Veiled Sentiments

VEILED SENTIMENTS

Honor and Poetry in a Bedouin Society

(Critique)

The book, Veiled Sentiments: Honor and Poetry in a Bedouin Society, by author and anthropologist, Lila Abu-Lughod, who is best known for her work on women's issues in the middle east, presents two years of fieldwork in Egypt among the Awlad' Ali Bedouin community who have gone from living a nomadic lifestyle , a farming system where animals are transported from one area to another in search for fresh grazing land, to living in villages where smuggling, raising animals, and doing odd jobs are ways of supporting themselves. In the book, Abu-Lughod brings together the concepts of structure, hierarchy, ideology, and discourse to illustrate the Bedouin culture, and how the Awlad' Ali deal with sentiments. Veiled Sentiments is divided into two significant parts, The Ideology of Bedouin Social Life and Discourses on Sentiment, that come together to better express the culture of the Awlad' Ali, and how they view sentiments.

Abu-Lughod uses part one to describe what she identifies as the ideology of life of the Awlad' Ali. In this particular part of the book, Abu-Lughod discusses the importance of bloodline; she observes that, "blood in the sense of genealogy, is the basis of Awlad' Ali Identity (p.44)." She expresses that kinship marks out each individual's social identity, from ones communal cultural identity to their position in the community as well as their relationship to others. Part one also explains how honor and autonomy are associated with each other, and the fact that not everyone in the community is autonomous or equal to each other. The book suggests that generally, men that are well respected among the Awlad' Ali are more autonomous than the women, children, the poor, and the men that are not respected in the community. Abu-Lughod also details that respect is gained by living up to the standards of the code of honor that the community has set for its people. By upholding the ideals in the honor code, one gains autonomy which is highly valued among males because "autonomy or freedom is the standard by which status is measured and social hierarchy determined. (p.79)"

When reading Veiled Sentiments, I got the impression that the existing social hierarchy among the Awlad' Ali was based on gender, age, wisdom, and wealth, "Women are always dependent," and "Ð'...the powerful have obligations and responsibilities to protect and care for the weak. The weaker members epitomized by the helpless infant, and by extension all children. (p.80-81)" Abu- Lughod did a good job depicting the ways that the social hierarchy works, by including terminology such as wliyya, and by vividly describing situations where women, and children seemed weaker than the adult males in the community, who in most situations appeared to be the head of households. The author also goes further into the ideals of the Awlad' Ali by discussing the relations between female modesty (hasham), "natural inferiority", and sexuality. She depicts the ideal woman in the eyes of the Bedouin people, describing her as soft spoken, and "well-behaved," and with no open thoughts on sexuality. Apart from discussing the importance of hasham in a woman, Abu- Lughod points out that emotion of love and affection between men and women is a taboo. Men that show emotion towards a woman are seen to be weak and are shunned upon by their male peers, as well as women in the community. "Women claim, for instance, that "real men" control all their dependents and beat their wives when the wives do stupid things ( p.89)". In many cases, the Awlad' Ali women associated beatings from their husbands as a loving gesture. The author continues her research by observing the meaning of women's veils. She reveals to the reader that women begin to veil when they get married, and sexually active, as a way to cover sexual shame. Women also veil when they are embarrassed about any sexual comments made in their presence. As Abu- Lughod goes further into veiling, the reader can conclude that sexual emotions as well as sentiments aren't received openly among the community. Women that are received as honorable among the Awlad' Ali, are those that completely deny their sexuality. Once more, sexuality is definitely taboo among the Bedouin people, especially for women.

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