Women Entering the Professions in Mandatory Palestine

Abstract:This article recounts the fascinating dynamics of women entering the professions of law, dentistry and midwifery during the Mandate period in Palestine. After presenting the theoretical background relating to the concept of “profession” and the relationship between the statutory regulation of occupations and their professionalization, it focuses on the relationship between women and the professions as it was differentially impacted by legislation in the Mandate period. The story of women’s entrance into the professions thus provides a partial response to the question of how the British framed laws in the complex reality of Mandate Palestine, while endeavoring not to be perceived as discriminating against or privileging either Jews or Arabs. I shall present the process of women’s entrance into or exclusion from different occupations while examining the various narratives that accompanied the regulation of these occupations, in order to expose the common threads or differences between them. I conclude that the regulation of these professions may be understood not through a single uniform narrative, but in various patterns of integration: feminization and de-feminization, professionalization and de-professionalization, sensitization, politicization, and shifts in custom and tradition, which are slow and at times work to the benefit of professional women and at others to their detriment.