Persian Journal, Iran
April 28 2005
FIRST IRANIAN WOMEN WHO ESTABLISHED THE GIRL SCHOOLS IN IRAN
Manouchehr Saadat Noury
Apr 27, 2005
Introduction: Women’s challenge for an improved lifestyle in general
and to obtain a better education in particular has a long history.
The Industrial Revolution (IR) of the 18th and 19th Centuries and the
materialization of machinery to the work force sparked the women’s
movement in Britain. In the 19th Century the IR spread throughout
Western Europe and North America, and it eventually impacted the rest
of the world. In fact the excuse of the physical difference between
male and female was no longer legitimate and women could easily enter
the work force. This was a turning point for women’s socio-political,
educational, and cultural roles. The financial independence resulted
by this development led women to gain more confidence in society and
created a condition for breaking the barriers towards freedom and
more advanced lifestyle. Those social changes of the IR together with
the Bolshevism Revolution in Russia in October 1905, and the
Constitutional Revolution in Iran during 1905-1911 had a great
influence on history of the women?s movement for a better status in
Iran.
Early Efforts: In1848, American Presbyterian missionaries opened one
of the first girls school in Orumieh, the capital city of West
Azarbaijan (a northwestern province of present-day Iran), and the
religious minorities, mainly Christians, attended the school. Similar
schools had opened in Tehran, Esfahan, Tabriz, Mashhad, Rasht, Hamden
and other cities of the country. Muslim girls, however, were not
allowed to attend the missionary schools by the religious authorities
and public pressure. Coincidentally, these girls schools established
in Iran almost on the same time of the Declaration of Sentiment (DS)
in the USA. (The DS is a document signed in 1848 by sixty-eight women
and thirty-two men, delegates to the first women’s rights convention,
in Seneca Falls, New York, now known to historians as the 1848
Women’s Rights Convention. The Sentiments followed the form of the
United States Declaration of Independence. The principal author of
the Declaration of Sentiments was Elizabeth Cady Stanton).
Girls and boys at Maktab-Khaaneh during Qajar period. Source
Apart from those schools opened by the missionaries, there was not
any systematic schooling in Iran until Mirza Taghi Khan-e-Amir Kabir;
the premier of Iran during Nasser-e-Din Shah (the fourth Shah of
Qajar dynasty) founded the educational institution of House of
Sciences (in Persian: Darolfonoon) in 1851. On those days until the
establishment of relatively modern primary-school (in Persian:
Dabesstaan or Madresseh), Iranian girls and boys used to attend the
Learning Traditional Centers (in Persian: Maktab Khaaneh) where
pupils between 4 to 14 years old could sit next to each other on the
floor (sometimes covered by rug or mat) and listen to the teacher.
There was not any age limitation for boys. Girls were only allowed to
attend these centers till age 7. They had then to stay home to help
the family or get a private female mentor to continue their
educations. In the course of Constitutional Revolution some Iranian
reformists started to open separate schools for girls and boys in
different cities of Iran. These reforms were led by a couple, Tooba
and her husband Hassan Roshdieh, with the first Dabestans, using
blackboards, instruction books and maps, opening in Tabriz (in 1887)
and in Tehran (in 1898). Some documents also reveal that in 1902
Tooba Roshdieh opened a girl school in her own house in Tehran and
named it as Training School (in Persian: Madresseh-e-Parvaresh). This
school lasted only for four days and it was closed upon the order of
some clergies. Similar schools in other cities were also closed.
The radical fraction of clergies considered these schools as
undermining Islam and the schools were routinely attacked by thugs
dispatched by the clergies burning and destroying the books and
supplies and shutting down the schools. It is documented that in 1902
Zainel-Aabedin Taghizadeh, an Iranian businessman in Tabriz and Baku
and possibly a friend of Roshdieh family, send one of his employees
to Najaf (in Iraq) to ask if Iranian Muslim girls could enroll at the
newly established schools. High spiritual authorities there, after a
long four days discussion issued a positive religious verdict (in
Persian: Fetwaa). Upon this positive verdict, the establishment of
the new schools became popular among a certain segment of urban
households, notably the middle classes. A group of radical clergies
who were against Constitutional movement were also against the new
schools establishments. Shaikh Fazlullah Noorie issued a Fetwaa
saying that girl schools were against Religious Laws and Regulations
(in Persian: Shar-e-Yat). Another clergy, Shaikh Shushtari organized
protests, which included women from the least privileged classes
against women’s education and distributed a leaflet entitled “Shame
on a country in which girl schools are founded”!
New Girls Schools: Disappointed with the outcome of the Constitution
(since it did not support the right of women to vote and also to
facilitate the establishment of girl schools), Iranian women decided
to organize by themselves and the issue of education became the
priority. On January 20, 1907, a women’s meeting was held in Tehran
where ten resolutions were adopted, including one that called for
establishing girl schools and another that sought the abolition of
dowries so that the money could be spent on educating the girls
instead. Dowry (in Persian: Jahaaz) is an amount of money or property
which the woman’s parents give to the man she marries, and it is a
tradition in many countries. In 1907, Tooba Roshdieh opened a girl
school in Tehran and named it as Chastity School (in Persian: Efaaf).
