Analysis of poem "We Sinful Women"

Kishwar Naheed portrays theme in her poem “We Sinful Women” throughout the whole
thing using a range of different key poe c devices. She begins with rising the issue of all
woman are sinful, all woman deserve to be treated this way, which is of course not true. She
uses sarcasm throughout the en re poem to emphasise the point that it is not the women
themselves who choose to be treated like this. In stanza 3, the phrase “while those who sell
the harvests of our bodies/become exalted” can tell the reader that the men who buy the
women’s labor and body become known and praised for ‘their own’ achievements while the
women who did the work get nothing. The repe on of “It is we sinful women” at the
beginning of each stanza is effec ve because it informs us that it includes all women who are
involved with this kind of behavior, she is speaking for everybody. The quota on “not awed
by the grandeur of those who wear gowns”, extracted from the 6th stanza is a way of saying
that not all women are that stereotypical that they care so much about what someone else
is wearing and how it makes them look. The forth stanza holds “who find that tongues which
could speak have been severed”, this is Kishwar referring to the fact that many woman in
many countries who had the courage, knowledge, power or opportunity have been cut off,
thrown in the dark and not allowed to stand up for their own rights. Kishwar Naheed uses a
very deep, meaningful and powerful theme throughout this poem “We Sinful Women”. It
creates the impact that she has hoped for, as many women are being inspired by her words
and take what she says to heart so that they can do something to make a change

“We Sinful Women:” Transgressing Temporality and Poe c Form

by Sultan Jahan Begum

In 1977, Kishwar Naheed’s transla on of Simone de Beauvoir’s The Second Sex was banned
by the Pakistani government for three reasons: first, she had translated and published the
book without government permission; second, she had violated copyright (although Pakistan
does not honor copyright laws); third, the transla on was considered pornographic and
vulgar. (Haeri, No Shame for the Sun, 287) The English version of The Second Sex was not
banned anywhere in Pakistan. Naheed was then ousted from her government posi on,
arrested, released on a he y bail and watched by the Criminal Inves ga on Department
from 1977 through 1979 because of her controversial poetry and poli cs. In a 2009
interview, Naheed responded to the charge that her transla on was pornographic and vulgar
by no ng that one obstacle to wri ng about women’s bodies and sexuali es in Urdu is that
“many words in prose don’t even exist… My transla on of The Second Sex was banned
because of the use of words describing a woman’s private parts in actual language.” (Shoaib,
“Vocabulary of Resistance,” 175-176)
In class, we have discussed transgression as the act of expanding or going beyond
established social boundaries and limits. Chris Jenks’ Transgression opens with the
immediate post-9/11 moment, characterized by global outrage because, “A viola on had
occurred, some boundary had been crossed.” (Jenks, Transgression, 1) Jenks further defines
transgression as not only going beyond a defined social norm or boundary, but also “to
announce and laudate the commandment, the law, or the conven on,” thus making
transgression into a “deeply reflexive act of denial and affirma on.” (Jenks, 2)
This simple defini on is handy for reading Naheed’s poem as transgressive of a few different
ideas, in this case, temporality, poe c form and contemporary poli cs. This presenta on will
address Naheed’s most famous poem, “We Sinful Women,” within the context of late
nineteenth century Indian femininity and contemporary Pakistani society, exploring how
Naheed’s poem addresses the con nuity of these two temporal contexts, considered by
historians as dis nct periods. This is also a feminist argument, one that ques ons the extent
to which the liberal, Enlightenment-inspired na on-state has actually secured equal rights
for all its ci zens. This presenta on will then further examine how Naheed’s poem
transgresses the tradi onal bounds of the ghazal, a poe c form that has pervaded South
Asian literature for centuries. Finally, I will present a reading of “We Sinful Women” within
the context in which it was wri en, 1980s Pakistan.
Kishwar Naheed was born in U ar Pradesh, India in 1940 and moved to Lahore, Pakistan in
1949, just two years a er India was par oned. Naheed’s wri ng career, which began
approximately in the late 1960s, is based on themes that cri que the rela onship between
women and patriarchal states and socie es. Throughout the 1960s and 1970s, Naheed
a ended various conferences on women’s issues abroad and traveled widely, mee ng
writers and ac vists from all over the world. Naheed con nued to write during 1977-1988,
although she was individually targeted by Zia-ul-Haq’s military regime. Naheed is widely
known in Pakistan and the global community for her women-posi ve poetry.
While many of Naheed’s readers call Naheed to be a feminist, including Rukhsana Ahmad,
who has translated many of Naheed’s poems into English, Naheed has never explicitly taken
on this label herself. I a ribute this to the very complex debate over feminism in Pakistan. (If
you are interested, you can read my piece on thefeministwire on this topic.) However,
Naheed’s work is transgressive par ally because the themes she addresses, such as female
equality in the legal and domes c (or formal and informal) realms, are read as feminist.
Since there is a notable popula on that rejects feminism as (pejora vely) Western,
inauthen c and an -family, this lens makes Naheed’s work transgressive among readers who
think her work is feminist.
Reading Naheed’s work as feminist adds a transgressive lens to her poetry. Addi onally,
much of her work cri ques the Pakistani state. These cri ques represent transgression as a
“deeply reflexive act of denial and affirma on.” (Jenks, Transgression, 2) Naheed’s work
serves to point out the flaws in Pakistan’s na on-state project in order to rec fy them. This is
arguably a feminist goal as well- to cri que patriarchal na onalism in order to rec fy its
ills. Since Naheed’s work is not an -na onalist, her work is therefore more reflexive and
wavers, in a complex manner, between affirming and denying the na on-state.
The Par on of India and the Crea on of Pakistan- August 14/15, 1947

