Alborz Ghandehari

This project explores the intersection of class politics with feminist activism in Iran since 2002. It analyzes the work of women’s movement activists in the context of labor and ethnic stratification. These individuals have composed Persian translations of works of US radical black feminist theory as well as Italian and Arab Marxist feminist texts. This study shows that their work brings such transnational traditions of radical political thought into an encounter with an Iranian intellectual history that includes figures as diverse as the poet Simin Behbahani and Iranian socialist women from the 1950s to 1970s. Contrary to an orientalist view that holds neoliberalism and Islam as incompatible, this project also argues that fractured neoliberalization in Iran has pushed this group to center working poor and working class women in their political work who experience marginalization as a result of precarious jobs, rape, and government repression.