THE HIDDEN HALF: Les femmes cachées du Yémen

Zia ZEFF


This post is also available in: French

I went to Yemen for few month to witness on the situation of women in a conservative Muslim country in 2010. Instead of Saudi Arabia or the Arabic Golf countries, Yemen is far from modernization and women mutilations, honour crimes, early mariages (50% of yemenis women are married before 14 years old) are sadly common. Half of the population is under the Niqab, black dress, gone are the days when Yemeni women, dressed in jeans and blouse, donned Kalashnikovs as socialist militants in the Republic of South Yemen. They have become black ghosts, their jeans hidden under the burqah, the integral veil. 20 years after the re-unification of the two republics, the whole country has adopted the ultra-conservative mores of the North. Until 1962, when the Imam was deposed, Yemen was one of the most secluded countries on earth. The ubiquitous black burqah is but one symptom of the radicalisation creeping all over the Muslim world. The Westerner vision often reduces their life to the veil, arranged wedding, violence, and terrorism. The urge of the news doesn’t give us time to understand the reality of Muslim societies. We make women all tarred with the same mediatic brush. I invite you to discover those women within Islam, in their diversity and their beauty.

 


Country : Yémen

Number of photos : 25