{"product_id":"the-harem-within-tales-of-a-moroccan-girlhood-9780385405423","title":"The Harem Within: Tales of a Moroccan Girlhood","description":"\u003cp\u003eAs a little girl  Fatima Mernissi was often puzzled by the idea of the harem: even if you accepted that men and women had to be kept apart  she asked  why could nt it be the women who walked freely in the streets  while the men stayed locked behind the harem gate? In this book she weaves an evocative tale of her childhood in a Fez harem in the 1940s  a period of social transition in Morocco. Yasmina  Fatimas grandmother  was one of nine co-wives. She had the freedom to ride horses out and about on her husbands farm and in the surrounding countryside  but she carried around within her the hudud  or sacred frontier  that separates women from men. Fatimas mother was an only wife  but she lived with the other women of her extended family inside an enclosed courtyard in the city  guarded by a gatekeeper whose sole duty it was to keep the women from going out in the street. Forced into seclusion  they re-created an imaginary world of their own  where enchanted princesses and adventurous winged women appeared on the terrace  in Aunt Habibas tales and in Cousin Chamas improvised theatre. But Fatima was allowed out to cross the tiny street between the harem and the girls school built by the nationalists fighting French colonization; and she grew to confuse living with trespassing  and freedom with communicating. In this book  the author casts an eye on the roles assigned to women and men by traditional Muslim society. She also shows the intimacy and riotous sense of fun that can unite women in an enclosed community in her memoir. Other work by the author includes \"Islam and Democracy\"  \"The Veil and the Male Elite\" and \"Beyond the Veil\".\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"My Store","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":45651941425205,"sku":"ByrdShop_0385405421","price":94.12,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0627\/8139\/0901\/files\/9780385405423.jpg?v=1781846499","url":"https:\/\/atxbooks.com\/products\/the-harem-within-tales-of-a-moroccan-girlhood-9780385405423","provider":"ATX Books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}