by Nina Ansary
Samira Makhmalbaf
In 2000, Iranian filmmaker Makhmalbaf was the youngest director ever to compete for the prestigious Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival for her film Blackboard.
Dr. Mehrangiz Manouchehrian
In 1947, Dr. Manouchehrian becomes Iran’s first female lawyer, and in 1963, she was one of two women appointed as the first female senators in Iran.
Arefeh Mansouri
Award-winning Iranian fashion and costume designer, whose “avant-garde masterpieces” have been showcased in major Hollywood productions and featured in fashion magazines including Vogue, Elle, and Marie Claire. “My designs are created for the unafraid. Decisive women who are non-conforming.”
Tahmineh Milani
Feminist Iranian filmmaker Milani’s numerous controversial features showcase women’s lives under an oppressive regime. “When I make a movie, my aim is to challenge society.”
Maryam Mirzakhani
In 2014, Iranian mathematician and Stanford University professor Mirzakhani became the first woman to ever win the Fields Medal, known as the “Nobel Prize of mathematics.” Upon receiving the award, she said, “I will be happy if it encourages young female scientists and mathematicians. …”
Mahnaz Mohammadi
In 2014, award-winning Iranian documentary filmmaker and prominent women’s rights activist Mohammadi began serving a five-year prison sentence. “I am both a woman and a filmmaker: sufficient to be arrested.”
Farshid Moussavi
Award-winning Iranian architect recently chosen as one of “Five Women Changing the Face of Architecture,” has co-authored numerous critically acclaimed projects, including the mirror-clad Museum of Contemporary Art Cleveland. “Architecture is a creative field … and my strength is actually my difference.”
Dr. Azar Nafisi
Prominent professor and author of the critically acclaimed long-running New York Times bestseller Reading Lolita in Tehran: A Memoir in Books. Since 1997, Dr. Nafisi has been living in exile in the United States. “I left Iran but Iran did not leave me.”
Noora Naraghi
Naraghi is an Iranian motocross racer. In 2009, she won Iran’s first-ever female championship in motocross.
Marina Nemat
Author of the international best-selling memoir, Prisoner of Tehran. Nemat is the recipient of the European Parliament’s inaugural Human Dignity Award and Italy’s prestigious literary Grinzane Cavour Prize.
Zahra Nemati
First Iranian woman to win a Gold Medal in archery at the 2012 London Paralympic Games. Paralyzed in an earthquake, Nemati dedicated her medal to “all of the people who prayed for me to achieve success.”
Shirin Neshat
Internationally acclaimed Iranian visual artist and the recipient of numerous accolades and awards for her creations reflecting the paradoxes and complexities of a life in exile. “An artist like myself finds herself in the position of being the voice, the speaker of my own people… art is our weapon, culture is a form of resistance.”
Mahin Oskouei
A pioneering figure in theater arts, Oskouei was Iran’s first stage actress and first female theatre director.
Princess Fatemeh Pahlavi
Half-sister of Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, the late Shah of Iran, was the first woman in Iran to be issued a helicopter license.
Princess Shams Pahlavi
Elder sister of the late Shah of Iran. An international Red Cross leader, she built the Red Lion and Sun Society, Iran’s Red Cross. As the country’s largest charitable organization, the group supported hundreds of hospitals, orphanages, youth activities, and disaster relief efforts.
Farokhroo Parsa
Iran’s first female minister Parsa (1922–1980) served as Minister of Education (1962–1979) during the reign of Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi.
Zoya Pirzad
In 2014, Iranian novelist Pirzad received France’s prestigious Chevalier Legion of Honor award.
Polaris
First all-female Iranian pop band to perform live in concert in Iran since the Islamic Revolution (1979). “We spent three years getting authorization to perform. … We aim to show that Iranian women are also able to work in this field.”
Laleh Pourkarim
Iranian singer-songwriter and producer. Since her 2005 debut on the Scandinavian music scene, Pourkarim has been awarded multiple Swedish Grammys including Artist of the Year, Newcomer of the Year, and Producer of the Year. “Just because it is black in the dark, doesn’t mean there is no color. …”
Azita Raji
In 2014, Raji became the first Iranian woman, as well as the first female, to be nominated as U.S. ambassador to Sweden.
