Sivan Balslev: Masculinity in Late Qajar and Early Pahlavi Iran

In this episode, join host Yasamin Jameh, in exploring the topic of Iranian Masculinities at the turn of the 20th century when Iran was experiencing tumultuous social, political, and economic transformations which destabilized long-held traditional power structures and cultural mores.

The 22nd episode of Parse is an excerpt from a presentation given by Dr. Sivan Balslev on her 2019 book, Iranian Masculinities: Gender and Sexuality in Late Qajar and Early Pahlavi Iran. Her book interweaves ideas and perceptions, laws, political movements, and men’s practices to spotlight the role of men as gendered subjects in Iranian history. It shows how men under the reign of Reza Shah dressed, acted, spoke, and thought differently from their late Qajar period counterparts. Furthermore, it highlights how the notion of being a “proper Iranian man” changed over these decades.  
Balslev is a historian of modern Iran, focusing on the cultural and social history of the 19th and 20th centuries. She is a lecturer at the Department of Islamic and Middle Eastern Studies at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. After receiving her Ph.D. from the University of Tel Aviv, Balslev was a fellow at the Polonsky Academy for Advanced Study in the Humanities and Social Sciences at the Van Leer Jerusalem Institute. She has also translated two of Iranian poet Forough Farrokhzad’s books from Persian to Hebrew.  

To watch the full talk, click here: ⁠https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FPVthJT8xik&t=2742s