Female Bloggers - Assignment Example

I have chosen to describe and analyze two blogs written by two Arabic women. The blogs will attempt to show how differently both the female bloggers communicate their thoughts with their audience. Both the blogs will be described individually and a combined analysis of the blogs will be done at the end. The first blog under analysis is the “Neurotic Iraqi wife”. It operates under Google’s blog services and contains the thoughts of an Iraqi woman who feels she is being ignored as a wife because her husband is too occupied working for the country. She hails from an Arabic background and is currently based in UAE while her husband makes on and off trips to Iraq. She has been on the blog since August 2004 and has had over 50, 000 profile views but the blog entries stop in September, 2010. The blogger writes about her personal experiences and expresses her thoughts, views and concerns about her family, friends and constantly gives an update about the situation in Iraq. This is a traditional blog as opposed to a news blog. Her journey begins as a new wife of an Iraqi man and she takes us through the changes she experiences over the course of six years. She also writes about her experiences on being a mother and gives detailed accounts of her visits to her motherland i.e. Iraq. In her last entry, she has thanked all her fans and discloses her permanent shift to the United States. She says that the new beginning of her life in the United States would not allow her to communicate via the blog and thus breaks the news of stopping any further blog entries (Neurotic Iraqi wife). She has a good writing style and articulates her thoughts well. It is very informal and there is no use of technical jargon which makes it easy to read. Her ideas are consistent, while her writing is coherent and fluent. Often when telling a story, she makes use of “anadiplosis”. This is when the same word or words are used at the end of a sentence and the beginning of a new one. She makes good use of this technique when she wants to grab attention of the reader and over emphasize something. This example can be found in the following sentence where she writes “Today after all these years I stopped asking. I stopped asking ……..” (Neurotic Iraqi wife). The blog has a background image of a woman standing in a mosque. The subtle brown color of the blog coupled with the light gold imprints of the writings gives it a very surreal touch. It is aesthetically pleasing to the eyes. The blogger links her blog to other blogs as well (specifically ones that give information on the situation of Iraq). She also has links to newspaper websites like BBC News, The Washington Post and the Guardian Post Iraq. When she started the blog, the ‘neurotic wife’ updated it quite frequently; within an interval of a few days. As the years progressed, however, her entries became less frequent. In 2010, she only made entries in the months of February, March, August and September. The comments of the readers also follow the same pattern. Initially, only a few people commented on her entries and it seemed like the blog did not have a big readership. However, in the last two years the comments have remained consistent and she has an average of 30 comments per entry. The people who comment are from different backgrounds. They share their opinions and views with the blogger and keep the forum interactive. Men and women both comment on her blog. Initially, the blogger was seen as being interactive with the people. She replied to reader comments and kept the discussions alive. However, since the last two years the blogger has stopped interacting with her fans. The target audience of the blog seems to be women in particular, but it is open to anyone who wants to learn about the culture of Iraq and read about neurotic Iraqi wife’s personal stories. The blog is historically significant because it talks about Iraq in an era, when the war on Iraq was still in process. That has a social dimension to it which should be taken into account. It was because of the destruction caused by the war that the blogger’s husband decided to leave for Iraq in the first place. And thus the blogger deemed it necessary to create the blog under these circumstances. The blog also has political and cultural dimensions attached to it. The blogger posts entries about the politics of Iraq and comments on her take on the 2008 US elections. The cultural element comes into play when the Iraqi wife talks about the culture of Iraq and how she has felt it change over the years. In addition, the comments of the readers are also an important source of debate. They not only share their cultural experiences but in connection, carry out many other discussions on culture and politics. The above described blog is an entertaining device for readers and gives a look into a life of a woman who wishes to communicate her fears, concerns, anxiety, frustrations, happiness and anger to the audience. The blog is not made for one certain cause or to inform and educate the reader in politics, history or sociology alone. However, there are certain entries which do inform the readers about what is going on in the world and concentrate specifically on politics, history etc. These are, however, the sole interpretations of the blogger alone and show