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Power
Ahmed focuses intently on the granting (or taking back) of power and authority in this work. In the realm of politics, we see the struggle between colonial authority and the need for self-determination. In religion, there is the tension between textual Islam and the lived tradition, which also boils down to a clash of the sexes.
Personally, for Ahmed, there's the push and pull of identity: who gets to determine who she is and how much say she has in accepting or rejecting these ideas. This is the crux of the work since Ahmed's quest to understand her political, cultural, and familial identities leads her to examine the forces that have shaped her life and the life of the communities that she moves through.
Ahmed feels that colonial rule had a more profound (though less visible) effect on her mother's life than it did on her father's.
As Ahmed learns in Abu Dhabi, sometimes things that are meant to empower people can actually destroy them.
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