Living in a great city like Los Angeles next to people from all over the world with different cultures is an interesting experience. One is able to learn about new cultures and meet new people that have come from thousands of miles away. These cultures bring different languages, ethics, fashions, cuisines, and overall change to the new place. Genders have different roles and expectations to meet in each of these cultures. Depending on where one is born, he or she will adopt the gender characteristics of that region compared to one that is born on the other side of the world raised with different standards.
Males are usually expected to be independent, hard-working, and problem solvers. On the other hand, females are sensitive, caring, and are considered the gentle sex. The perception towards both genders has changed throughout the years in most countries around the world including here in the United States. In most cultures, males are considered the dominant gender which comes from their role throughout the history of human’s existence. Before I start comparing the two cultures that I have chosen, I would like to first highlight some of the main differences between the two genders.
Armenians and Iranians are the two cultures that I decided to compare. There are a lot of similarities and differences in the two. Religion is one of the main reasons for the differences between the two cultures besides the history of the two countries. I learned more about both cultures not only because of the research that I have done about the two, but also the fact that I have both Armenian and Iranian friends here in Los Angeles who have helped me further my research. However, I never went too much into the details about the two cultures before I started to write this esearch paper.
The topics that interested me and the gender roles in each one in both cultures were religion, marriage, and responsibilities of a spouse in a family. Armenia is known as the first country that accepted Christianity as their state religion in 301 AD. 95 percent of Armenians consider themselves Armenian Christians. Bartholomew and Thaddeus were the two apostles that introduced Christianity to Armenia. Both were men. Paganism was practiced by the kings in Armenia before Christ y took over.
In the beginning of the twentieth century, Armenia was divided between the Russian and the Turkish Ottoman Empires. Since then, Turks have massacred the Armenian population which led them to the genocide of 1915 in which 1. 5 million Armenians were killed by the Turks. The entire Armenian population that was living under the Turkish rule was annihilated and they ran to the neighboring countries in order to save their lives. As a result, the Armenian genocide is known as the first documented genocide of the twentieth century. Later in 1917, the Russian empire withdrew its armies from the Western Armenia.
The Turkish army was able to capture most of the western lands of Armenia and they were blocked from entering the eastern Armenia. Armenia declared its independence later in 1918. Two years later, Armenia had to become a Soviet republic in order to save its territories. However, Armenia regained its independence on September 21, 1991. After their independence, Armenians were able to practice Christianity in public again and there was no need for them to hide their holy book which was the Bible. The result is seen today where almost all of the Armenians consider themselves Christians.
There are a lot of Armenian churches in Los Angeles and throughout the United States. Religion has helped Armenians to save their country and their race even after the 1915 genocide unlike many other populations that do not exist today. Because of their religion and culture, most Armenians do not marry non-Christians in order to keep their religion. When it comes to girls, families are more against them marrying non-Armenians compared to their sons marrying a non-Armenian girl. An Armenian wedding takes a whole day and sometimes a few days depending on which country they are from.
Armenians start the party early in the morning, where all the bride’s maids, groomsman and close family members go to the bride’s house to get the bride and groom ready for the big day. After partying and exchanging gifts at the bride’s house, bride, groom, bride’s maids and groomsman go to a nice location to take pictures and be ready for the church ceremony in the afternoon. After the church ceremony, everyone heads to the wedding venue to celebrate the big day with the bride and groom, the party usually takes all night long.
All guests bring cash as a gift to the wedding venue which helps the new couple with their wedding cost and the start of their new life. After the wedding is over, the couples go on a honeymoon and start their life together as a family. Every Armenian family is strict about keeping the custom traditions of marriage to pass it through the new generation. Most of today’s Iranians are Muslim. There are also Jewish Persians, Christian Persians, and etc. There were three religions in Persia which were later mixed together and became Ahura Mazda. Ahura Mazda religion was created by Zoroaster in 660 BC.
Zarathustra acknowledged only one God and believed in “Good Thoughts, Good Words, and Good Deeds. ” Even though Islam is the religion of Iranians today, Zoroastrianism still has its influence on national custom. Iranian New Year is in March with the custom called the Wednesday Feast when Iranians light bonfires to jump over the fire to leave bad luck behind in order to start a new year with success. These are some of the celebrations that have stayed from the Zoroastrian days. Iranians have the same view towards their children marrying a foreigner or someone that is not a Muslim.
