Artifactuality, season 2, episode 6.
Kim Thuy (Narration) [00:00:01] On this episode of Artifactuality, how people and stories from around the world become part of Canada’s history and identity. My name is Kim Thuy. On this podcast from the Canadian Museum of History, together we explore what objects and stories from the past can tell us about who we are today. What will resonate tomorrow? How will the events unfolding around us be remembered in the future?
[00:00:38] On September 13th, 2022, a young Kurdish woman was visiting Tehran with her family. As she exited a metro station in the Iranian capital, the 22 year old was stopped by the so-called “morality police”, a branch of law enforcement that persecutes women who don’t dress according to strict modesty laws. The police didn’t explain why she was detained, only that it was related to the requirement for women to wear the hijab. Within hours, she was hospitalized. Three days later, she was dead. Her name was Mahsa Jina Amini.
Kim Thuy (Narration) [00:01:32] Jina’s death sparked global protests against Iran’s theocratic regime. The country’s security forces said she died from a heart attack, but a UN fact finding mission held the Iranian government responsible for her death. The report concluded Jina died as a result of physical violence while in police custody. Saeedeh Niktab Etaati was living in Canada when she heard about what happened to Jina. Saeedeh is the curator of diasporas and transnational communities at the Canadian Museum of History. She lived in Iran for 27 years and witnessed interactions with the morality police. Saeedeh says watching this kind of tragedy unfold in your homeland is a struggle for people who have moved away.
Saeedeh Niktab Etaati [00:02:32] To be honest, living in diaspora, as many immigrants can testify to that, is a very different experience. You live in a split. You are here, but you are thinking of there. So you have to navigate and respond to two different worlds. I was living in Canada, but my heart, my thoughts, my everything was with Iran and everything that was going on in Iran. And most often for the first generation of immigrants, including myself, these are strong emotional and familial ties to Iran. Anything that happens oceans away from Canada has direct impact on your everyday lives and on how you’d make your day, how you function on a daily basis. So to me, when that happened, I thought, okay, like any other thing that is happening to Iran, it is just related to me as an Iranian. It is just an Iranian issue. It is about Iranian diaspora.
Kim Thuy [00:03:34] Did your past come back to mind? Did you feel that, you know, all the years living the same kind of constraints or, you know, living in Iran came back to your mind?
Saeedeh Niktab Etaati [00:03:45] Yeah, it definitely did. It was interesting because it triggered many experiences, my own interactions with the police. You know, all the things that I experienced as an Iranian woman there. And even now when I’m saying this I feel the change in my body because your body remembers and the memories are with it. I was remembering all those years that I was forced to act in a certain way. I was forced to cover my body in a certain way, and I wasn’t pleased with it. But I became much more conscious and cautious about it when I immigrated. And I realized, okay, now I can do this in a way that I want. I don’t have to think about morality police. I can just be me.
Kim Thuy [00:04:40] The death of Mahsa Jina Amini sparked the most widespread revolt led by women since the 1979 Revolution. It became known as the “Woman, Life, Freedom” movement after a popular Kurdish rallying cry. Protests in solidarity with the growing uprising erupted around the world, including several cities in Canada.
Saeedeh Niktab Etaati [00:05:09] It was very heartwarming. It was a unique experience to me as an Iranian woman, to be honest, living in Canada because these movements, Iranian women’s uprising, it wasn’t just Iranian anymore. It turned into a transnational feminist phenomenon and it got international momentum. So when I saw that Iranian diasporas in Canada, they were united, mobilized for this cause, coming to streets, it was fascinating for me to see. And the other important thing was when I went to these rallies, I felt fully supported. I didn’t feel I am alone in this experience, in this grief. It did help me. One of the most powerful moments for me when I was participating and going into these rallies and protests, was when the crowd chanted, “Say her name, Mahsa Jina Amini.” That stood out to me, until this moment I’m talking to you. It was very, very powerful. Because the tenant of oppression is when an injustice happens to someone, there is no consequence to the oppressor. And I experienced that, but this time the whole nation rises. And they were united. They were mobilized despite of the differences in the whole ethnic and social diversity and injustice, to one life lost ultimately turned into injustice to all.
Kim Thuy (Narration) [00:06:40] It became something bigger than “Woman, Life, Freedom.” It became a movement, focused on justice for anyone who has been oppressed, including the queer community.
