W-Women Globally

Written by : Ardita Gjeçi

“Hana” is a book and documentary “Sworn virgins” of Elvira Dones, a well know Albanian writer who lives between USA and Switzerland.
The author of several books about women stories, this time decided to write about an old tradition of very North Albania.
“Hana” tells the story of this 19 years old girl, who – after her fathers’ death -drop out from the school, going back to her small village in the middle of the mountains and decides to become a MAN.

“Women become man”, the so called “Burrnesh” was a woman that give up all women duties and life, to take the man role in the house.
This tradition exists since the XV-th century, when the first codes ( Kanun, the strictest one, by Leke Dukagjini) were written. “The sworn virgins” were “created” for urgent needs and fast solutions: in case the man of the house would die and there was no other man to rule the house, this way the “Woman become man” could inherit the properties belonging to her family and govern it, things that couldn’t be done if being a woman. By taking this decision women would be aloud to undertake every man activities, but she must sworn eternal virginity and give up future own family. This “transformation” was used even in case of an undesired marriage. By becoming a man, they could refuse the arranged marriage. This tradition was happening also in other Balkans countries as Kosovo, Yugoslavia, etc.

From the description of ‘Sworn Virgins’, the movie:

The ancient laws allowed certain women known as “Sworn Virgins” to take an oath in front of their clan, announcing their intention to remain virgins. This fascinating film reports on several unusual Albanian women who dress, act, talk, drink, shoot and are respected as real men. It’s not a matter of sexual orientation, and there’s no surgery involved. The villagers in this area simply accept the fact that some women want to live like men because they like their freedom. They prefer to manage their own lives; they do not want to marry and have children. One such virgin, the oldest of six daughters, took over the running of the family when their parents died. Another became an accountant, saying: “I am neither wife nor mother. I loved working, I did everything for myself.”

Elvira Dones, the 47 years old writer, wrote primarily the book and then decided to film a documentary and personally meet the few left “Sworn virgins”.
Hana from the book decides to break the tradition and emigrates to the States to become a woman and to get back her femmine side, while filming for the documentary Dones noticed that none of the real virgins ever stepped back from the decision to become a man.

The researcher of the Bradford University in UK, Antonia Young, based on her 10-years long research, states in her book “Women who become man: Albanian Sworn Virgins” that at the beginning of the 90’ there were nearly 100 of them. Nowadays there are just few left and the tradition is completely disappearing.

This is the fragment of the National Geographic documentary about ‘Sworn Virgins’:

Sources : osservatoriobalcani.it , Shekulli newspaper, youtube.com

Ardita Gjeçi is Albanian student of Economics and Management of Art, Culture and Communication at Bocconi University in Milan, Italy. Writer, creator of Swallow Artists Network.