her personal biases. Such entries should be critically analyzed by the readers before they place their complete trust in them. Considering this blog as a descriptive account of war prevalent in Iraq, we can still visualize glimpses of how an Iraqi woman portrayed post-invasion Iraq and how her blogging will narrate history for generations to come. The second blog under analysis is a blog owned by Amal AlMalki. Amal AlMalki is an assistant Professor at the Carnegie Mellon University in Qatar where she teaches English writing courses and also courses as diverse as postcolonial literature and theories of translation. She holds a P.H.D from the University of London and is currently in the process of writing two books. The blogger is a Qatari woman and she takes pride in her Arab nationality and gives it a precedent above anything else (Amal AlMalki 2010). She has been a given a two year grant by the Qatar National Research Fund to study the representation of Arab women in the Arab press. The blogger started the blog in the April of 2009 and still continues to write. Through her blog she has attempted to voice her opinions about the Arab culture and the role of Arab women in particular. She writes extensively about Arab feminism and also takes up issues which show the stereotypical male patriarchal structure still embedded in the Arab society. The blogger has made her blog a public forum and values the opinion and comments of the readers. She also devotes a section of her blog to “Creative Writing Journal” where she welcomes articles from other writers as well. She edits them and posts them on her blog. The journal writings mainly consist of topics which are related to Arabic history, culture, politics or sometimes specific to Qatari society only. It provides other writers a platform to share their stories, opinions and views openly with others. The blogger has a good writing style which immediately grasps the attention of the readers. When dealing with important issues like Arab feminism, Arab male sexism or even religion she often titles them provocatively, which often give away her take on the topic. She gives compelling arguments for what she believes in and uses strong persuasive words to portray her viewpoints. Mostly she starts her writings by directly approaching the topic but sometimes she starts with short anecdotes which are not only interesting but immediately grip the readers. When writing about technical issues, the blogger attempts to define every word very precisely for the ease of her readers. The blog is very simple in terms of its design. It has a dark brown background with minimal designing on the top and bottom. The blogger uses black fonts over an off white paper image to write on. At first instance, the navigation of her blog looks a bit complicated. The homepage represents her most recent blog entries and the latest journal writings. The archives are linked to another page, and further she divides her blog into five categories which all come under a blog home. The blog home is divided into Arabic Blog, Free Space, Déjà vu, General and News. It takes time for the reader to figure out the navigation intricacies. The blogger does no link her blog to any foreign resources. When the blog was started, it used to have almost four to five writings a month. However, in the last year the blogger has only updated the blog with a maximum of two writings per month with an interval of quite a few days in between. The blog has a fixed number of readers who comment on her blog entries. There are a handful of three, four readers who constantly follow the blog and always share opinions and stories with Amal AlMalki. The blog entries have only a few comments and that is why it is easier for the blogger to interact with those few who share their opinions. Men and women both post their comments, but it varies with every blog entry and topic. Sometimes topics which attack the stereotypical male patriarchal structure of the Arab society or issues that deal with Arab male sexism have a lot more comments coming from men than women. The men who comment often defend themselves on such topics and very rarely reaffirm to the bloggers point of views. The comments of the readers, however, show that they are passionate about the topic and have a good deal of knowledge pertaining to the issues. The target audience of the blog seems to be Arab people in specific (she also post entries in Arabic language only) but it is open to anyone who wants to share their own historical and cultural experiences in comparison to the Arab world. The blog is culturally significant because it attempts to view the Arabic culture as a construct of current societal practices. The blogger questions and writes about issues which have very important significance in the Arab culture and religion. For example, she writes about Arab feminism and how it is wrongfully viewed in the Arabic world because it is often seen as clashing with religious teachings. She writes about the typical Arab male attitudes found in the Arab society, but her real goal in writing about such issues is to find the true place of women in the Arab society. It is this need of defining women and portraying their issues out in the open which seems to be the main reason for creating the blog in the first place. Through her