Graduate student Amila Daulatzai, under the supervision of Dr. Pamela Reynolds, will investigate the social realities faced by the many widows in contemporary Afghanistan. The care and protection of widows is of special concern for both Islamic societies and for international aid agencies. The researcher will explore formal and informal kinship networks, the convergence of the Afghan state with traditional legal structures in the new family court system, and the activities undertaken by international aid agencies to understand how the various notions of care, and the ways widowhood is understood, affect widows' lives.
The researcher will conduct ethnographic research in a bakery that is sponsored by an aid agency to provide employment for widows. The researcher will participate in and observe the operations of the bakery and the daily life worlds of the women who work and shop there. The researcher also will gather data on the formal and informal kinship and community ties of the women, their use of the new family courts in Kabul, and their interactions with humanitarian aid agencies and neighborhood Islamic charitable services. She will document these domains of care and explore how they interconnect with and define the women's lives.
The research will contribute to anthropological theory about long-term effects of war and the post-war state, particularly on women and family. The project will facilitate the training of an American doctoral student, and three students from Kabul University and the University of Peshawar who will assist her. It also will contribute to the rejuvenation and rebuilding of social science research in Afghanistan.
