Reviews tagging 'Sexual assault'

Our Women on the Ground: Essays by Arab Women Reporting from the Arab World by Zahra Hankir

7 reviews

hankatcol's review against another edition

challenging emotional informative inspiring reflective slow-paced

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Xenophobia, Sexual assault, Torture, War, Colonisation, Death, Hate crime, Sexism, Genocide, Islamophobia, Violence, Child death, Misogyny, and Police brutality

cantfindmybookmark's review

adventurous challenging emotional informative reflective slow-paced

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexism, Violence, and War

Moderate: Sexual assault

bookedbymadeline's review

challenging emotional hopeful informative inspiring reflective sad medium-paced

4.5

Each chapter is an essay from a different journalist’s perspective during their time reporting in the Middle East! All of whom are Arab women, who either grew up in the country they’re reporting in or they grew up abroad. Essays range from around 2000 to 2017 and cover countries including Iraq, Lebanon, Egypt, Syria, Morocco, Sudan, Yemen, Palestine, and Saudi Arabia; as well as looking at the experiences of Islamophobia in the UK and France.

I learned a lot with this book, and found the essays very engaging and emotional. I found each story eye opening, as it made me challenge and question what I had known about each region and their conflicts prior to reading this. 

I liked some essays more than others due to the different writing styles (some were more technical/academically written compared to others). Overall every essay was powerful and inspiring; I think this is one of those books that everybody should read!

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Misogyny, Death, Grief, Sexual harassment, Sexism, Violence, and War

Moderate: Sexual assault, Child death, Islamophobia, and Police brutality

Minor: Body horror, Genocide, and Racial slurs

kawooreads's review

adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful informative reflective sad tense medium-paced

5.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: War, Colonisation, Injury/Injury detail, Islamophobia, Medical content, Murder, Confinement, Death, Forced institutionalization, Genocide, Violence, Torture, Police brutality, Rape, Religious bigotry, Sexism, Sexual assault, Child death, Grief, and Gun violence

clarabooksit's review

challenging dark emotional informative inspiring reflective sad medium-paced

4.75

This is a powerful, eye-opening collection of essays from Arab women writing about their experiences as journalists and photojournalists in the Arab world. While most of the women discuss or at least touch on the Arab Spring,  each essay takes a different approach. As a whole the collection tackles so many subjects from war to displacement to censorship to patriarchy to refugees to misogyny to being detained and interrogated to having two lives—one as an Arab woman, the other as a war correspondent—to death of loved ones and so much more. It’s this range of writing that makes this book really come alive: taken on their own, each essay is good, but together they give the book a scope that is breathtaking.

It would be remiss of me to not mention how difficult some of these essays are to read. There is a lot of heartbreak and violence in these pages. But I genuinely loved reading from each of these women’s perspectives and what they chose to write about when asked to write about their experiences. The stand out essays for me were: The Woman Question by Hannah Allam, Spin by Natacha Yazbeck, and Just Stop by Eman Helal.

I have a few very minor criticisms—the foreword by Christiane Amanpour was kind of meh, there’s one essay that is startlingly different from the rest but I think I understand why it was included, and the organization didn’t quite work for me—but overall, this is a moving, important collection and I highly recommend it. I learned a lot. Definitely a top read of the year.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Grief, Murder, Sexual harassment, Torture, Violence, Genocide, Gun violence, Police brutality, Sexism, Body shaming, Child death, Death, Misogyny, and War

Moderate: Sexual violence, Kidnapping, and Sexual assault

morganrigg's review

informative inspiring reflective tense medium-paced

4.5

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Content Warnings

Minor: Rape, Sexual harassment, Sexual assault, and Mass/school shootings

questingnotcoasting's review

challenging dark informative inspiring reflective medium-paced

4.0

This is a really powerful collection of essays. Each one is by a different female Arab journalist and their stories are remarkable, engaging and heartbreaking. They've reported from a wide range of countries: Yemen, Lebanon, Syria, Egypt, Palestine, Libya, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Morocco and Sudan. These are mainly countries I've only read about in the news which obviously doesn't compare to reading first hand accounts of what it's like on the ground. While the stories are all different, there are similar experiences which connect them and the women are all courageous and dedicated journalists. They're playing such an important part in challenging stereotypes and providing more nuanced narratives from their homelands and this was such an impactful read. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Misogyny, and Violence

Moderate: Blood, Child death, Death, Gore, Gun violence, Hate crime, Islamophobia, Kidnapping, Police brutality, Racism, Sexism, and Sexual assault