Unveiled Voices of Women in Afghanistan

"We have been forgotten, and we need the right to speak. If no one hears what we say, nothing will change."In 1997, during the Taliban's repressive rule, award-winning photographer Harriet Logan went to Afghanistan and encountered a group of extraordinary women whose strong characters and dreams for the future made an indelible impression on her. Despite the peril to her life and theirs, she captured their lives in a series of striking photographs. The women risked their safety by speaking to and being photographed by her because they felt that the outside world needed to know what was happening to them. The images of women from 1997 contrast sharply with those from the 1970s, when they were free to dress as they wished, speak up for their rights, and pursue their educations alongside men. After the Taliban's defeat at the end of 2001, Logan returned to Afghanistan, where she found many of these women again and met others. These courageous and intelligent women shared with her stories ofunimaginable sadness and abiding strength through the long years of war and uncertainty. Zargoona, a widow, reveals that she could not afford to treat her cancer because Taliban law prevented women from earning a living. Nahed, a schoolteacher, has vowed never to marry because even her own brothers beat her, Durkhanai, the daughter of a famous television anchor-woman, tells how she experienced the joys of family life and the pain of lost freedom all at once: "We were likeLogan, Harriet is the author of 'Unveiled Voices of Women in Afghanistan', published 0000 under ISBN 9780060510879 and ISBN 0060510870.