Women, Water and Memory: Recasting Lives in Palestine

Front Cover
BRILL, Jan 31, 2009 - Social Science - 192 pages
This book tells a different story about water. Against the backdrop of the end of the Ottoman Empire to the Palestinian uprisings, old Palestinian women recount life before and after piped water. While talking about fetching and managing household water, women also talked about being women. Women, Water and Memory speaks of many different lives. We hear stories about women's own strength and beauty, and about the woman who married a man whose ugly face made her sick. While one woman married the man “she cared for”, another was relieved that her husband died when she was too old to be forced to remarry. We learn about the joy they feel each time they dance at a wedding, the sheer satisfaction of lighting a cigarette, the loyalty and shared despair towards families with members in prison, and about the tears of sorrow at each death and the delight at each birth.
 

Contents

Introduction
1
The Women and Their Stories
11
PART ONE ABOUT MUSHARAFAH
35
Chapter One Musharafah
37
Chapter Two PalestineA Contested Site
57
PART TWO LIFE WORLDS
67
Chapter Three Women Water and Memory
69
Chapter Four Being in the World
105
Chapter Five Women and Places Outside
125
Chapter Six Telling Stories
139
Conclusion and Further Reflections
151
Bibliography
163
Index
169
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