GENDER APARTHEID AS AN EXTENSION OF ISLAMIC FUNDAMENTALISM IN KHALED HOSSEINI’S A THOUSAND SPLENDID SUNS

Abstract

Talibans’ fundamentalist regime in Afghanistan had erected a system of gender apartheid based on female subjugation. They had introduced a new type of extremism which had no concern with Islamic values and it also does not abide by the humanitarian laws. The present research is the study of Afghan females’ subjugation which has deeply imbibed into their social milieu. Khaled Hosseini’s A Thousand Splendid Suns, depicts how Islamic fundamentalists in Afghanistan try to impose their laws to ensure and prolong their ruling position in that society. Backed by religion as an imperialist force, they create a system that backs up oppression of the others in every walk of life by considering themselves superior to the others. The research is purely qualitative in nature and it has used contextual analysis of the relevant excerpts as its mode. It is based on the theory of Iris Marion Young’s Five Faces of Oppression to execute the subjected forms of Afghan females. The paper concludes that major female characters are the victims of gender apartheid and they suffer a lot in the effort to avert the unjustified implications of Talibans.