Sheyma Rashidi
The only female firefighter in the city of Ahvaz, Iran.
Shahla Riahi
In 1956, Riahi (1926–present) became the first Iranian woman to direct a feature film, Marjan.
Atoosa Behnegar Rubenstein
Former editor-in-chief of Seventeen and the founding editor of CosmoGirl. Honored in 2004 by Columbia University as one of the “Top 250 Alumni” through the ages, Rubenstein is a strong advocate for girls to resist the pressure to be perfect. “Your greatness is about the kind of person you are and the contribution you make to humanity.”
Shahla Sabet
In 1993, Sabet became the first Iranian woman appointed as judge in the United States.
Dr. Pardis Sabeti
Iranian computational geneticist and lead singer of the critically acclaimed alternative rock band Thousand Days. A graduate of Harvard Medical School and recipient of Smithsonian magazine’s Ingenuity Award, Sabeti has been named one of the “Top 100 living geniuses.”
Roohangiz Saminejad
Iranian actress Saminejad (1916– 1997) was the star actress in the first sound film made in the Persian language. Famous for playing the heroine Golnar in the film Lor Girl (1934), she suffered social ostracism from the conservative culture of the time. She had to change her name and live in anonymity and seclusion.
Pourandokht Sassanid (aka Buran)
First woman to become queen of the Persian Empire (629–632). Daughter of Khosrow Parviz II, the King of the Sassanian Empire (590–628). Pourandokht, who preached egalitarianism, infamously wrote in a letter to her troops, “A monarch, regardless of being a queen or king, must defend his or her land and treat the people with justice.”
Marjane Satrapi
Academy Award-nominated director and author of the internationally acclaimed best-selling graphic novel Persepolis. “It’s true that in Iran women have half of the rights that men do. And yet 66% of students are women.”
Dr. Fatemeh Sayyah
In 1942, Dr. Sayyah became Iran’s first female professor when she was awarded the chair of Russian Language and Comparative Literature at Tehran University.
Maryam Sedarati
In 1973, Iranian female high jump star wins the Bronze medal by setting the 1.60-meter record at the Asian Track and Field Championships in Manila, Philippines.
Hila Sedighi
Renowned Iranian poet and female activist. Recipient of the Human Rights Watch’s prestigious Hellman/Hammett grant in 2012, Sedighi’s poems depict pain, suffering, and oppression in Iran. “But I shall still remain … in this place, in my homeland. … I am rooted here in this soil.”
Neda Shahsavari
The first Iranian woman to compete in table tennis at the 2012 Olympic Games in London. “The fundamental problem facing female national table tennis players is a lack of financial support for (Iran’s) Table Tennis Federation.”
Mansoureh Shojaee
Leading Iranian women’s rights activist and founding member of the 2006 One Million Signatures Campaign for Equality. “We have so many successful women in the fields of art and culture, but for that we cannot say the situation of women is acceptable. We will only accept women’s situation when women and men share the same right by law.”
Dr. Shahla Solhju
Iran’s first professional female astronomer and first codirector of Pahlavi University’s Abu Reihan Observatory.
Neda Agha Soltan
A moment of silence for the beautiful and courageous Soltan (1983–June 2009), whose shooting death for protest against the 2009 presidential elections made her an iconic symbol of Iran’s struggle.
Sura of Parthia
One of the greatest heroines of Persian history. A strategical and military genius, the daughter of Ardavan V, the last king of the Parthian (Ashkanid) Empire, Sura held the rank of Ashkanid’s General Sepahbod (Lieutenant General).
Parisa Tabrizi
Google’s “Security Princess”: As head of security at Google Chrome, Iranian hacker Tabrizi protects the tech giant from cybercriminals in a booming industry in which women are vastly underrepresented.
Niloufar Talebi
Award-winning Iranian librettist, poet, and theater artist. The recipient of numerous translation prizes from the international community, Talebi is the creator and visionary behind multimedia projects and theatrical pieces designed to pay homage to the Iranian culture on the world stage.
