Iran - Andrew Burke [27]
Education is highly regarded; literacy is well above average for the region at 77%, according to Unesco. Many middle-class teenagers spend up to two years studying for university entrance exams, though the sheer number of entrants, ideological screening and places reserved for war veterans and their offspring make it very hard to get in. And once out of university, there is no guarantee of work. With the sexes segregated at school and boys and girls discouraged from socialising together, trying to get to know members of the opposite sex is a huge preoccupation for Iranian teenagers. They hang around shopping malls, in cafés and parks, parade up and down boulevards and spend lots of time cruising around in cars. This is especially noticeable in Tehran.
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More than 97% of all children are enrolled in schools, with the rations being almost equal among girls and boys.
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Drugs are available and increasingly a problem, from the army of war-veteran addicts to middle-class kids with nothing better to do, via a wide range of social problems, including a lack of jobs and opportunity. Social taboos make it hard for parents to seek help for addicted children, though when they do, they find Iran has some of the most progressive addiction treatment practices on earth. The phenomena of teenage runaways, especially girls, is another social problem that gives weight to those decrying the breakdown of traditional family structures.
For the most part, though, the average Iranian family is a robust unit and, despite economic and social differences, most operate in broadly the same way. They provide an essential support unit in a country with no state benefit system.
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POPULATION
When Iranians meet they inevitably ask: ‘Where are you from?’ This is because Iran has a multiplicity of distinct ethnic identities who are all, nevertheless, Iranian. It is important to understand that though the indigenous ethnicities are very much part of life, there is a unifying Iranian identity that keeps all these separate peoples part of a bigger whole.
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The population of greater Tehran is about 14 million – almost one-fifth of Iran’s population. That’s comparable to 50 million people living in New York City.
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Iran’s population has more than doubled since the revolution, as contraception was outlawed and large families encouraged. This policy was hastily reversed when the economic implications became clear and in recent years population growth has fallen sharply. Having said that, the number of Iranians is still growing and with all those born in the 1980s now beginning to have children of their own, expect that growth to continue. In 2007 the population was more than 70 million, with almost 70% of those under 30 years old and about one-third under 15, creating serious issues with unemployment and underemployment; (see Iran’s Big Brain Drain, Click here).
The rapid urbanisation of Iranian society started well before 1979, but was intensified by the Iran–Iraq War. Now an estimated 70% of the population live in cities and large towns. Traditional rural life is becoming a thing of the past.
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Rakhshan Bani Etemad’s latest film, Mainline (2006), looks at drug addiction among a middle-class Iranian family, with the protagonist, Sara, played by her daughter, actress Baran Kosari.
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The following are brief summaries of the main ethnic groups you’ll find in Iran. For more detailed descriptions, follow the cross-references to the relevant chapters.
Persians
Persians are the descendents of the original Elamite