Narrowing the gap between Middle east, West:
Iranian professor a force on campus for women's rights
ENVISION Magazine, 2006
Growing up in Tehran, Iran, Zoreh Ghavamshahidi always believed she could become whatever she wanted to be, unlike the popular conception that women’s rights are an oxymoron in her homeland.
Her parents, Behjat and Esmail Ghavamshahidi, were both professionals, working for Park Davis Pharmaceuticals, and her aunt, Heshmat Eftekhari, was a homemaker who steadfastly encouraged her niece’s intellectual pursuits. “She was a brave and independent thinker, yet compassionate and kind,” said Ghavamshahidi, calling Eftekhari the greatest influence in her life.
In 1976, after earning her Bachelor of Arts degree from Tehran’s University of Damavand, Ghavamshahidi moved to the United States and enrolled at the University of Oklahoma in Norman, where she earned a master’s degree and ultimately a PhD. She was hired at UW-Whitewater in 1987 as a political science professor.
Since arriving at UW-Whitewater, Ghavamshahidi has been a driving force in the area of women’s rights – she was chair of the Women’s Studies and Anthropology department and instituted the annual campuswide Women’s Fair – and she helped to bridge the gap between the Middle East and the West.
“Through her eloquent and incisive presentations, audience members have gained a much more nuanced and complex understanding of the specific geopolitical issues of the Middle East and have moved far beyond the stereotypical equation of Muslims as terrorists, presented in the mainstream media,” said colleague Paula Mohan.
The recipient of the university’s Excellence in Service award in 2005, Ghavamshahidi has spent the past year on sabbatical. In her quest to become an expert in conflict resolution (on a global scale), she spent last fall in Iran, where her primary focus was to survey public opinion on nuclear energy for an ongoing research project.
Her firsthand knowledge of the Middle East coupled with her endless curiosity will no doubt provide her students with even more insightful knowledge about a part of the world not easily understood by outsiders.
While Ghavamshahidi said she was honored to receive the university’s excellence award, what really makes her proud is the fact that “every semester I have a few students that I see the light in their eyes. That makes me proud.” – Barbro McGinn