Newsha Tavakolian
Self-taught photographer Newsha Tavakolian began her career as a photojournalist at the age of sixteen, publishing work in National Geographic, the New York Times, Le Monde, Newsweek, and Time magazine. Tavakolian’s captivating images document the evolving role of women in Iran and their struggle to overcome gender-biased restrictions.
Effat Tejaratchi
In 1939 Tejaratchi became the first Iranian woman to earn a pilot license using a Tiger Moth aircraft.
Dr. Alenush Terian
Iran’s first female physicist. Referred to as the “Mother of Modern Iranian Astronomy,” Dr. Terian was Iran’s first female physics professor and founding member of the solar observatory of the Institute of Geophysics at the University of Tehran.
Badri Teymourtash
Iran’s first female dentist and one of the founding members of Mashad University’s School of Dentistry.
Iran Teymourtash
A pioneer among women activists, Teymourtash was the country’s first female editor of an Iranian newspaper.
Maryam Tousi
Known as “The Fastest Woman in Iran,” sprinter Tousi is the Iranian record holder in the 400m relay, and Gold Medal winner at the 2012 Asian Indoor Championships. “As a female sprinter, there is no future for me. … You can’t hide the discrimination. But I am still hopeful for the future.”
Monir Vakili
Celebrated opera singer Vakili (1923– 1983) started the first opera company in Iran. A pioneer in the true sense, she gave performances as Madame Butterfly, Mimi in La Boheme, Violetta in La Traviata, and many others in Tehran’s famed Rudaki Hall.
Maryam Nayeb Yazdi
The internationally renowned Iranian human-rights activist and heroine to Iran’s political prisoners, Yazdi is the founder of Persian2English.com, a blog exposing human rights infractions by the Islamic regime to a global audience. In 2013, she was awarded the Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Medal in recognition for achievements in social activism.
Irene Zazians
Regarded as the Elizabeth Taylor of Iran, “Iren” was the first Iranian actress to appear in a bikini, in the 1959 Persian film The Messenger from Heaven.
Iranian Girl Scouts prepare for a parade in their uniforms: Tehran, c. 1950s.
Iranian women from Malayer (near Hamadan in the northwest) engage in target practice, c. late 1950s.
Iran: Women’s orchestra, c. 1960.
Female Pilot: Iran, c. 1960s.
Imperial Iranian female police officers: Tehran, c. 1970s.
Women parliamentarians of Iran, c.1970s.
Female motorcycle officers: Tehran, c. 1970s.
Imperial Iranian female naval officer, c. 1970s.
Imperial Iranian female military rifle training, c. 1970s.
Imperial female Air Force cadet of the Pahlavi era: Tehran, c. 1970.
The Iranian Women’s Fencing Team, winners of the Gold Medal at the 1974 Asian Games.
Notes
INTRODUCTION
1K. H. Adams and M. L. Keene, Alice Paul and the American Suffrage Campaign (Urbana and Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 2008).
CHAPTER One
1Clara Rice Colliver, Persian Women and their Ways (Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott Company, 1923), 269, 273, 274, 277.
CHAPTER Two
1F. M. Mueller, The Sacred Books of the East (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1880), 61.
2K. Farrokh, “Gender Equality in Ancient Iran (Persia),” Fezana Journal 28, no.1 (Publication of the Federation of Zoroastrian Associations of North America), (March/Spring 2014): 105–107.
3“This is an unknown area that requires further historical research.” Cited from E. Sanasarian, The Women’s Rights Movement in Iran: Mutiny, Appeasement, and Repression from 1900 to Khomeini (Westport, CT: Praeger Publishers, 1982), 10.
4H. Afshar, “Competing Interests: Democracy, Islamization, and Women Politicians in Iran,” in Women and Fluid Identities: Strategic and Practical Pathways Selected by Women, ed. H. Afshar (U.K.: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012), 172–173.
5Parvaneh Pourshariati, Decline and Fall of the Sasanian Empire: The Sasanian-Parthian Confederacy and the Arab Conquest of Iran (London and New York: I. B. Tauris, 2008), 204.
6Maria Brosius, Women in Ancient Persia, 559-331 B.C. (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1998), 140–144.
