Mahlagha Mallah

Mahlagha Mallah (born 21 September 1917) is an librarian and environmental activist from Iran, who founded the Women’s Society Against Environmental Pollution. She is referred to as the "Mother of Iran's Environment".

Mahlagha Mallah
مه‌لقا ملاح
Mahlgha Mallah in the "Women's Society for Combating Environmental Pollution" office (5 February 2008)
Born21 September 1917
CitizenshipIran
EducationUniversity of Tehran; University of the Sorbonne
OccupationLibrarian; Environmental activist
EmployerUniversity of Tehran
OrganizationWomen's Society Against Environmental Pollution
Parent(s)
RelativesBibi Khanoom Astarabadi (grandmother)

Early life

Mallah was born on 21 September 1917, in a caravanserai close to Now Kandeh, whilst her parents were travelling to Mashhad on a pilgrimage.[1] Her mother Khadijeh Afzal Vaziri (it), and her grandmother Bibi Khanoom Astarabadi, were both women's rights activists in Iran.[1] Her father, Aghabzorg Mallah, worked for the government and lived in several cities.[1] Aged 17, Mallah married Hossein Abolhasani.[2]

Education and career

After studying philosophy, social sciences and sociology at the University of Tehran, Mallah was awarded a MA on Social Sciences in 1958.[2] In 1966, she moved to Paris to study for a PhD at the University of the Sorbonne, which she graduated from in 1968.[2] During her time in Paris she also studied librarianship at the National Library of France.[2]

After graduation, Mallah returned to Iran and began work as a librarian at the Psychology Research Institute Library at Tehran University.[2] It was only after her retirement from librarianship that Mallah and her husband began their environmental campaigning.[2]

Activism

Mallah's interest in environmental activism was fostered growing up as her mother, Khadijeh Afzal Vaziri, was an environmentalist too.[2] However her interest grew when she was working as a librarian and, in 1973, read a book on pollution in order to understand how to catalogue it.[3]

After Mallah retired in 1977, she began work researching pollution in Tehran, and started by visiting houses and knocking on people's doors to talk to them about pollution and other environmental issues.[2][4] She founded the organisation the Women’s Society Against Environmental Pollution, which was the first non-governmental environmental organisation in Iran.[5][6] It was founded in 1993 and registered with the Ministry of the Interior in 1995.[7] As a campaigning organisation, by 2012 it had become the largest environmental group in Iran.[8] It has branches in 14 Iranian cities and has enabled over 25,000 families to recycle.[2] In 2011 it was reputedly the most popular environmental group in the country.[9]

In 2009 the Society published a report entitled "Water Rights" and stressed the urgent need for the conservation of wetland habitats in Iran.[10] This includes work in the Zayandeh Rud region.[11]

Awards
  • Personality of the Year - “Natural Heritage and Environment” (2010)[12]

Legacy

Mallah has been described as an ecofeminist, since her outlook on environmental issues empahsises that women need to be central in any kind of environmentalism.[8]

In 2015 the documentary All My Trees featured Mallah's life-story and was directed by Rakhshan Banietemad.[13] As a result of her activities, Mallah has become known as the "Mother of Iran's Enivornment".[14]

References
  1. "۱۰۰ سالگی «مه لقا ملاح»". web.archive.org. 2020-12-11. Retrieved 2020-12-11.
  2. "Mahlagha Mallah – Women's rights". Retrieved 2020-12-11.
  3. Weisman, Alan (2013-09-24). Countdown: Our Last, Best Hope for a Future on Earth?. Little, Brown. ISBN 978-0-316-23650-8.
  4. "Mahlagha Mallah: Iran's Environmental Pioneer". IranWire | خانه. Retrieved 2020-12-11.
  5. Women's Worlds in Qajar Iran. "Women's Worlds in Qajar Iran". Women's Worlds in Qajar Iran. Retrieved 2020-12-11.
  6. "#31: All My Trees – Docunight". Retrieved 2020-12-11.
  7. Fadaee, Simin (2012-04-27). Social Movements in Iran: Environmentalism and Civil Society. Taylor & Francis. p. 96. ISBN 978-1-136-45914-6.
  8. Fadaee, Simin (2012-04-27). Social Movements in Iran: Environmentalism and Civil Society. Taylor & Francis. p. 97. ISBN 978-1-136-45914-6.
  9. Fadaee, Simin (2011-03-25). "Environmental Movements in Iran: Application of the New Social Movement Theory in the Non-European Context". Social Change. doi:10.1177/004908571104100104.
  10. Hassanpour, Golnoush. "Celebrating Water in an Arid Paradise, From Antiquity to Present". Tirgan Publications. Retrieved 2020-12-11.
  11. Azimpour Tabrizi, Khousheh (2020), Mohajeri, Shahrooz; Horlemann, Lena; Besalatpour, Ali A.; Raber, Wolf (eds.), "Environmental Capacity Building Program for the Residents of the Zayandeh Rud Basin", Standing up to Climate Change: Creating Prospects for a Sustainable Future in Rural Iran, Cham: Springer International Publishing, pp. 281–297, doi:10.1007/978-3-030-50684-1_13, ISBN 978-3-030-50684-1, retrieved 2020-12-11
  12. socialinform (2015-04-03). "Mahlagha Mallah: 96 year old Iranian environmental activist". The other Iran. Retrieved 2020-12-11.
  13. Banietemad, Rakhshan (2015-02-22), All My Trees (Documentary), Mahlaghah Mallah, retrieved 2020-12-11
  14. Tavaana (2015-02-23). "Mahlagha Mallah: Mother of Iran's Environment". Tavaana. Retrieved 2020-12-11.
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