The Tenderloin is the poorest neighborhood in San Francisco. Some of its poorest residents are immigrants who come from the poorest regions of Yemen. Yemen is one of the poorest countries in the world.
Ninety percent of Yemeni immigrants to the US are single males, and this pattern prevails among the approximately 1,000 Yemenis in the Tenderloin. But there are some married couples with children and some extended families.
Cultural anthropologist Lucia Volk conducted interviews with 15 Yemeni women who live in the Tenderloin. Her conversations reveal the many challenges they face and the resulting distress they are experiencing. A consistent theme is a strong sense of social isolation, both from the mainstream culture and other Muslims including other Yemenis. The women’s inabilities to speak English and their Yemeni dress (including full veiling) create barriers separating them from people in mainstream American culture. In terms of the latter, their small apartments with an open kitchen-dining room-living room plan prohibit the women from receiving guests according to Yemeni rules that require separate areas for men and women. High crime rates on the street inhibit the women from moving around the neighborhood.
Another pervasive factor contributing to the women’s sense of isolation is that other Yemenis are beginning to act more American: “Everyone is looking out for themselves.”
Volk concludes that the sources of distress for Yemeni women immigrants in the Tenderloin are multiple and cannot be easily changed. The women’s loneliness translates to complaints of physical fatigue, depression, and weight gain. Medicalizing their condition is not a solution.
Educating the non-Muslim population to become more accepting of the Yemenis and their culture would help improve understanding and acceptance. Providing English language classes for the Yemeni women that they can attend safely would help them communicate with non-Yemenis. Volk admits she has no idea how to counteract increasing self-centeredness either.
Any ideas from you?
Link: Volk’s article in Medical Anthropology Quarterly (December 2009)
Image: “-1231” by Flickr user Carpetblogger, licensed by Creative Commons.
anthropologyworks 
Everything I discuss below is from my own personal experience and my opinion. I don’t expect it to be taken in entirety but hope it helps in some measure. It is my advice but I please use it as best fits the situation or not.
I just came back from Yemen 2 weeks ago. I am also an ESL teacher of 13 years and was working to set up an English program in Yemen. I am more than sympathetic to immigrants and have lived in 8 middle eastern countries and worked with people from all Arabic countries. I also speak Arabic rather well.
What these Yemenis are experiencing is not only culture shock but a very real temporal displacement. The average Yemeni lives in a society that would be more akin to European social norms and technology of several centuries ago.
Some may think this sounds harsh, but it IS the reality. Believe me the conditions these people come from are far more harsh than the average American has any notion of. But they have lost their extensive social and familial support net which is in fact much stronger than most people have in Western and particularly American culture. And what they need in it’s place and what we can help them cultivate is personal empowerment. What the less adjusted will likely label as “looking out for themselves” when they see independence blossom in other Yemeni immigrants.
The first thing we should do to help them is explain gently but firmly that ‘YES, this is a different society. We DO expect people to be self-sufficient and independent, In fact, it is one of the most valued traits in American and Western society. Then we should acknowledge that it is ALSO one of the most difficult skills to cultivate, even for Americans,and we should openly discuss the failings in our society too. But,we do no service to them by cushioning them from reality. Rather the best service is to give them the tools to deal with the very reality they are trying to negotiate and to give them the tools that make anyone successful in American society.
That said anyone living in a foreign culture needs a safe haven-usually their home. I did. A simple solution for their open-living homes is to get them room dividers and screen off the kitchen, bath and bed areas so that women can move freely from the private areas to the kitchen to cook. This screened off area should include a small portion of the living room if possible for the woman’s sitting area. Many apartments have balconies and the area screened off for the men can include half of the living room that connects to a balcony and the balcony itself.
Also, as immigrants tend to like to live in the same apartment buildings you might discuss with them the idea of designating some apartments for the men at certain hours and others for the women mainly. If they are nearby, such as across the hall, the women can cook and prepare food in one place and send the food over to the other-much as they often do in Yemen.
It would be very important also for them to have a place they can congregate socially, like a community center or even room in a building, or two for gender segregation. That has worked very well for our Sudanese immigrants here in Colorado. There are also surely other Arab immigrant communities they could be put in touch with. While they will have some very different social norms they can help these Yemenis immensely. Especially the women.
