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Assignment 12

In her essay Do Muslim Women Really Need Saving? Anthropological Reflections on Cultural Relativism and Its Others, Lila Abu-Lughod describes the way in which women of Afghan descent are utilized within the “War on Terrorism”. Abu-Lughod uses the term “cultural mode of explanation” to describe the practices that were used in an attempt to generate insight regarding counterterrorism. The investigation of Afghan people was believed to be a more useful tactic in this respect as opposed to creating an understanding of the political and historical events that have contributed to the development of terrorism.

Westerners fail to realize that they have not played as significant of a role as they believe they have in the liberation of women hailing from Afghanistan. Certain aspects of Afghan culture are used to justify their interactions with the land as a means to create this “liberation”. For example, it is widely-known that the Taliban required women to wear the burqa, which is commonly perceived as a symbol of oppression. Confusion became somewhat widespread after women were “liberated” from the Taliban and had more freedoms to choose what materials adorned their bodies, though still chose to wear the burqa. What had not been realized is that the burqa was perceived as an “appropriate form of dress” (Abu-Lughod 785) and was a social norm within the women’ native lands. That the problem was not exactly the rule of the Taliban, but how both the preexisting and new political, historical, and social conditions impacted the way of living for native Afghan women, and Afghan people as a whole. Despite the absence of the Taliban, this does not change the fact that these women still face oppression in Afghanistan.

Abu-Lughod believes that we must not simply accept cultural explanations as a means to understand that way a large body of people live amongst one another. It is simply a matter of showing respect for cultures that differ from ours, and understanding that every cultural has a different standard for living.