Cocoons as a space of their own: a case of Emirati women learners

© 2017 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group. This article focuses on ‘cocooning’ as a spatial practice of Emirati higher education women learners in a single-sex learning context, which emerged from exploring the intersectional and intertwined relationship of gender, place and culture with its unique cultural formation that informs women learners’ spatiality. To understand women’s spatiality and explore these intersecting relations, I conducted an ethnographic qualitative inquiry, applying multiple levels of data gathering and analysis. I also utilised social theories of space as a theoretical framework, specifically the social construction of space and Lefebvre’s triad of perceived, conceived and lived space. Cocooning, represented in these women learners’ unique spatial appropriation in their quest for a space of their own, emerged as a pervasive socially constructed spatial theme. As a spatial practice, it was largely influenced by the women learners’ cultural model, including socio-cultural status and gender roles, rooted in their national, historical colonial and traditional past as well as current economic, political, demographic, academic-institutional and global positions and demands. Furthermore, cocooning is a spatial representation of what also seems a universal longing among women, beyond context and culture, for a space of one’s own. Such a spatial need is manifested differently in the perceived space while shared in the conceived and lived

Spatializing higher education: Emirati women learners’ hot and cold spaces

© 2018, © 2018 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group. This article is concerned with the types of lived spaces that emerged from exploring Emirati women learners’ spatial experiences in higher education. By conducting an ethnographic qualitative inquiry and by utilizing Lefebvre’s triad of the perceived, conceived and lived space and rhythmanalysis as a theoretical framework, two distinctive categories of the lived space emerged: ‘Hot’ and ‘Cold’ spaces, with their sub-categorizations. These emergent spaces reveal and reflect Emirati women learners’ spatial needs and experiences as manifested through their spatial appropriation and unique rhythms on campus. The findings also extend our understanding and utilization of Lefebvre’s abstract triad, specifically the lived space, and confirm how space is neither abstract nor static, but socially constructed, dynamic as well as culturally and contextually bound. The spatial focus of this study offers a novel way of thinking about women’s experiences and needs in higher education, thus extending the scholarly work on spatializing education

A perspective on women’s spatial experiences in higher education: between modernity and tradition

© 2018, © 2018 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group. This paper is concerned with the spatial experiences of Emirati higher education women students. It presents some of the unique ways they engaged with and appropriated their campus space. To understand and explore women’s spatial experiences as manifested through their spatial practices, appropriation and emerging spaces, I conducted an ethnographic qualitative inquiry with multiple levels of data gathering and analysis. I utilized social theories of space specifically the social construction of space and Lefebvre’s triad as a theoretical framework for this study. The emerging spatial practices of ‘togetherness’ and ‘sitting on the floor’ were highly informed by aspects of women students’ identity and socio-cultural formation, with an evident link to their traditional past that intersects with their specific nation’s modern demands and challenges. Although Emirati women learners’ spatiality might resonate with that of other women learners, their spatial practices are context and culture specific

Beyond a Black Sea of Sheilas and Abayas: Do Emirati Women Students Have a Space of their Own?

This paper is concerned with Emirati women students’ spaces of inclusion and exclusion with specific focus on both their physical bodies and the places they occupy, and the mental space of their creative work where they forge a space for themselves. The paper employs ethnographic research at a women’s federal university campus in the UAE using several levels of data gathering and interviews while utilizing thematic and contextual analysis of the data sets. The work is backed up by the theoretical framework of feminist theory and Lefebvre’s perceived and conceived space. Lefebvre’s perceived space is represented through the physical presence of the female body, and its pure material representation, while the conceived space represents the mental abstract spaces constructed in these women’s writing that come to form a textual space of their own making. The findings emphasize these women’s lack of space, their exclusion, and their agency in utilizing their bodies as a space of their own while constructing other mental arenas beyond the material world to assert themselves. The resulting spaces are often seen as a rebellious and dissident medium against what social and cultural norms allow. Such actions, practices and representations of space are culturally and socially driven while being closely intertwined with their unique identity as Emirati women

Methodological map: a mixed methods approach to explore the role of space in an Emirati single-gender learning environment

This paper provides a methodological map that guides the choice and application of research paradigms and design frames that can be of value to a wide range of researchers in the fields of education, social sciences and interdisciplinary studies who are interested in teaching and learning for women. Following an interpretivist/constructivist paradigm I used a mixed methods research approach to study the spatial experiences of Emirati female students. The main component was qualitative, using ethnography, while the quantitative part included a survey. In such a research approach, my reflexivity and unique positionality as both insider and outsider played a significant role. The Paper is divided into three sections: the beginning , which justifies the choice and philosophies of the methodological route, the journey , which illustrates the data collection techniques, and the destination with reflexive lessons from the field

Types and dynamics of gendered space: a case of Emirati female learners in a single-gender context

© 2016 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group. This article is concerned with gendered spaces as they emerge from exploring Emirati female learners’ spatiality in a single-gender context. By conducting ethnographic research and utilising Lefebvre’s triad of perceived, conceived and lived space for the analysis and categorisation of students’ spaces, three types of gendered spaces emerged: ‘generally’, ‘absolutely’ and ‘conditionally’. These spaces were grounded in the sociocultural context of the institute and its participants. The research also revealed the dynamics associated with such gendered spaces, including mobility restrictions and the agency of the female learners through the ways these females contested gender segregation practices, negotiating and attempting to establish new positions of power within cultural and institutional constraints