A Border Passage Quotes and Reflections
A Border Passage-Quotes and Reflections “And I found myself angry also at her sister, my mother and aunts, their eyes swollen and red, receiving condolences in the rooms for women.
Why are you crying now? I thought. What’s the point of that? Why did you do nothing to help her all this time, why didn’t you get her out of that marriage? I thought it was their fault, that they could have done something. If they cared enough they could have done something. That is what I thought then. Now I am less categorical. (Ahmed, 120) -I thought this quote was important because it shows the role of women being secondary to men. Aida was stuck in the unhappy marriage because she was a woman and her father would not have her divorcing.
From Ahmed’s view, as a child, she is confused, as most would be, as to why the family she trusts so much would not help Aida but continues to grieve for her. She says she is now “less categorical”.Does that mean she now realizes there is not much the women could have done because they did not have power? “For one thing, we all automatically assume that those who write and who put their knowledge down in texts have something more valuable to offer than those who simply live their knowledge and use it to inform their lives. And we assume that those who write and interpret texts in writing—in the Muslim context, the sheikhs and ayatollahs, who are the guardians and perpetuators (perpetrators) of this written version of Islam—must have a better, truer, deeper understanding of Islam that the non-specifically trained Muslim. (Ahmed, 128-129) -Ahmed is pointing out that the ones who study and write about Islam are not necessarily the ones who know it best. This can be applied to all religions and even other ideas. Ahmed got a much better, richer understanding of Islam from the women in her family which was much more accessible because it could be applied to decisions in morality of everyday life.
This idea that not just the well educated men know about religion is something that should not be overlooked.In fact we all have something unique to bring to the table on a subject, especially religion and it would be useful for the men to listen to other’s opinions. -“What I hanker for now is hearing it live, Arabic music but also other non-Western music, particularly Indian, and not only classical instrumental Indian music but other varieties too—table, dance, mawali (ecstatic song), music of presence and community, and of audience and musicians together, and of being here, now, in body, mind, spirit.Not a music to be appreciated silently, intellectually, privately and then discussed in connoisseurs’ murmurs as we file out. ” (Ahmed, 153) – This quote really moved me because it made me think of international music compared to familiar music. The best way to enjoy music is to feel it with family and friends around and join in singing and dancing. And it made me wonder why don’t I do that more often with family? There’s something about it that seems improper but it shouldn’t be.
It is getting old fashioned to be able to dance with a boyfriend or girlfriend (unless inappropriately at a club) and it shouldn’t be, why has this changed? I also like this quote because it expresses something that Ahmed originally tried to reject because it wasn’t what was popular but now longed for because it was part of her culture. -“Colonialism, we have seen, reshapes, often violently, physical territories, social terrains as well as human identities. As the Caribbean novelist George Lamming, put it, ‘the colonial experience is a live experience is the consciousness of these people’. (Looma, 155) -This quotes help us explain Ahmed’s parent’s identities as shaped by Britain. Specifically Ahmed’s father, who keeps his Muslim religion but is totally emerged in the new sciences and technology of the Western world, finds his colonialism. Ahmed now finds it harder to compose an identity with as much of her Cairo roots she would like. She has not received the same amount of knowledge about the language or history that her parents have and she must struggle to find her own identity.