Transgressing Temporality: Formal Colonialism and Indian Femininity

Naheed transgresses the temporal bounds of history to argue that Pakistani women today
s ll emphasize late nineteenth century models of femininity based on male-defined
concepts of morality, motherhood and domes city. Temporality refers to the state of exis ng
within or having some rela onship to me. Naheed transgresses temporality by arguing
that social expecta ons have transgressed historical ruptures. While historians theorize
events as ruptures in me, a er which nothing remains the same (think Jenks’ descrip on of
9/11 as a “metaphor for irrevocability”), Naheed’s argument shows that despite the end of
formal colonialism and the Par on of India in 1947, women’s social role remains
unchanged. This line of argumenta on is deeply cri cal of the liberal na on-state model,
which purports to give equal rights to all ci zens, regardless of ethnicity, race, gender and
religion, and follows contemporary feminist literature on the patriarchal implica ons of the
na on-state. (Sco , Only Paradoxes to Offer).
Naheed’s poem “We Sinful Women” discusses women who transgress social norms. These
norms, which exist in Pakistani society today, have a very par cular history. On May 10,
1857, the Bri sh East India Company’s sepoys mu nied against Company rule. It was the
largest rebellion against European empire in the nineteenth century. The Bri sh Crown,
which was formerly ruling India through the Bri sh East India Company and a series of
Mughal puppet-emperors, came to rule India formally in an era known as Crown Raj. One
aspect of elite court culture that disappeared completely in this me was that of the north
Indian royal court. Shahs were also patrons of the arts and maintained courts consis ng of
nobles and tawaifain, or dancing girls. A tawaif usually catered to the nobility and
contributed to the maintenance of Urdu music, dance and literature. The Bri sh
confiscated tawafain property and assets during the Rebellion and while most resumed their
careers in order to support themselves, without the cultural structure that
granted tawaifain class and pres ge, they became pros tutes in the true Victorian sense.
Their profession became “the great social evil.”
Pros tu on- The Great Social Evil
The courtesan’s fall from grace became the main premise for reforming Indian womanhood
in the late nineteenth century. Male-authored novels and manuals described women in two
categories: woman-as-ornament and woman-as-pros tute. The didac c tone in these texts
was intended to reformulate the elite woman into a monogamous wife who
embodied tawaif characteris cs (literary and musical educa on, among other traits). The
woman-as-ornament characteris cs were incredibly difficult to replicate. Women were to be
well educated in poetry, music and literature- a er all, tawaifain were sources of
intellectual s mula on and entertainment- and simultaneously pious Muslim housewives
who spent their me producing and raising the next genera on of pious Muslim men.
This curious mixing of wifely and tawaif characteris cs is one context into which Naheed’s
poem “We Sinful Women” takes on a par cular valence. The protagonists of her poem, so-
called “sinful women,” are neither ornamental wives nor pros tutes, both of whom lament
the inevitability of selling their lives to husbands or pimps. This is a direct play on the word
sinful and the normaliza on of pros tu on as an immoral act, rather than the fact that
there con nue to be customers (presumably male). The ‘normaliza on’ of pros tu on as a
sinful profession is a tangible recogni on of the hegemony of Victorian ideals and Bri sh
coloniza on. Naheed’s language suggests that the real sinful women are those who stand up
against the woman-as-ornament and woman-as-pros tute categories that were placed on
women from without. Her sinful women refuse to let others become “exalted and
dis nguished” and princes or gods in the material world by their selling female beings- both
literal female bodies and ideas of womanhood that are impossible to a ain. Women do not
follow male-defined dictates are s fled, their tongues severed and their paths blocked.