writings, Amal AlMalki also introduces the work of other feminist writers and also discusses feminism on a global level, specifically how it is being interpreted in other countries. In one of her blog entries, she writes a case of a Sudanese UN employee Lubna Ahmed al-Hussein who faces punishment for wearing trousers. This blog can also be seen as religiously prominent. Because Amal AlMalki chooses topic which directly pertain to the social and cultural dimensions of the Arab world, it also, indirectly, makes religion come into play as well. The religious doctrines of the Arab world are deeply ingrained within the social and cultural constructs of the society and therefore her blog is also an analytical opinion on how she interprets religion as well. The above blog is an informative and interactive device. Amal AlMalki has the credibility through her work experience and education to make her writings a very valuable interpretation of the cultural and social phenomenon prevailing in the Arab world. Though the reader is asked to critically analyze her writings, it is clear that she has the knowledge to interpret and publicly disclose her opinions. Blog Analysis Both of the blogs described above are the worldly interpretations of two female writers. Though both of them come from an Arabic background and both of them see writing as a medium to communicate their thoughts, their social circumstances lead them to write very differently and for very different reasons. Starting with the blog analysis of the neurotic Iraqi wife, her blog entries follow the pattern of a personal diary. Though her everyday stories are written as an Iraqi wife who communicates her concerns for her husband, her writings also have a political dimension to them. Whenever she writes her stories, she makes sure to describe the political situation of Iraq. This is because the safety of her husband is closely associated with the situation in Iraq. By writing and criticizing the political and social situation of Iraq, she gives the reader a critical analysis of the war on Iraq and also the steps taken by the US government to handle the political situation of Iraq. Though the blog can solely be considered as an emotional journey of an Iraqi wife, it can also be interpreted to have hidden agendas. Weaving politics into her writings may be an attempt by her to show to her readers her political stance and may further be an attempt to sway her readers to support her political stance by employing emotional writing techniques. The blog clearly appeals to the emotions and reader is often found sympathizing with the blogger. We do not have any information on the credibility of neurotic Iraqi wife as a writer. She writes with personal biases and this at times, represents the situation solely from her point of view. The side links to news papers may be an attempt by the blogger to remove the inconsistencies arising in her writings because of her lack of knowledge on the subject. In contrast to neurotic Iraqi wife’s blog, Amal AlMalki’s blog displays information about the Arab society which can be more critically analyzed by the readers. She uses less emotional appeal and her writings in comparison, appeal more to the logic. Though Amal AlMalki writes to revere the position of women in Arab society and push away the misconceptions that are plagued in the Arab society concerning the position of women, her writings are more critical and she gives logic and reason to support her stance. Additionally, she provides a wider preface for users to interact and analyze her writings. She employs one such technique by adding “Creative Writing Journal” into her blog. She gives the audience the chance to compare her writings with other writers as well and this gives the reader a clearer picture of what really is the prevalent situation in the Arab society. Though both of the blogs are an attempt by Arabic writers to openly voice their concerns and question the traditional practices of their society, the neurotic Iraqi wife’s blog, as already mentioned before, is more impersonal. The picture that she has put on her blog also appeals to the emotions. Amal AlMalki’s blog, on the other hand is more formal in communication and her blog has a more professional appearance. She does not take the reader into her own personal life but writes about issues which are not only important solely to her but to the Arab society at large. Her agenda seems to be directed towards changing the prevailing opinion about women in Arab society in a more conforming manner and by using reason and rationale explanations. Also, when we compare the opinion columns of the two blogs the comments on Amal AlMalki’s blog have more constructive criticism and offer more advice than the neurotic Iraqi wife’s blog. The neurotic Iraqi wife’s blog have comments which usually commend her writing skills, more than the content of her writings. Also, Amal AlMalki’s credibility as a university professor gives the reader the impression that her writings are borne out of hard work and research. I would recommend others to read Amal AlMalki’s blog because it is more constructive and follows a good critical analysis approach. Works cited Neurotic Iraqi Wife, 14 Sept. 2010.Web.29 Dec.2010. Amal Almalki, 31 Dec. 2010. Web.2 Jan.2011.< http://amalalmalki.com/> Read More