Women fighters and the ‘beautiful soul’ narrative

Sjoberg, Laura

doi:10.1017/s181638311000010x

Cited by 32 publications

(22 citation statements)

References 13 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Unclassified

Order By: Relevance

“…49 The visible and active presence of Kurdish women in many different aspects of public life demonstrates the lasting legacy of women’s initial mobilization by the PKK. 50 This pattern is consistent with historical patterns where sacrificing one’s life for one’s country and community has been the precondition of access to greater rights but not equality (Sjoberg 2010; Yuval Davis 2011, 103). It also suggests how a highly unconventional route for liberal feminism could contribute to agency of women subject to multiple forms of ethnic, class, and gender-based inequalities.…”

Section: Resultssupporting

confidence: 63%

A Path out of Patriarchy? Political Agency and Social Identity of Women Fighters

Tezcür¹

2019

Perspect. polit.

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Violent movements in different parts of the world have employed large numbers of women fighters. I address the question of how and why so many women from diverse backgrounds join an ethnic insurgency. Informed by an intersectional approach, I suggest that when gender and ethnic inequalities overlap, an ethnic insurgency promising gender emancipation would have strong appeal among women. At the same time, the intersection of class and gender shapes distinctive patterns of mobilization among women of an ethnic minority. In particular, uneducated women with lower class backgrounds join the movement because it provides them with the most viable way out of patriarchal relations. I employ a multi-method research design to study a paradigmatic case of women in arms, the Kurdish insurgency. I use an original large dataset containing information about more than 9,000 militants, from extensive fieldwork entailing dozens of in-depth interviews, and an archival study of sources in primary languages. My findings reveal the effects of unequal relationships based on ethnicity, gender, and class on violent political mobilization and the ambivalent relationship between women’s political agency and empowerment.

show abstract

Section: Resultssupporting

confidence: 63%

A Path out of Patriarchy? Political Agency and Social Identity of Women Fighters

Tezcür¹

2019

Perspect. polit.

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Such studies contend that the symbolic power of rebel efforts to showcase women’s participation stems from the challenge it presents to observers’ expectations about armed conflict and the motivations of its participants. Deeply entrenched gender norms and stereotypes in most societies implicitly associate women with peacefulness, vulnerability, and innocence and men with aggression and violence (Elshtain 1987; Sjoberg 2010). Images that juxtapose women’s assumed roles as pacifistic mothers and caregivers with their observed roles as fighters therefore become a potent propaganda instrument and a powerful strategy through which rebel groups can shape their public image (Bayard de Volo 2001, 42-43; Viterna 2014, 192).…”

Section: Gender Frames and Imagery In Armed Conflictmentioning

confidence: 99%

Framing the Narrative: Female Fighters, External Audience Attitudes, and Transnational Support for Armed Rebellions

Manekin

Wood

2020

Journal of Conflict Resolution

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Female combatants play a central role in rebel efforts to cultivate and disseminate positive narratives regarding the movement and its political goals. Yet, the effectiveness of such strategies in shaping audience attitudes or generating tangible benefits for the group remains unclear. We propose and test a theory regarding the channels through which female fighters advance rebel goals. We argue that female fighters positively influence audience attitudes toward rebel groups by strengthening observers’ beliefs about their legitimacy and their decision to use armed tactics. We further contend that these effects directly help them secure support from transnational nonstate actors and indirectly promote state support. We assess our arguments by combining a novel survey experiment in two countries with analyses of new cross-national data on female combatants and information about transnational support for rebels. The empirical results support our arguments and demonstrate the impact of gender framing on rebel efforts to secure support.

show abstract

“…In fact, many of the news stories of female victims contain gender-stereotypical assumptions about women’s helplessness, even as those victims have taken part in fighting (see, e.g. discussion in Sjoberg, 2010). Many of the news stories about female fighters, jihadi brides, or female members of IS more broadly tell stories of women that fit well with the mother, monster, and whore narratives—effectively removing choice from female perpetrators, instead treating them as victims of both IS and flaws in their own femininity.…”

Section: Reading Women In and Around Ismentioning

confidence: 99%

Jihadi brides and female volunteers: Reading the Islamic State’s war to see gender and agency in conflict dynamics

Sjoberg

2017

Conflict Management and Peace Science

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Decades ago, Cynthia Enloe called for a research agenda looking for where women are in war and conflict. Enloe recognized that women play active roles in and are affected by wars and conflicts, but are often ignored in news coverage, policy analysis, and scholarship. The current conflict in Syria and Iraq appears as a counterexample: hundreds of millions of Google results mention women and the Islamic State (IS). Subjects vary widely: the stories cover female victims of IS, female recruits to IS, and women who fight IS. This article explores the hypervisibility of women in this conflict, looking for lessons about sex, gender, and conflict. The first part analyses discourses in a sample of major news reports, evaluating how different women around IS are represented. It finds that agency is removed from both female victims and female IS partisans, while it is exaggerated for women who fight against IS. This corresponds with emphasis on different gendered traits for differently positioned women. After tracing these gendered representations, the article applies theories of gender and conflict to understand how women have become central to the fighting and coverage of the conflict in Syria and Iraq. It concludes that paying attention both to the empirical presence of women and to the co-constitution of gender, war, and conflict augments understanding of this war, and across conflicts.

show abstract

Women fighters and the ‘beautiful soul’ narrative

Cited by 32 publications

References 13 publications

A Path out of Patriarchy? Political Agency and Social Identity of Women Fighters

A Path out of Patriarchy? Political Agency and Social Identity of Women Fighters

Framing the Narrative: Female Fighters, External Audience Attitudes, and Transnational Support for Armed Rebellions

Jihadi brides and female volunteers: Reading the Islamic State’s war to see gender and agency in conflict dynamics

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About