Afghanistan through Afghan Voices Series
Panel with Wazhmah Osman (Temple University), Helena Zeweri (University of Virginia), and Hosai Qasmi (University of Ottawa)
Discussant: Mejgan Massoumi (Stanford University)
Thursday, April 7, 20229:30 AM - 11:00 AM (Pacific Time)
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In recent years, media in Afghanistan and its diaspora has experienced a resurgence both in quantity and content. Contrary to popular and scholarly discourse, Afghan women have been at the forefront of this resurgence. This panel features scholars of media and gender to critically analyze the ways in which Afghan women in Afghanistan and the diaspora have used television, radio, and social media as a source of political dissidence and anti-imperial politics. Panelists will discuss their research on the following topics: Afghan women’s participation and consumption of television media, locally produced political media that critiques the state as well as imperial agendas, and diasporic women’s media that links the US intervention in Afghanistan to a broader critique of US racial violence domestically. Examining Afghan women’s usage of media content since the 1950s, the panel will offer analyses of how women have generated a distinct feminism that uses media as tool for both dissent and anti-imperial critique.
Afghanistan through Afghan Voices is a series of virtual workshops that highlights and critically engages with recent scholarship on one of the most culturally diverse regions in the world. It aims to open an inclusive and multidisciplinary space where Afghan scholars and artists come together in conversation with broad audiences to publicly reflect on their research endeavors and creative trajectories. Monthly programs include Afghan artists from around the globe in dialogue with scholars of literature, art, and history; panels featuring conversations on visual culture and media; and poetry readings in Persian/Dari, Pashto, and English.
The series is hosted via Zoom by the UCLA Program on Central Asia and co-sponsored by the University of Washington’s Persian and Iranian Studies Program, Stanford University’s Center for South Asia and Abbasi Program in Islamic Studies, the UCLA Center for Near Eastern Studies, CMRS Center for Early Global Studies, as well as the Center for India and South Asia.
Sponsor(s): Program on Central Asia, Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, University of Washington Persian and Iranian Studies Program, Stanford University Center for South Asia and Abbasi Program in Islamic Studies