Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-76fb5796d-vfjqv Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-28T09:45:48.715Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

5 - Youth Culture and the New Bi-Hejab Girl

from Part II - Agents of Correlation and Change

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  17 October 2019

Liora Hendelman-Baavur
Affiliation:
Tel-Aviv University
Get access

Summary

Chapter 5 examines what specific cultural meanings were applied to the modern woman by virtue of the country’s youthful age structure, reconceptualization of adolescence, and generation gap during the late Pahlavi era. Within this framework, the discussion introduces "the modern girl" that hitherto was not acknowledged as an important figure in Iranian historiography, while addressing the magazines’ engagement with the beauty culture and discussions on issues like makeup, fashion, and weight concerns. The overemphasis on the female body in women’s magazines, and their excessive promotion of social values of beauty and slenderness, conflicted with their attempts to empower femininity through representations of female determination, dedication, and educational accomplishments. Iranian editors and journalists were familiar with this conflict, and their responses become evident in two distinct and equally challenging images that receive special attention in this chapter: the Teen Princess (dokhtar-e Shayesteh) elected in Zan-e Ruz’s annual flashy beauty pageant and the female volunteers who served in the Literacy and Health Corps, after completing a short military training. In the late Pahlavi era, both these programs targeted young, single, high school graduates and college students, and substantially expanded women’s entry into the formerly segregated public sphere.

Type
Chapter
Information
Creating the Modern Iranian Woman
Popular Culture between Two Revolutions
, pp. 154 - 199
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2019

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure coreplatform@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×