Saeedeh Niktab Etaati [00:06:52] Exactly. And the thing is, it became a human rights issue. It was across gender, across minorities. It was across different groups. What was very interesting was to see non-Iranians who didn’t speak Farsi joined and participated in those rallies. In one of the roles, actually in St John’s, Newfoundland, it coincided with the Pride Parade, and the proximity of these two rallies in St John’s led to merging of these two. So these rallies joined forces, so it became much more bigger. One of the most interesting aspects of it was the intersectional aspect of it. So yes, the slogan says “Woman, Life, Freedom”, but the “women” includes all women-identifying bodies, all marginalized bodies, all oppressed bodies. So it isn’t just about women. It’s about all queer, non-binary people. And “Queer, Life, Freedom” is another very powerful slogan in this movement. So when I saw that happen in Canada, the Pride Parade and the “Woman, Life, Freedom” movement, to me it was a very great manifestation of the intersectional nature of this movement. And again, it happened in Canada, not in Iran. So to me, as an Iranian woman, it adds another dimension how important it was and how transnational, uniting, far reaching this movement became.
Kim Thuy (Narration) [00:08:22] Part of Saeedeh’s job at the Museum is to work with diaspora communities in Canada and help document their stories by collecting artifacts and oral histories. When Saeedeh attended the rallies, she collected audio and video recordings as well as placards from protesters. Saeedeh’s friend Safaneh Neyshabouri offered to collect signs from the demonstrations she attended in Alberta. Safaneh teaches in the Gender and Sexuality Studies program as well as the Muslim Cultures Department at the University of Calgary. She moved to Canada from Tehran 14 years ago.
Safaneh Neyshabouri [00:09:06] It was heartwarming to see Iranians of very different political convictions showing up to the rallies here in Calgary with their placards, with their banners, with different flags. I felt a lot of pride and a lot of hope, specifically seeing the rainbow flag and seeing, for instance, the ethnic flags such as Kurdistan. To see that various minorities are taking active part in this, not just because of a sense of togetherness, of like various peoples and people of various political convictions coming together. The fact that this solidarity exists with all the marginalized was also present, was very heartwarming, and I was very proud.
[00:10:06] One placard that stood out for Safaneh features a black and white print of Jina’s face. Next to her, there’s a drawing of a dagger. It has a handle shaped like a soldier with a gun pointing directly at Jina. Next to the dagger, there’s a drawing of a torso with no head. It’s topped with what looks like a sickle, a curved blade used for farming. There’s red paint dripping across Jina’s face, but instead of dripping down to the ground, it drips sideways towards the weapons.
Safaneh Neyshabouri [00:10:50] The significance of the sickle is that it reminded me of another young woman, Romina, who was, I think it was a year before the “Woman, Life, Freedom” movement that this young woman wanted to marry the person she fell in love with, and her father beheaded her with a sickle. And there was a lot of conversation around this, because it’s not like this was some sort of common practice. But in interviews with the father, they found out that it wasn’t like even a moment of anger. He had gone and he had talked to a lawyer, and the lawyer ensured him that if he kills his daughter, he was not going to, you know, be imprisoned. He may be held for a few months and then let go because it was his daughter. He Legally, technically owned her. So it’s kind of like patriarchy absolutely supported and encouraged to do violent acts on women’s bodies by the state. And I kind of see that, like, the figure with the sickle head is perhaps the ultimate patriarchal figure in Iran, which is the supreme leader, and how these soldiers are, with his support, shooting at woman. And then there’s a red line. And the way that red line crosses the poster, which is like Jina’s blood or the blood of these people who are fighting for freedom in general, is that it has not dropped on the ground, but it’s coming back at the man with the – the soldier and the man with the sickle head and kind of, like, crossing their faces and their necks.
Kim Thuy [00:12:42] So when you approached people and asked if you could keep their placards, how did they react?
Safaneh Neyshabouri [00:12:49] They were fascinated and they really wanted to take part in it. I think it was very … one of the things that was interesting for me, both with protesters in Iran and the people who were rallying in support in Calgary, was how obsessed and focused they were on recording things. They really wanted this to be recorded. They want this to exist that day, for instance, for Iranians outside was, like, that they support, that they showed up, that they would do what they can to support the people in Iran in their fight for freedom. And I saw that, like with the little clips and videos that came out of Iran, people running away from, you know, the forces… what do they call them? Anti-uprising – and they don’t call it uprising. They have a negative word for that, like the suppressive forces. And they were running and filming, you know, one is screaming to the other one with the camera, “What is the date? Where are we.?” And then the person says “The date is da da da da, you’re in this square in Tehran.” Like, they make sure everything is recorded and they want there to be evidence categorized, classified, a record of what they’re doing.
Kim Thuy [00:14:07] How meaningful is it that the Canadian Museum of History wants to preserve the placards from these rallies in support of the 2022 uprising?
