45 pages • 1 hour read
Nujood Ali, Delphine MinouiI Am Nujood, Age 10 and Divorced
Nonfiction | Autobiography / Memoir | Adult | Published in 2009A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Summary
Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Key Figures
Themes
Symbols & Motifs
Important Quotes
Essay Topics
Tools
BetaThemes
Tradition Versus Change in Yemen
The tension between tradition and change, or modernity, in Yemeni society at large undergirds this work. In the character of Nujood, this tension plays out in her marriage. Tradition and custom dictate that child marriages are normal, especially in rural Yemeni society, so the practice remains commonplace. Yemeni law, however, specifies that the legal age for consent is 15, meaning that most child marriages are illegal in the eyes of the law. Nevertheless, because of the power of tradition and the idea of child marriage as a hallowed custom with Islamic roots, cases of illegal child marriages are never brought to court. Nujood is the first little girl who seeks to upend tradition and custom, which place her in a seemingly inescapable and horribly abusive marriage. She uses the power of change or modernity embodied by the modern Yemeni legal system. This debate plays out between her father, who argues that even the Prophet married Aïsha when she was 9, and her older sister Mona, who insists that this was centuries ago and that things have changed. This debate also plays out in geography, as the remote village of Khardji is portrayed as a place of custom and tradition while the capital city of Sana’a is portrayed as a city of change and modernity.
This tension between tradition and change, or modernity, is also embodied by the many women in Nujood’s life who influence her decisions in the present and her hopes for the future. Some women, like her mother and mother-in-law, represent tradition and custom. They resign to their prescribed role in rural, patriarchal Yemeni society, and they expect Nujood to do the same. Some women, like Shada, represent change and modernity. Shada is an esteemed lawyer and a woman of power who champions women’s rights, eschews the niqab, and wears make-up and high heels. Other women like Mona and Dowla stand somewhere in between, rebelling and espousing change and modernity in some instances while adhering to tradition and custom in others. Throughout the book, the question remains whether Nujood will go the way of tradition and custom or the way of change and modernity. At the end of the book, she tends more towards the former, planning her education and future career as a lawyer and stating that she will raise the legal age of marriage and challenge the male members of her family. At the same time, she remains with and continues to care for her family, so in that sense, she continues to straddle both spheres.
Honor and Patriarchy in Yemen
Male honor in patriarchal Yemeni society is another theme that persists throughout this work. In particular, the men who come from the more rural parts of Yemen prioritize honor above all. In the book, this honor is heavily connected to women in the family, whether they be wives or daughters. In order to maintain their honor, the men reserve the right to make all decisions on behalf of the women, such as issues of marriage and veiling, and these decisions rest on honor.
In the case of Nujood’s father, Ali Mohammad, his sense of honor is threatened when his daughter Mona is sexually assaulted while he and his wife are away from their home. In order to retain his honor, the father undertakes two actions. On the recommendation of a local sheikh, he consents to Mona’s hasty marriage to her rapist as a way of quashing rumors that would further damage his and the family’s honor. He also raises alarm in his village and accuses fellow villagers of plotting against him. In this instance, his sense of honor runs up against the honor of the villagers. When they cannot reconcile, he and the family are forced at gunpoint to flee from Khardji. Later, when Nujood begs him for help with leaving her husband and obtaining a divorce, he angrily refuses and cites the issue of honor. Because he agreed to the marriage and gave Nujood as a bride on his honor, breaking it leaves him open to violence from other members of his family.
Much to Nujood’s disbelief and lack of understanding, Ali Mohammad prioritizes his honor above her wellbeing. In this instance, women are perceived as pawns in a crucial patriarchal game of honor. At this point in the work, Nujood, as a little girl at the whims of this game, fails to understand the meaning of honor. In the courthouse, she learns from the judges that most little girls in her situation do not seek justice because it would be an affront to family honor. In other words, traditionalists would perceive her actions as dishonorable. Despite the fact that she makes her stand and rejects these definitions of honor, at her trial, she still notes that she has come to some understanding of why honor is so important to her father in the context of his standing with other men.
The Damaging Effects of Poverty
Delphine Minoui opens the work by revealing that poverty in Yemen has a very damaging effect on the youth and that it leads them away from education into work on the streets and human trafficking. The rest of the work demonstrates how this theme plays out and governs the lives of Nujood’s family members.
In her own situation, Nujood sees poverty as something that hardens the hearts of others. She mentions it first in the context of her father’s chronic unemployment. Although she does not connect the two explicitly, she thinks her father agreed to marry her off young in order to financially better his situation. Given his recent refusal to help her leave her husband, she may be reflecting on how his heart has hardened and is not sympathetic to her abusive marriage.
In the case of Nujood’s siblings, none of them are educated or literate. As a result, they were forced at a young age to sell items on the street and beg for money. Nujood relates that all of her siblings did this regularly. In the case of her brother Fares, his frustration at the poverty that plagued his family led him to run away to Saudi Arabia in search of work. Here, he becomes a victim of human trafficking, forced to work for an exploitative landlord. Rather than ascending from poverty, Fares returns to Sana’a in the same financial situation, dejected and disillusioned. In this case, poverty is cyclical and endemic, a situation from which one cannot escape and a situation which puts one in vulnerable positions. In the case of Nujood’s sister Mona, she sees her mother-in-law using her young daughter Monira as a way of extracting more money as a beggar. This supports Nujood’s initial point, that poverty hardens hearts.
The narrative ends with Minoui’s explanation that, despite Nujood’s victory in court, poverty continues to plague her family and affect her decisions. The decision to write a book about her ordeal is partially informed by the desire to better her family’s financial situation and to enable her to escape the cycle of poverty.