7R. N. Frye, The Golden Age of Persia (London: Phoenix Press, 1975), 54–57; R. N. Frye, ed., The Cambridge History of Iran, Vol. 4: The Arab Conquest of Iran and its Aftermath: From the Arab Invasion to the Seljuqs (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005), 1–56.
8E. Sanasarian, The Women’s Rights Movement in Iran: Mutiny, Appeasement and Repression, From 1900 to Khomeini (New York: Praeger Publishers, 1982), 14.
9R. Arasteh, Man and Society in Iran (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1964), 23; J. R. Kolayi, “Foreign Education, the Women’s Press, and the Discourse of Scientific Domesticity in Early Twentieth-Century Iran,” in Iran and the Surrounding World: Interactions in Culture and Politics, eds. N. R Keddie and R. P. Mathee (Seattle and London: University of Washington Press, 2002), 183.
10Arasteh, Man and Society in Iran, 6.
11E. L. Daniel, The History of Iran (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 2001), 77.
12E. Sanasarian, The Women’s Rights Movement in Iran: Mutiny, Appeasement and Repression, From 1900 to Khomeini (New York: Praeger Publishers, 1982), 12–13.
13Sanasarian, The Women’s Rights Movement, 13–14.
14Jack Weatherford, The Secret History of the Mongol Queens: How the Daughters of Genghis Khan Rescued his Empire (New York: Crown Publishing, 2010).
15Weatherford, Secret History, xiv.
16R. J. Abisaab, Converting Persia: Religion and Power in the Safavid Empire (London and New York: I. B. Tauris, 2004); A .J. Newman, Safavid Iran: Rebirth of a Persian Empire (London and New York: I. B. Tauris, 2006).
17“Central to the beliefs of Twelver Shia is the story of the hidden Iman, Muhammad al-Mahdi, or simply the ‘mahdi, ‘ meaning ‘divinely guided one.’ In AD 874, the six-year-old son of the eleventh Iman went into hiding to protect himself from the persecution of the reigning Abbasid empire. The Shia believe that he hid himself in a cave below a mosque in Samarra; this cave is blocked by a gate that the Shia call ‘Bab-al Ghayba, ‘ or the ‘Gate of Occultation.’ This is one of the most sacred sites in Shi’a Islam, and the faithful gather here to pray for the return of the twelfth Iman. The occultation of the mahdi, known as ‘ghaybah’ in Arabic, will end with his return to the world for the Last Judgment. This period will be marked by violent upheavals and attacks upon the faithful, but in the end, the mahdi with deliver the world to peace.” In “Pilgrimage to Karbala. Who are the Shia?: Hidden Imam” PBS.org, March 26th, 2007, http://www.pbs.org/wnet/wideangle/episodes/pilgrimage-to-karbala/sunni-and-shia-the-worlds-of-islam/?p=1737.
19The Sunni and Shiite divide is primarily over the succession to the Imamate. The Sunnis claim that the successor to the prophet Muhammad can be chosen from the Muslim community, whereas Shiites believe that the successor can only be a direct descendant from the Prophet himself.
20A. Amanat, ed., Taj Al-Saltaneh: Crowning Anguish. Memoirs of a Persian Princess (Washington, DC: Mage Publishers, 2003).
21A. Mango, Ataturk: The Biography of the Founder of Modern Turkey (New York: Overlook Press, 1999); P. Kinross, Ataturk: The Rebirth of a Nation (London: Phoenix, 2001).
22S. K. Nawid, Religious Response to Social Change in Afghanistan 1919–29: King Amanullah and the Afghan Ulama (Costa Mesa, CA: Mazda Publishers, 1999).
23Bonnie E. Smith, ed., Oxford Encyclopedia of Women in World History (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008).
24S. Effendi, God Passes By (New Delhi, India: Bahá’í Publishing Trust, 1971), 75; N. Motahedeh, “The Mutilated Body of the Modern Nation: Qurrat al-Ayn Tahirah’s Unveiling and the Iranian Massacre of the Babi’s,” Comparative Studies of South Asia and the Middle East 8, no. 4 (1998): 38–50.