The Girl With Three Legs
A Memoir
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3.8 • 6 Ratings
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- $21.99
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- $21.99
Publisher Description
Having experienced firsthand the horror of female genital mutilation (FGM), Soraya Miré reveals the personal violation and immense challenges she overcame. This book is at once an intimate revelation, a testament to the empowerment of women, and an indictment of the violent global oppression of women and girls. This forthright narrative recounts what it means to grow up female in a traditional Somali family, where girls' and women's basic human rights are violated on a daily basis. Forced into an arranged marriage to an abusive older cousin, Miré was also witness to the instability of Somalia's political landscape—her father was a general in the military dictatorship of Siad Barre. In her journey to recover from the violence done to her, Miré realizes FGM is the ultimate child abuse, a ritual of mutilation handed down from mother to daughter and protected by the word “culture.” Despite the violations she endured, her words resonate with hope, humanity, and dignity. Her life story is truly one of inspiration and redemption.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Mir , "the daughter of a Somali general, a survivor of female genital mutilation, a survivor of an abusive arranged marriage to a relative, now an activist for African girls and women," brings all these personae together in her memoir. Mir is at her most compelling in her graphic rendering of the harrowing genital procedure performed on her. She studiously avoids politics ("I didn't want to get involved with the north and south politics in Somalia"), but readers unfamiliar with those politics may be disoriented when they impinge, as they do. Bits of Mir 's account border on the ethnographic: chewing qat (leaves and twigs meant to stimulate the mind); a spirit dancer's purification ceremony ; her surprise arranged wedding made "with the blessings of my family and without my knowledge or agreement." Mir 's sojourn to America, by way of Italy, Germany, Switzerland, and France, and the saga of making her film, Fire Eyes, are reported more minutely than is engaging. Although the telling is long-winded and the dialogue bland, Mir 's personal, passionate, and persuasive rejection of any cultural defense of female genital mutilation makes compelling reading. "I own my story, my body, and my voice," Mir asserts, "and no one can stop my mission to end the practice." Her "mission of speaking out to end the abuse of girls" is well served by her heartfelt account.
