention and airtime the same warnings and threats started flooding in. This time from members of the Muslim community in the United Kingdom. As a result in early 2005 Deeyah went to the MET police where she has found understanding, support, advice and guidance till this day. '

Reactions from the Muslim communities
In 2005 Deeyah moved to the US where she, out of years of anger, sadness and frustration over this life of start and stop, ended up recording a song and music video called ‘What Will It Be?’, as a middle finger to the people who do everything in their power to choke individual's right to freedom of expression and choice. Since then she recorded an album with Andy Summers, Bob James and Nils Petter Molvaer called ‘Ataraxis’.

Deeyah: “The Ataraxis album was a wonderful creative outlet for me. Something I desperately needed to do for my own peace of mind.”

Freemuse: What have reactions from the various Muslim communities been towards your Sisterhood project?

“The reactions from young male and female Muslims have been overwhelmingly supportive and encouraging. However, from what I understand, some community leaders and religious leaders are not all that supportive of the concept and the Sisterhood project. Although this is disappointing and disheartening, these types of negative attitudes are no longer a surprise to me and sadly it's something I've just come to expect from these so-called leaders. ”

http://www.myspace.com/deeyahpresents
http://www.freemuse.org/sw29495.asp

Norwegian singer Deeyah wins Freedom Award



27 November 2008

USA / UK / Norway:

Deeyah, the exiled Norwegian singer and activist, was awarded with an ArtVenture Freedom to Create Prize at a ceremony in London on 26 November 2008.

More than 900 artists from 86 countries had been nominated. Three artists, Deeyah along with Turkish-Kurdish Ferhat Tunç and Burmese Win Maw, nominated by Freemuse, all made it to the final shortlist of five in their respective categories.

The main prize category was awarded to the Zimbabwean playwright Cont Mhlanga — a fierce opponent of the Mugabe regime. Deeyah was awarded 10,000 US dollars as third place winner, which gives her a financial opportunity to continue her work for freedom of expression.

The prize recognizes artists who use their talents in promoting empathy and understanding and confronting discrimination and oppression.



Appreciation
Says Deeyah: “I feel proud and overwhelmed! To even be considered in the context of such extraordinary artists and talent is a tremendous honour. To make it this far is absolutely unexpected, humbling and a great privilege that I am extremely grateful for”.

Deeyah was nominated by Freemuse for her two of her major productions — ‘Sisterhood’ and the video ‘What will it be’.

Exiled in the USA, Deeyah finds the The ArtVenture Freedom to Create Prize a wonderful and inspiring initiative.

“The belief in change through artistic expression is near and dear to me. I am very very appreciative of the work of groups like ArtVenture and Freemuse, and I thank you for your necessary work and for your encouragement and support.”

The panel
The final award winners were chosen by an independent panel consisting of amongst others Brazilian theatre director & writer Augusto Boal, founder of the Theatre of the Oppressed, the Chilean poet Carlos Reyes-Manzo, who as a photojournalist has documented the lives of thousands of marginalised peoples and Iranian filmmaker, Samira Makhmalbaf.

At the prize ceremony in London Carlos Reyes-Manzo said: “Deeyah is an important voice telling us what happens round the world to women.”

About the Freedom to Create Prize
The Award was initiated by ArtVenture, a grant-making philanthropic organisation and Freemuse’s sister organisation, ARTICLE 19 — a human rights pioneer which defends and promotes freedom of expression and freedom of information all over the world.

The prize ceremony was attended by leading representatives of human rights organisations working with artistic freedom of expression, artists and members of the jury. The ArtVenture Freedom to Create Prize consisted of three categories. The winner of the main prize was awarded 50,000 US dollars.

The ArtVenture Freedom to Create Youth Prize open to artists and oargnisations working with young people under the age of 18 was given to Brazilian hip hop collective ‘City of Rhyme’.

45 years in prison
Freemuse has nominated Burmese singer Win Maw to the ‘Imprisoned Artist Prize’. Making it to the final shortlist Wim Maw was considered an important voice for freedom of speech. The award was given to his Burmese colleague, satirist Zarganar, recently sentenced to 45 years in prison by the military dictattors of Burma.

Of all nominating organisations Freemuse was the only human rights organisations which succeeded geting all of its nominees to the shortlist.

Says Freemuse Executive Director, Marie Korpe:
“This is a very important acknowledgement of the importance of the role that musicians play in today’s society for freedom of expression and we congratulate the artists that we have the honour to working with.”

The organisers of the event declared in a statement:
“Some governments harass and impoverish their citizens, steal resources, stifle entrepreneurship and undermine human ingenuity and hope. In these societies, art can play an important role in giving a voice to those who are denied opportunity and resources. The arts empower people through the free expression of ideas, hopes, dreams and aspirations. It helps to create our future. Our goal is to use the arts to alleviate suffering and provide opportunities to the world’s most neglected communities.”





Click to read more about Deeyah on freemuse.org
Deeyah

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