They are usually fine with their son or daughter marrying a nonMuslim as long as the other person changes his or her religion to Islam. Iranian marriage ceremony is different than compared to Armenians. The first step is called khastegari where the man and his family go to the woman’s house to meet the family and get their permission for the marriage. After the bride and her family give the permission for the marriage, the young couple goes into another room leaving their families together to get to know each other better and decide on the amount of dowry.
Dowry is for the bride, in case the young couple wants to get divorced later on, the groom is required to pay the aggraded amount to bride so she can use the money to live as a single divorced mother. After the formal proposal, another ceremony takes place which is called Bale Boroun. During this ceremony the families announce the couples union to everyone and the groom’s family gives gifts to the bride. The gifts are usually jewelry to show the support and love of the close family members. Later, the engagement party takes place in which the bride and the groom exchange rings.
The final stage is the wedding ceremony which is called Wedding Spread. They put several kinds of food on the table including herbs, pastries, bread, feta cheese, greens, fruits, rock candy, honey, coins, prayer rug, Persian rose, candles and mirror of fate. During the ceremony, a scarf is held over the bride and groom’s head by the bridesmaids. Two sugar cones are softly ground above the couple’s heads on the scarf by the maid of honor in order to make their life sweet. While the sugar cones are being grounded above their heads, A Mullah who is the Islamic minister starts the ceremony and ask the bride and the groom for their permission.
Then the contract is signed for the wedding in which the groom agrees with the dowry that his family had offered to bride’s family. The amount for the dowry is restated during the ceremony. If the families are religious, some verses of the Quran are read during the ceremony. Usually the cost of the wedding ceremony is paid by the groom’s family and the cost is shared in today’s modern families. When it comes to gender roles, Armenians are old fashioned and it depends on. In the Armenian culture the man has the dominant and masculine role which is very similar to many other cultures.
The man is the head of the family in every Armenian family. The man in every Armenian family is required to provide financial comfort and material needs for the family, and also making major decisions such as banking, household repairs and taking the garbage out. The father of the family is responsible to discipline the children and teach them important lessons in life. No man should do things such as changing diapers or washing the dishes in an Armenian family because it is considered degrading a man’s honor. Woman has the submissive and emotional role in Armenian culture.
The household is the woman’s domain and the kitchen is her kingdom. She is responsible of taking care of her family and does daily chores such as cooking, cleaning and raising children even if she is pursuing a career or owns a business. The woman is responsible to have the meal ready when her husband comes home from work, even if she was also working. An Armenian woman must always be prepared for having unexpected guests over for supper. No Armenian woman will allow any other woman to cook in her kitchen, as the kitchen is her kingdom.
There are also tasks that can be shared in the household such as grocery shopping, taking children to school or after school activities, and maintaining the children health, depending on the parent’s work schedule. In Iranian culture religion plays a huge role when it comes to gender roles and expectations. Men have the dominant and masculine role in Iranian culture. They are considered to be the leader and the head of the household. When it comes to making major decision for their family, men are responsible to make those decisions even if his wife doesn’t agree with his decision.
Woman has to obey and support her husband in any situations. Men are responsible to show the reputation of their family through work where women have to show their modesty and how dedicated they are to their homes. In a traditional Iranian family a man is responsible to go to work to provide financial support for his family, where the woman is not allowed to work and has to stay home to take care of the children and maintain the household. In Iran, women are required to have their father’s permission in order to travel aboard and once a woman is married to a man, he is responsible to make important ecisions for her such as the permission of leaving the country.
In Iran, women have to cover their body from head to toe and have no right to show their skin in public places or to other men, because that shows her respect toward her family. An Iranian woman is responsible to do daily chores such as cleaning, cooking, taking care of the children. She is responsible to wake up every morning to make breakfast for the family, dress up the kids for school and pick them up after school while her husband is at work.
Every Iranian woman is considered to be the queen f the household where she makes the decisions such as decorating the house and the man is not allowed to conflict with her decisions regarding the minor changes in the house. Iranian women are very similar to Armenian women when it comes to the kitchen, they are in the charge of the kitchen and no other woman is allowed to cook and use her kitchen in her absence. The Father of the family is responsible to teach the children about Islamic religion and take his family to mosque every week in order to teach the kids how to pray and follow the holly book Quran.
