Book Review On Part 1: ‎
The Bedrock Of The ‎
Family By Mohammed Bashe H. Hassan

By Rhoda A. Rageh

When I read the first part of the Bedrock of Family marked ‘qeybta 1aad’ I became quite confused about its main idea or purpose. The writer says at the beginning that he intends to bring out the strength of the Somali women but I can surely rename it as the condemnation of modern women.

There are two stark attitudes that hit the reader in the face: women were trained as young girls to take care of the male family in a setting rural and primitive (as if women were solely created for that purpose or as if that kind of living was predestined) and that anything ancient is better than anything modern. What the book subtly rejects is the strength of women in the face of modernity and its challenges especially at a time the Somali men failed the family. He naively looks back at a time in our culture when men were not only readily available for their family in a simple living but were the leaders and decision makers in the family and the roles of men and women were clearly defined. In his book, he fails to recognize that the strength of culture is based on the participation of men and women and when men do their part women find the time to take care of home without the pressure of dealing with failures of partners as fathers, husbands and sons but still remain remarkably committed to their family.

In his discussion of the strength of women, he looks nostalgically at the young girl who was for ever present to help her mother with the house, livestock and hut building yet he condemns the building of a modern shelter by women. What he does not seem to grasp is that the strength of women in the modern world doesn’t diminish the character of the Somali women rather it molds them into serious individuals coalescing the old and the new in a remarkably difficult environment. He seems to step over on the young Somali girl in the West who walks in the streets of the West with a Hijab risking her life everyday to maintain her identity, the young girl who is resisting the temptations of following her peers, the young girl who is the source of support for her abandoned mother and family when dad left home for the Mafrish to chew qat or left his family to seek pleasure with another.

For the writer the loss of rural women and the old ways of rearing girls or doing things is synonymous with women’s strength, which renders the book a lament of what should be, rather than an affirmation of women’s strength and a celebration of their character. Aren’t women to be commended for keeping up with the fast paced changes of modernity, if for nothing else, at least for building and maintaining modern houses? If the houses they build in Hargeysa lack water, how is the blame theirs? His serious condemnation of the new buildings built in Hargeysa, and the plastic bags covering trees in the city seem enmeshed in the loss of the strength of the rural women. Is he lamenting the women he knew in his childhood? Or is that the only definition of strong women he understands? How can the simple life of a woman in the rural Somalia compare with the complex life of a modern woman?

If the writer’s aim is to praise Somali women for their strong character in order to convince the youth outside Somaliland about their valuable background, he failed to even understand the mind of a young reader like the young girl in his audience who voicing her disgust in what he views as the ideal Somali girl/woman shouted ‘Hell no’ meaning I don’t see my role model in your book. How does the writer expect his effort to give the young modern Somali girl in the West something to identify with and be proud of without condemning her? How would his message resonate with young modern Somali women? Do the Somali women have to be kept in the rural area as house and livestock keepers to be of any value in a profoundly modern society that expects and requires much more. If his attitude of praising the old and condemning the new persists as it begins in ‘qeybta 1aad, the book is seriously flawed and an attitude of condemning the educated modern women emerges.

Stay tuned: more to follow.

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