Abarzanan is an annual art exhibition that commemorates Afghan women’s strength, rebellion, and courage, and our role in shaping our society. For each woman it honors, Abarzanan produces a symbolic costume signifying their place in our cultural memory. Khalida Popalzai, Parween Pazhwak, Shabana Basij-Rasikh and Roya Sadaat are among the women celebrated this year.
Khalida Popalzai is an international football player and activist. Born in 1987 in Kabul, Khalida was taught how to play football by her mother, who was a physical education teacher. Her mother focused on the power of sports and how it can foster confidence and create new opportunities for young girls.
Khalida experienced persecution as a teenager playing soccer under Taleban rule. The Taleban banned women from playing sports and attending sporting events. In order to avoid being caught, Khalida and her friends played after school in an isolated yard. Although forbidden, more girls joined Khalida in playing football in secret. Empowered by the growth in the number of young girls playing, Khalida eventually moved to playing in public fields after the fall of the Taleban. In 2007, with the support of the Afghan Football Association, Khalida formed the Afghan Women’s Football League with her friends. In the recent years, she has had the opportunity to train with girls around the world, advocate on the importance of sports education for girls, and spearhead change to make football safer and more inclusive for women. In 2018, she led a movement of Afghan women football players who courageously told their stories of abuse, corruption, and harassment while playing on the Afghanistan Women’s National Football Team and brought global attention to holding FIFA accountable to end discrimination and harassment harming women in the field. Khalida has a degree in International Marketing Management from the Business Academy of Denmark.
Parween Pazhwak is a prolific author and artist born in Kabul to the literary and political Pazhwak family in 1967. She attended Malalai High School and studied medicine in the Avicenna Medical Institute but was unable to practice medicine due to the war in Afghanistan. Her family like many others had to leave their homeland in search of safety. Parween Pazhwak’s work of literature includes modern Persian poetry, novels, and short stories. She has also written, translated, and illustrated countless children’s books and her books has been translated to English and French. Among Parween Pazhwak’s most well-known published books are River in Dew, Salam Marjan, and Negina and the Stars. She now lives in Ontario, Canada with her husband and children.
Shabana Basij-Rasikh was born and raised in Kabul. She grew up under the rule of the Taleban, when education was banned for women and like many other girls, she had to dress as a boy to attend a secret school. Her passion for education lead Shabana to start School of Leadership Afghanistan (SOLA), the first boarding school for girls in Afghanistan. In addition to her work as the president of the school, Shabana is a fierce advocate for girls’ education. She has spoken at global platforms to encourage investment in education as a means for progress and peacebuilding. For her advocacy and her service to education, Shabana recently received the esteemed Malalai Medal from President Ashraf Ghani and First Lady Rula Ghani. In 2010, she was named one of Glamour Magazine‘s Top Ten College Women.In 2014, she was named an Emerging Explorer by National Geographic. Shabana is a Global Ambassador for 10×10: The Girls Education Project.
Roya Sadat was born in Herat, Afghanistan in 1983. Roya was a teenager when the Taleban took control of Afghanistan forcing women and girls to abandon schools and stay at home. Roya’s mother educated her and her five sisters at home.
Shortly after the fall of Taleban, in 2003, Roya and her sister Alka Sadat, established the first independent Afghan film company. Roya’s films tell the stories of women, their lives, their journeys, their triumphs, and their heartbreaks. They also tell the stories of the continued violence women face at home and in society. For example, her fiction film Taar wa Zakhma, screened at the 7th Asian Women’s Film Festival in 2011, deals with the tribulations of the life of a 17-year-old girl forced into marrying a much older man. In 2007, Roya worked with TOLO TV to produce a popular series called The Secrets of This House. With 50 episodes, the series paints a realistic picture of contemporary life in Afghanistan. Her most recent film, A Letter to the President, gained international notoriety after being shown at festivals around the globe.
In addition to her work as an award-winning director and producer, Roya is the Cofounder and President of the International Women’s Film Festival in Afghanistan, a yearly event that brings global critics, actors, directors, and others in the film industry to Herat to celebrate films about and by women. Roya has a degree in law and political science from Herat University. In 2006, she studied Film Directing at the Asian Film Academy in South Korea.
This article was published in partnership with Abarzanan, an annual art exhibition that commemorates Afghan women’s strength, rebellion, and courage, and our role in shaping our society. For each woman it honors, Abarzanan produces a symbolic costume signifying their place in our cultural memory. Learn more about Abarzanan here.