The Yemeni triangle of wisdom! [Archives:2006/939/Opinion]
Nashwan Dammaj
Yemeni society is based on an interwoven texture of male-female roles and their presence shoulder-to-shoulder in a variety of different fields of life – economic, political and social. Agriculture was the backbone of Yemeni life, mingled with many difficulties resulting from constant conflict with harsh nature and terrain that would reject them and yield nothing except by force. Therefore, women lived their lives just as men did. Their struggle on the field was equally, if not more remarkably vivid in the memory of their agricultural society.
In his “Social Approach to the Study of Arab History and Heritage,” Dr. Hamoud Al-Awdi mentions, “Throughout history, the relation between Yemenis and agricultural lands is more than mere economic benefit necessary for survival. Such a relation tends to represent the approach and the main dimension of these people's characters, mindsets and economic, social and ideological relations.”
It is natural that this is reflected upon women and their independent personality, which outline those relations. It was not strange to see women present in the most private male places, whereas it is commonplace today to find things thought to be for men and others specific to women – at both social and political levels.
Such relations are influential at the economic level, as apparent in the childlike way Yemenis show gratitude to their lands. Men and women gather in circles singing and dancing on the eves and at harvest times, celebrating the bounty of their Motherland, before whom they – however old – feel young and whom they view as too big for their love to contain.
The freedom of Yemeni women in olden times did not come from symposia, nor did it come from slogans promoted here and there. Their freedom came from their productive position in society and their real involvement and empowerment to play their role. Wherever work was available – no matter what it was – women's true freedom was found. The more women inextricably are linked to their society and land, the more their freedom is stable and fixed.
Al-Awdi adds, “For ancient Yemenis, the belief in and practice of different types of labor by different social classes were the fundamental components of society and its economy. Not only that, the standards of personalities, relations and regards, as well as social relations among people, were not based on sex or race, but on labor and production in the case of the individual and the group. The profound belief in labor, its respect and prevailing cooperative spirit were the main components that enabled society to cope with, subdue and harness tough nature and its changeable conditions.”
Such strife did not offer Yemenis a chance to think of marginal issues, which prefer the surreal to the real, because only emptiness and luxury could have allowed such matters.
As stated above, it was a must that Yemeni women were present in ancient Yemeni society literally in all fields without exception. Productive work conducted by men similarly and excellently was done by women. Most often, one would join the other to do the same job.
Perhaps the most apparent sign of society's health and vitality and sophistication of its thought and mentality is that while women either were buried alive or, at best, toys for enjoyment in other cultures, Yemeni women were ruling queens or at least respected ladies with status resulting from necessity and the nature of land.
It was “taboo” cultures – popularized by successive imamates, the Ottoman invasion and alien thought – that marginalized and displaced women. All of them wanted to transform Yemeni women into dumb owls and night creatures afraid of the light. The enemies of women relied on misinterpretations of religion and on their hatred of this society's humanness, advancement and civilization.
Yemeni women should follow the model of Arwa bint Ahmed Al-Sulaihi, a Yemeni woman who told her husband several centuries ago: “The woman who is meant for bedding can manage nothing. Let me do what I want (i.e., governance).”
That is the logic of Yemeni women. That is Arwa, the sublimely ideal queen who ruled Yemen under Islam. She resented being what others wanted, except what she wanted herself to be.
This shows unlimited ambition and self-confidence – two factors that gave her the leverage to rise to power. She was not less than another Yemeni queen, Bilqis (the Queen of Sheba), who experienced the pomp of power thousands of years earlier. Bilqis and Arwa embodied the most inspiring examples in Yemeni man's mind of woman as she should be.
A question now poses itself as to whether the third part of the triangle of Yemeni civilization is to be fulfilled by a third people-ruling woman? After a few months have elapsed, presidential elections shall answer this question.
Nashwan Dammaj is a Yemeni writer and a poet. He is Yemen Times correspondent in Ibb.
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[archive-e:939-v:14-y:2006-d:2006-04-20-p:opinion]