Safaneh Neyshabouri [00:14:18] It’s meaningful in different ways. First of all, as Iranian Canadians, to have the histories of what we did and the things that happened within our community preserved in the Canadian History Museum is, is an acknowledgment to our inclusion in Canadian history as Canadians, as people contributing to Canadian society and culture. But on another level, it’s also very important for academic research in the future for investigating the histories of this time. We are in a very special couple of decades in the history of the SWANA region, Southwest Asia, North Africa region. But we are very involved in it right now with everything that’s happening in the region, including, of course, Iran. In a few decades we might want to study this and we need all these resources to understand the connection of all the liberation movements, of all the feminist movements, and the connection between the feminist movements, the environmental movements, the labor movements that are happening in our region and their connection to the global North, to what’s happening outside. So it’s very meaningful. And I’m very, very grateful that this is happening both as an Iranian and as a Canadian academic.
Kim Thuy [00:15:54] Saeedeh Niktab Etaati says collecting artifacts from diaspora communities is important because Canada is a multicultural country that’s home to millions of immigrants.
Saeedeh Niktab Etaati [00:16:08] There isn’t a singular notion for Canadian history. It’s not just one narrative. It encompasses many multiple stories. People like me, people with hyphenated identities, with multiple identities. They are part of this. So this is very important to me to challenge that singular notion that Canadian history is one thing and it should include certain people. No, it is very diverse because Canada is a multicultural country and all these histories, they are part of this multicultural fabric and they should be included. So my part is to document and show that these are also worthy of collecting, because they are making this history and they are part of this national history.
Saeedeh Niktab Etaati [00:17:03] These events, these political, social, emotional upheavals may have happened thousands of kilometers away from Canada, oceans away from Canada, but the fact is they have impact on the lives of Iranian Canadians. Like many other things that are happening around the world right now, it is happening somewhere else, but the impact, it is direct on people’s everyday lives, how they navigate, how they live their everyday lives because of the thing that is happening beyond the borders of Canada. It’s been two years almost since the inception of the “Woman, Life, Freedom” movement in Iran, and I can say for sure it’s long living legacy persists in different forms. Maybe right now not in the form of the street protests, people coming and shouting and protesting visibly on the streets, but for sure in a different form, in quiet acts of resistance that I see in Iran – women defying the compulsory hijab law and in other ways, how they express their resistance and defiance in a quiet way, not in the form of protests, but how they are not obeying to the laws and how they are expressing their anger. They rage and also they grieve because of all the killing that happened since the murder of Mahsa Jina Amini.
Kim Thuy [00:18:54] So how optimistic are you about the future of social change in Iran?
Saeedeh Niktab Etaati [00:19:00] I am very optimistic. I mean, how can I not be optimistic about this when I witness Iranian women, despite all this oppression, despite all the crackdowns, all the things that are happening, this form of, you know, different forms of oppression, they continue – they continue, they resist and they voice their discontent? So I am optimistic because they are continuing and without optimism, no social change would happen.
Safaneh Neyshabouri [00:19:33] I know that, in the long run, I know that the movements will hopefully connect and bring liberation for all of us because these things don’t happen in isolation. And that also makes it important, the connection to Canada, because it affects us. All of this affects us in Canada as well, as we can see it now with whatever is happening in the world. And it makes us contemplate as to what our role is as citizens of a democracy, to preserve our own democracy, as people who have choices. How do our choices and what we do affect other countries in freedom and in their efforts to become democratic?
Kim Thuy [00:20:36] Safaneh Neyshabouri is an assistant professor in the Gender and Sexuality Studies Program, with a joint appointment in the Arabic Language and Muslim Cultures Department at the University of Calgary. Safaneh is currently developing a new academic course about the “Woman, Life, Freedom” movement. She hopes the course materials will also reach individual learners in both Iran and Afghanistan through accessible platforms. Thanks to Safaneh for speaking with me. Saeedeh Niktab Etaati is the Curator of Diaspora and Transnational Communities at the Canadian Museum of History. Thanks for listening to Artifactuality, a podcast from the Canadian Museum of History. I’m Kim Thuy. Artifactuality is produced by Antica Productions. Ann Lang is our producer. Soobin Kim is the researcher. Laura Regehr and Stuart Coxe are Executive Producers at Antica. Mixing and sound design by Alain Derbez. Jenny Ellison, Robyn Jeffrey and Steve McCullough of the Canadian Museum of History are the executive producers of this podcast. Check out historymuseum.ca for more stories, articles and exhibitions from the museum. For more information about the artifacts connected to the “Woman, Life, Freedom” demonstrations in Canada, check out the links in our show notes.