The women need to learn English, and eventually learn to take public transport and even drive. One solution for English is to have the teachers come to them. I did this for Saudi and Libyan women. The main problem I had was with the children interrupting our class time, so the solution was to arrange for the children to go to another woman’s nearby home. If they are in the same house/apt, even with an attendant, they will inevitably interrupt, taking away from valuable lesson time. This can be a touchy subject as the Libyan female students felt the program was rejecting their children and the children had horrible separation anxiety because they were away from all the mothers. This was overcome in the school venue by providing games and good supervision and explaining the children were being well-looked after, and after 3 days it was fine. Again, this was an issue of independence where the Arab women thought it cruel to separate the children and the Americans thought it unhealthy and unusual for children not to be able to be away from their moms for as little as an hour. At home venues this did not prove to be a problem, as the children were with other mothers or relatives.
Most importantly, if the women want to get out in the world, and thus reduce their depression and physical symptoms the issue of face-veiling must be addressed. They of course will not be allowed to drive if wearing a face-veil and they they will be asked to remove it in the case of identification verification, even sometimes to ride a bus when presenting their pass. So…
These women must also learn to be brave. Either they will have to learn to deal with the stares as they walk around with their niqabs or they will have to learn to wear just the hijab and uncover their faces. These are extremely frightening prospects for many Yemeni women, even in Yemen. Because the whole point of the niqab is the opposite and women get accustomed to the refuge it offers them. But the one factor that does not exist in the US that does in Yemen is the larger social pressure to wear the face veil and the judgments that come along with not doing so. This can be used to advantage if the community and families choose this option.
The best way to approach this in my experience is to discuss it with the husbands, as a group– first. It may run counter to what an American woman thinks is empowering but if you don’t first discuss it with the men and allow them the feeling of some control you will end up with a situation of pitting a wife against the husband, or one husband or brother or father facing ostracism or harsh criticism from male peers.
Another factor is to discuss it with the men as a group so that any one husband will not also find himself receiving ridicule from his peers if he and his wife take the decision. I think here it is best to approach it as it is an option to unveil only the face. May Yemenis will already acknowledge that face veiling is traditional rather than Islamic. And it is VERY important to point out that what is being proposed is not Unislamic either(This of course should not be done by an American who is not a muslim nor a muslim authority, but rather by an acknowledged Muslim authority in the community that the Yemenis acknowledge-and importantly not of a different sect, which could lead to worse problems)
Of course this is a process and the first session should be a discussion of possibilities only. A similar discussion should be organized for the women after the initial discussion with the men, but only after that idea has been presented to the men-and ideally in the way that they have input , or even better they have come up with the idea themselves. It may sound tricky to those who prefer a more upfront, lay it all out on the table type, but culturally it just won’t work.
Also with these first meetings I think it of utmost importance that there be present other Yemeni males who have adjusted successfully to life in the US, and some sort of religious figure or someone who is respected in the community as such. At later meetings with the women other Arab women and successful Yemeni women should be brought in.
In the end it will be up to the community to decide this issue and individual families also but by first addressing the men as a group it will do alot to circumvent a community-wide split. Eventually different choices will be made no matter.
If and when you get to discussions about face unveiling it might be useful to bring in the subject of modern women in Yemen today. There are prominent female figures in Yemen who do not face veil, in Aden many women do not. Be careful with whom you choose to discuss however, because many figures are political, such as opposition leader Tawakal Karman. But on the other hand she is an inspiring figure to men and women alike and might be very useful.
If in the end a family chooses to retain the face veil then the best way to prepare them is to explain all the situations in which it will hamper them. Be realistic but not harsh. Some examples are: getting an official ID. Pictures might be taken by men, and when a clerk somewhere asks for an ID to write a check or verify something he might be a man and either way they lady will have to show her face. You can think up many situations where this type of interactions can occur, I suggest discussing it with them by subject area: health, finance, library & schooling etc…
This will, again, all hinge upon the decision by the men as to whether it will be generally permissible for the women to be out and about. In reality it is unavoidable while the husbands are out working, and in my opinion the best way to address this is by first discussing the necessities of life with the men and letting that lead to this discussion. It’s pragmatic first rather than calling their cultural norms into question first. In reality Yemeni women are not as restricted back in Yemen. It is NOT Afghanistan under the Taliban, and Yemeni women go to market and shop and visit friends, take their kids to the doctor etc…They are really more cooped up here than ever and thus leading them to depression manifesting in physical symptoms. And many of them are probably used to hard labor outdoors and being coped up in urban settings maybe another shock.
Sorry to ramble on so but I really just wanted to give my ideas about what has worked in my experience and impart some thoughts after living in Yemen. Their situation is of course unique and the apparent concern here is a good thing. I have faith you will do much to help them adjust.
Peace and best of luck
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