Naheed’s poem has an overlapping, contemporary valence as well. She transgresses the
temporal bounds of history to argue that Pakistani women today s ll emphasize late
nineteenth century models of femininity, the aforemen oned male-defined concepts of
morality, motherhood and domes city. Temporality refers to the state of exis ng within or
having some rela onship to me. Naheed transgresses temporality by arguing that social
expecta ons have transgressed historical ruptures. While historians theorize events as
ruptures in me, a er which nothing remains the same, Naheed’s argument shows that
despite the end of formal colonialism and the Par on of India in 1947, the social role of
women remains unchanged. This line of argumenta on is deeply cri cal of the liberal
na on-state model, which purports to give equal rights to all ci zens, regardless of ethnicity,
race, gender and religion, and follows contemporary feminist literature on the patriarchal
implica ons of the na on-state.
Naheed takes this feminist line of argumenta on one step further by examining how females
oppress other females by enforcing feminine norms among genera ons of women. Naheed
calls the unchallenged reproduc on of social mores the perpetua on of a ‘feminine myth.’
Her language mirrors that used by Simone de Beauvoir, one of Naheed’s influences. Beauvoir
herself has noted,
“Daughter is… at once her [mother’s] double and another person, the mother is at once
overweeningly affec onate and hos le toward her daughter; she saddles her child with her
own des ny: a way of proudly laying claim to her own femininity and also a way of revenging
herself for it… Even a generous mother, who sincerely seeks her child’s welfare, will as a rule
think that it is wiser to make a ‘true woman’ of her, since society will more readily accept her
if this is done.” (Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 281.)
Here we have a type of genera onal violence in which the burdens of femininity are passed
on as inheritances. In this system, described by Beauvoir and Naheed alike, there is very li le
room for transgressing social norms and both writers advocate for challenging the
reproduc on of ideas and mores along genera onal lines.
Transgressing Form: The Ghazal in South Asian Literature
The transgressive theme that runs throughout Naheed’s work applies to her poe c form as
well. “We Sinful Women” takes the tradi on form of a ghazal, a Central and South Asian
poe c form that usually celebrates illicit, una ainable love and/or unbearable pain, o en
due to separa on from one’s beloved. The main themes contained in ghazals surround
metaphysical and eternal ques ons, such as the non-earthly beloved, or God. Ghazals have
been likened to sonnets due to their carefully structured and controlled rhyme scheme and
rhythm. (Silva, “Shameless Women,” 3) They are o en put to music and performed as songs
in a performa ve genre that is available to all classes. Overall, expressing intense affect is the
main idea that dis nguishes a ghazal from other forms of South Asian poetry.
Naheed’s poem transgresses the centuries-old norms regarding ghazal thema cs. While she
is expressing deep emo on and personal feeling, her messages are necessarily poli cal and
social in a way that ghazal poetry never was. Her affect is intertwined with a socio-poli cal
feeling that forces the reader/listener to face the plight of women, both in historical and
contemporary periods. To this end, Naheed joins a contemporary movement of an -
colonial ghazals, in which deep pain is expressed through cruel (colonial) rulers and
martyred freedom fighters. In these early twen eth century ghazals, poli cal ac vism and
tradi onal poe c form became wedded. Yet the main an -colonial poets of the twen eth
century did not write gendered poetry. Un l very recently, men controlled the mushaira (a
gathering to recite ghazals and other types of poems) scene as well as the edi ng and
publishing markets.

Renowned Urdu and Persian poet Talha Rizvi Barque performing at a mushaira in Bihar, 1969
Female poets, including Naheed and many of her contemporaries, transgress upon the
bounds of this male-centric world. While female poets have existed for centuries, many
were forced to write under pen names and have been wri en out of history. Using the deep
emo onal force that has characterized ghazals for centuries, Naheed’s work again departs
from the norm by expressing frustra on with a predetermined future, an emo on that is
neither eternal nor metaphysical. The thrust of Naheed’s work is poli cal and contemporary,
using history to support her claims about today and to warn other women about the
dangers of tomorrow. Her dic on about women’s bodies does so in “actual language,” not
quite to the extent of her Urdu transla on of The Second Sex, but is nonetheless directly
addressing corporeal women and the labor their bodies produce. This is a dis nct departure
from tradi onal ghazals, which only discuss the beloved in veiled terms, using metaphors
such as the moon to describe a young, innocent face.
The bodies in Naheed’s poems are riddled with social contradic ons. In the poem, we have
pros tutes, considered ‘sinful’ by a society that nonetheless demands their sexual servitude.
We also see women who speak up for themselves yet are ideologically pushed out of public
discourse because they are ‘sinful’ for transgressing these norms. These are just two
examples of themes previously untouched by the tradi onal ghazal. Her invoca on of a
tradi onal form to express untradi onal themes is a transgressive act, one that does not
create a new poe c form but rather expands the ghazal’s boundaries to include poli cal
ideas.

