53 pages 1 hour read

Lila Abu-Lughod

Veiled Sentiments

Nonfiction | Book | Adult | Published in 1986

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Chapter 6: "Honor and Poetic Vulnerability"

Chapter Summaries & Analyses

"Discourses on Loss" Summary

Abu-Lughod recognizes that poetry for the Bedouins is not the only means of expressing emotions; rather, it is a way to express “sentiments radically different from those they express about the same situations using nonpoetic language” (186). Both modes, common discourse and poetic discourse, address personal life in diverse ways. Abu-Lughod summarizes the Foucauldian definition of “discourse” (35) in order to explain these sets of language that she teases apart. 

"Matters of Pride" Summary

Using a previous example, Abu-Lughod explains that poems can reveal sentiments (like sadness) that differ from those which societal conventions might demand (like anger) in charged circumstances. She uses stories of two separate women who are older than those at the centers of the stories, like first wives or older aunts. These stories illustrate the ways in which women might use or share poems that express their true sentiments, even though their outward actions and speech appear “to ignore […] or not to care” (197) about the circumstances that cause them stress. In either case, the woman will lose face if she expresses disappointment for the lack of respect or position afforded her; sharing the poems is a way to “[confess] how wounded” (197)she feels.