March 04, 2007

WOMAN. You hear this word and you think of controversy — especially in societies where the roles they play are well-defined and preferably unwavering. However, even these traditional societies cannot resist change for a very long time and have to succumb some day to what they are confronted with. The same has been the case with women’s education, at least as far as the South Asian region is concerned. Fifty years ago, the idea of educating women was inconceivable for many families in our part of the world and most of us do not have grandmothers who were “allowed” to go to school, though today it has become as essential an ingredient of a woman’s life as it is of a man’s. Regardless of why men and women are being educated, almost everybody has to go to school.

Today, education stands as the first necessity after food, clothing and, of course, a place to live. However, even education has not been able to create enough awareness for people to transcend stereotypes and traditions which, with all due respect, probably need to be thought over again before being followed. And, of course, traditions, norms and the notions of right and wrong assert themselves strongly when it comes to women. How strongly gender and education are interwoven in some societies and for some people can be gauged not only from the disciplines that women are being educated in, but also from what they are producing later on. And even though some of the biggest universities in the country have over 50 per cent female students, it is not hard to tell what many of them end up doing with their degree and what percentage of these women is actually contributing to the nation’s economy. It is certainly not my intention to belittle women who do not work, for it is precisely their right to do whatever they want with their education but when one compares citizens (especially in poor and developing countries) who do not want to contribute and be part of the nation’s workforce and those who do, then the latter are definitely more deserving.

As a student at the University of Karachi, I found it seriously strange, even exasperating, that many women I came across were studying at that level not because they wanted to or because they had any real interest in a certain field of study, but because that was what their fiancés and in-laws wanted them to do before they got married. Worse still, this was also the norm in a serious profession like medicine. A friend’s sister got a proposal and the conditions were: (a) the girl should be nothing less than a doctor; and (b) she will not work. This is when one is forced to consider whether these people try really hard to be so strange or is it just a gift? In the latter case, they must be really “blessed”. With such ideas, one cannot help but wonder about the aim of women’s education and what it means.

On a side note, one of my friends is looking for a wife these days, who should, of course, be no less than either a doctor or an engineer. However, she will not be “allowed” to work, “not because there is anything wrong with that” but, of course, in a society that is definitely more hostile to women than it has ever been to men it is awkward, dangerous and a whole lot else, not to mention the fact that it attracts unwanted attention. When asked why he wanted a doctor or an engineer for a wife, he said she would make a better mother to “my children” than a woman who is not sufficiently educated.

Is this why a lot of people send their daughters to medical and engineering colleges, so that they are “married well” because no one wants uneducated, let alone illiterate girls, for their sons? Or is it because they want their daughters to become independent human beings who are strong enough to make logical and conscious decisions in their lives? After all, education is “supposed” to make people aware and powerful enough to choose for themselves rather than be dependents, financially or otherwise, all their lives regardless of whether or not they want to be in such a position.

On the other hand, there are countries where people are setting ablaze institutions of women’s education — more recently in Afghanistan — and are targeting teachers employed in those institutions. All this hullabaloo about women, their education and the connection that exists with the roles that they have been “given to play” lead to some thought-provoking questions that have always existed in the deep recesses of our mind but have not been explored as they should be. Are educated women really that dangerous? If yes, what precisely is at stake here?

In the words of Mary Wollstonecraft, “only that education deserves emphatically to be termed cultivation of mind which teaches young people how to begin to think.” To this end, I cannot help but agree that if traditional forms of education fail to serve this purpose and only produce automatons, thus reducing human beings to mere functionaries rather than perceptive individuals in control of their own lives, then what good is it? Similarly, if women who, with the education they are receiving, are still not expected to be leaders but just trophy wives, then what real purpose does their education serve?

The writer is a freelance contributor

Please Visit our Sponsor (Ads open in separate window)