Transgressing the State: Military Rule(s) in Pakistan

This poem is a direct reflec on of Naheed’s own society and simultaneously her response to
it. This paper has made historical connec ons between late nineteenth century Indian social
mores and demonstrated that these tropes exist today. According to historian Saadia Toor,
“every aspect of the Pakistani state, society, poli cs and culture worth no ng today bears
the scars of the eleven years of mar al law under General Zia-ul-Haq from 1977-1988,
Pakistan’s longest and most brutal dictatorship.” (Toor, The State of Islam, 117) Within one
year a er obtaining power through a right-wing backed coup, Zia announced his inten ons
to “Islamize” Pakistan and added members of the conserva ve poli cal party Jamaat-e-
Islami to work in his cabinet to ensure his poli cal stability. Zia’s Islamiza on program was
not based on a pre-given meaning of Islam. Rather, he reproduced an earlier, late nineteenth
century arguments on femininity that dictated that women did not have a place in the public
sphere. Zia inten onally targeted women as the focal point of his Islamiza on plans because
he knew focusing on the “reinvigora on” of the Pakistani family would be outwardly
supported by the religious par es and win him “muted approval” of all classes of society.
(Toor, “Moral Regula on in a Post-colonial Na on State,” 255)

Pakistani dictator Zia-ul-Haq with American President Ronald Reagan

Khawar Mumtaz, author of Women of Pakistan and a vibrant part of the women’s movement
in Pakistan during Zia’s period, notes that by 1978 Zia’s Islamiza on campaign resulted in a
change of a tude and social atmosphere in Pakistan that affected women adversely. In
1981, a number of Karachi and Lahore-based female ac vists launched the Khawateen
Mahaz-e- Amal, the Women’s Ac on Forum (WAF), in order to address two alarming trends:
first, the growing tendency to segregate women and push them back into their homes and
second, to combat the various juridical ac ons, such as the Hudood Ordinances, that were
falsely adopted in the name of Islam. (Mumtaz, Women of Pakistan, 74-75)
One of the Hudood Ordinances, the Zina Ordinance, marked the first me that adultery
became a crime against the state as opposed to individuals and both ac ons became non-
compoundable, non-bailable, and punishable by death. Zina is defined as sexual intercourse
outside of legal marriage and conflates two prac ces: adultery among the married and
fornica on among the unmarried. There was no provision for rape within marriage. In order
to prove zina, four ‘pious’ Muslim adult male witnesses must account for the act of
penetra on, or the accused (male or female) may confess. With the implementa on of the
Hudood laws, rape was subsumed under zina and if coercion cannot be proved (which was
nearly impossible), then the vic m of rape becomes an offender of zina who had “enjoyed”
illicit sexual ac vity.

Women protes ng against the Law of Evidence (Zina) in Lahore in 1983. The police
suppressed the protest with violence.
Naheed was also a founding member of WAF and “We Sinful Women” was wri en in the
mid-1980s as a response to Zia’s Islamiza on. The fourth stanza is a direct comment on the
WAF’s protests against Zia’s judicially violent measures. The WAF has literally raised the
banner of truth, exposing these laws and the government that supports them as biased, and
was repressed, some mes brutally, at most turns. Given Naheed’s house arrest in the early
years of Zia’s rule (the late 1970s), the “night giving chase” realis cally represents the guards
si ng outside Naheed’s front door, enforcing her literal imprisonment. Towards the end of
the same stanza, Naheed writes, “the wall which has been razed, don’t insist now on raising
it again,” emphasizing the WAF’s persistence can never be beat out of them. With severed
tongues, these so-called “sinful” women will persistently find a way to speak and be heard.

Concluding Thoughts
This presenta on has read Kishwar Naheed’s “We Sinful Women” as a poem that
transgresses of temporality, form and the na on-state. It remains undeniable that her poem
is capable of many readings, a few of which I have offered here. My analysis of “We Sinful
Women” fits in neatly with the themes of the course, including the place of women’s agency
as female protagonists, women’s agency as writers, and transgressive literature that is
construed as “dangerous” within one’s own society. As a final note, I would like to stress that
it is simplis c and reduc ve to see Naheed and other third world women as figh ng against
an inherently patriarchal religion (as Mona el-Tahawy has recently argued). Rather, “culture”
seems to be the culprit of women’s oppression and, yet also provides the space for writers
such as Naheed to produce transgressive literature. Understanding culture as a concept is
not easily done, and it is increasingly important to acknowledge the role played by the
na on-state, for example, in juridically and culturally organizing and suppressing society and
by ques oning reform within a genera onal framework, in which custom and tradi on is
reproduced endlessly. From this vantage point, Naheed’s social cri ques can be read as
female, not just Pakistani. In class, I would like to con nue to think about culture as an
intellectual space, a ubiquitous zeitgeist, that simultaneously enables and disables
transgressive literature to be wri en, read, contested, banned and ul mately influen al in
an unprecedented way.