I found the film Solar Mamas we watched in class
this week very interesting. This film definitely displayed some global
inequality and touched on the modernization theory. I was very surprised at how
little education the female women of Jordan get. This film made me feel so
fortunate for everything I have and the ability for me as a female to get as
much education I want. This video showed how little the individuals of the
Jordan community had. Their houses consisted of tent like objects with very
little owned inside each of them. Although I wasn’t surprised with the low
quality housing I was surprised with the fact that those individuals (noticed
especially with the father) had a cell phone. They seemed so far behind but yet
were slightly advanced.
At first I was confused with the fact that only
women were going to work with the solar power and become more educated. They were
expected to leave their family for six months which didn’t seem accepted by
members of the community. The husband made it clear that his wife was supposed
to respect him, follow his rules and be the care taker of the family. However,
it didn’t take long for those roles to change. The women were going off to
become educated in order to bring back the knowledge to their community. It finally
made sense that the women were the ones becoming educated because if it were
the men there may be a chance of them not sticking to and continuing to apply
what they learned. If the men became more knowledgeable they may take their
knowledge elsewhere.
I was shocked at how modernized their work was. Although
solar power has been around for a while it is still a more recent and upcoming
phenomenon. It was surprising to see how Western practices were starting to be
used. As I have previously mentioned, it was surprising to see how their houses
were so not modernized but yet using advanced methods such as solar power in
their homes. This just makes me wonder how many products are produced in poorer
countries only to be used more frequently in wealthier countries.
As I was searching the internet I came across an
interesting article (posted below).
This article was written in 2013 but discussed where
the solar mamas are after the video was finished. It was unfortunate to see how
the solar panels were installed in the village but there no longer was funding
for the project.
I also found it interesting how the women were the ones who left to get more education about solar power, but it does make sense when you think about it. It's a shame that the funding stopped, because this seemed like such an advantageous event for these women. It could have really helped many more people if it had gone on.
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