Interviewees with knowledge of Gender Apartheid in Iran

Pari

Hoda Khamosh

Sahar

In the Islamic Republic of Iran, women and girls have lived under a long-standing system of gender-based discrimination that affects nearly every dimension of public and private life. Legal and societal mandates — including compulsory dress codes, restricted freedoms of movement, and structural inequalities in marriage, work and legal status — have shaped the experience of generations.

The death in September 2022 of Mahsa “Jina” Amini, a 22-year-old Kurdish woman who was taken into custody by morality police for alleged violations of Iran’s compulsory hijab laws, marked a profound rupture in contemporary Iranian society. Her death sparked nationwide demonstrations under the banner “Woman, Life, Freedom”, in which people from diverse backgrounds — women and men, young and old — took to the streets to call not just for changes to dress policies but for accountability, dignity and broader civil rights.

In the years since, women and girls across the country have continued to live with both entrenched legal restrictions and evolving forms of state enforcement. Compulsory hijab regulations — backed by police patrols, surveillance systems and civic monitoring — remain a central feature of these restrictions, affecting how women move through public space and how they are treated by authorities. In some contexts, new legislation has proposed harsher penalties for defying these mandates, including fines, imprisonment and other punitive measures, even as enforcement on the ground fluctuates.

Across interview narratives, women describe the everyday impact of these systems: restrictions that begin in school corridors and marketplace queues but resonate more deeply in the mind and body. Patterns of policing gendered conduct in public life — whether through direct confrontation, digital surveillance, or community reporting — shape ordinary routines, decisions about work or education, and feelings of safety and autonomy.

For many, these constraints intersect with other forms of social and economic pressure. Women recount how professional opportunities are circumscribed by social expectations and legal barriers, affecting career progression, economic independence and family roles. Some describe the emotional burden of being watched, judged and regulated in ways that extend into intimate relations and household life.

Nevertheless, the testimonies in this archive also document forms of resistance — some subtle, some overt — that persist despite risk. Women and girls recount small acts of defiance: removing a headscarf in a moment of solidarity, sharing images and reflections online under pseudonyms, engaging in poetry, music and art as forms of expression, organising study groups to continue their education, and participating in community networks that nurture connection and mutual support.

Families, friends and neighbours feature prominently in these stories — as sources of support, as witnesses to injustice, and as collaborators in everyday efforts to preserve dignity and hope. Across different regions and generations, interviewees reflect on how community ties provide resilience in the face of legal and social constraints, carrying memories of loss alongside acts of mutual care.

Together, the interviews trace both the structural pressures that shape women’s lives in Iran and the lived responses to those pressures: how laws and norms transform into daily lived experience, and how women and girls negotiate, contest and sometimes transcend those boundaries in pursuit of autonomy, identity and connection.