Temporary Marriage in Iran
Gender and Body Politics in Modern Iranian Film and Literature

An examination of temporary marriage, or sigheh, in Iran through the representation of women within modern novels, short stories and cinema.

Claudia Yaghoobi (Author)

9781108488105, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 30 January 2020

308 pages
23.5 x 15.9 x 2.2 cm, 0.56 kg

'What distinguishes Claudia Yaghoobi's winning storytelling and her original contribution to our knowledge of women, sexuality and temporary marriage in Iran, is her skillful analysis and highly engaging interpretations of sigheh women's paradoxical role at the margin of society yet at the center of male fantasy.' Shahla Haeri, Boston University

Proposing a methodology that brings feminist theories of embodiment to bear on the Iranian literary and cinematic tradition, this study examines temporary marriage in Iran, not just as an institution but also as a set of practices, identities and meanings that have transformed over the course of the twentieth- and twenty-first centuries. Based on analysis of novels and short stories from the Pahlavi era, and cinematic works produced after the Islamic Revolution, Claudia Yaghoobi looks at the representation of the sigheh women, or those who entered into temporary marriages. Each work reflects the manner in which the practice of sigheh impacts women by calling into question how sexuality works as a form of political analysis and power, revealing how a sigheh woman's sexual bodily autonomy is used as ammunition against what governments deem inappropriate gendered expression. While focusing mainly on modern Iranian cultural productions, Yaghoobi moves beyond the literary and cinematic realms to offer an in-depth examination of this controversial social institution which has been the subject of disdain for many Iranian feminists and captured the imagination of many Western observers.

Prologue: sexpionage and the female body
Part I. General Overview: Introduction: body politics and sigheh marriages
1. Sigheh marriages in modern Iran
Part II. Representation of Sigheh/Sex Work in the Literature of Pahlavi Era: 2. Gendered violence in Moshfeq-e Kazemi's Tehran-e Makhuf
3. The volatile sigheh/sex workers' bodies in Jamalzadeh's Ma'sumeh Shirazi
4. Colonized bodies in Al-e Ahmad's 'Jashn-e Farkhonde'
5. The grotesque sigheh/sex workers' bodies in Golestan's 'Safar-e 'Esmat'
6. Bodily inscriptions in Chubak's Sang-e Sabur
Part III. The Islamic Republic and Sigheh in Film Industry: 7. Whose body matters in Afkhami's Showkaran
8. Embodiment, power, and politics in Farahbakhsh's Zendegi-ye Khosusi
Reclaiming the female body via writing.

Subject Areas: Islamic life & practice [HRHP], Social & cultural history [HBTB], Middle Eastern history [HBJF1]