Also in 1907, Bibi Khanom-e-Vazir Zadeh, who was one of the
intellectual women of the time, opened a girl school and named it as
Mademoiselle School (in Persian: Madresseh-e-Dooshizegan). At the
same time Tooba Azmoodeh opened a girl school in her own house
located in Hassan-Aabad Square of Tehran, and named it as Chastity
School ( in Persian: Madresseh-e-Namoos). Despite threats and abuse
by the mobs and some clergies the efforts continued. The opening of
another girl school named Chastity and Modesty School (in Persian:
Madresseh-e-Effatieh) by Safieh Yazdi, the wife of the
pro-constitution clergy, Mohammed Yazdi in 1910 encouraged other
women and more schools were opened. In 1911 Maahrukh Gohar Shenass
started Progress School (in Persian: Madresseh-e-Taraghi). In the
same year Maah Sultan Amir Sehei opened Training School (in Persian:
Madresseh-e-Tarbiyat).
In 1912 Banoo Attaaey and Mozayanol Saltaneh opened Sun School (in
Prsian: Shamssol-Madaaress) and Adorned School (in Persian:
Madresseh-e-Mozayanieh) respectively. (Mozayanol Saltaneh was the
daughter of Dr Razi Khan Tabatabaa-e-Semnani Raissol Atteba, and she
was also possibly the first woman who published the first illustrated
daily publication dedicated to women in 1915.
Her publication was called as Blossom (in Persian: Shokufeh). By 1915
there were 9 Women’s Associations and 63 girl schools in the city of
Tehran and about 2500 students were enrolled. The curriculum of these
schools consisted of Persian Literatures, Foreign Language, Sport and
Physical Education, Music, Painting, Calligraphy, Sewing, Knitting,
Cooking, History, Geography, Mathematics, Holly Book of Koran,
Jurisprudence (in Persian: Fegh?h) and Religious Laws and
Regulations. Among interesting things about these schools were the
speeches delivered by students and teachers during the examination
periods and other occasions. In the text of the speeches, the role of
GS to educate those mothers of future who will bring up and train
zealous and patriotic female and male Iranians was highly emphasized.
Two Special Schools: During Reza Shah (reigned 1925-1941) several
girl schools were also founded by some Iranian-Christians, and among
them two should be recalled:
1. Yelena Avedisian, an Iranian citizen known as Madame Yelena,
opened a School of Dance first in Tabriz and then in Tehran in 1927.
She was actually born in Istanbul, Turkey, on January 25, 1910. She
then emigrated from Turkey to Armenia and after her marriage, in
1927, she moved to Iran to settle in the city of Tabriz, and she
established her own school of dance where many girls attended. She
then moved to Tehran in 1945, and started her new school of dance,
which was officially recognized by the country’s Ministry of Culture
and Fine Arts. A large number of graduates of Madam Yelena’s School
of Dance followed in her footsteps by teaching dance at various
schools. At the same time, several other graduates established their
own dance schools in Tehran. In 1979 shortly after the Islamic
Republic took over, Madame Yelena emigrated from Iran to the USA and
resided in California. (She passed away on July 2, 2000 in Glendale,
Los Angeles). It should be noted that Madame Yelena was one of the
eminent dance teachers in Iran and trained more than thirty thousand
dancers during her 65 years of teaching career. Here are a few lines
that one of the students wrote about her: “I remember a lady who was
simply called Madame Yelena?She affected our lives by her natural
grace and encouraging attention, which prepared us for our future
artistic careers.”
2. Bersabeh Huspian, a Christian lady born in
Chahar-Mahaal-e-Bakhtiari (a southern province of Iran), established
Bersabeh Kindergarten (in Persian: Koodakestan-e-Bersabeh) in 1930 in
Tehran. Later, the Kindergarten was expanded to a complex including
primary- and high-schools where all Iranian girls regardless of their
faiths could be admitted. The official language of Bersabeh complex
was Persian and its curriculum was similar to the schools already
mentioned. Bersabeh Huspian closed her educational premises and
emigrated from Iran to the USA when the Islamic Republic took over in
1979. (She died in the USA in 2000). Shireen Bakhtiar who attended
the Kindergarten described online how she was doing in that play
school: “I walked to my kindergarten, Bersabeh, in the early morning
sunlight?.Bersabeh was an old walled palace that now was my
kindergarten across from the iron grill-gated Parliament (in Persian:
Majlis)…Bersabeh would stand on the second floor balcony and look
down on us. Always dressed in black like a black bird watching over
her flock? In the sewing class we embroidered handkerchiefs with
colored silk thread pulling the needle into shapes of rose?s violets
and knots of blue bells.”
In contemporary Iran governed by a system that legally permits sexual
apartheid and misogyny, women are still seeking their human rights
for equality and respect. Many women in Iran now get caught,
regrettably, in a web of conflicting forces as their looks,
activities, and behavior become closely monitored. The momentum of
the demographic changes that are taking place in the country,
however, strongly suggests that the situation may alter in the days
to come. After all, approximately two-thirds of the population is
under 30, and more than half the country’s university students are
now females. If and when they become politically active, these
educated women could whole-heartedly struggle to affect the
substantial reforms.
AND IT SHOULD BE REMEMBERED THAT ANY PROGRESS AND SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT
IN IRAN IS DIRECTLY LINKED TO THE WOMEN’S RIGHT TO PARTICIPATE FREELY
IN ALL SOCIO-ECONOMICAL, CULTURAL, AND POLITICAL ACTIVITIES.
Manouchehr Saadat Noury