SHE: Journal for the Home

The SHE archive consists of excerpts from issues published in the period from 1970 to 2020, which were obtained in print copy from private individuals during the course of the EWA project. Some of these are now storied at the offices of Karachi Biennale Trust, and some have been returned to their owners. Additionally, we have included issues from the 1970s digitized by LSE and available here 

Given SHE’s wide lifespan, the material included in the Editing Women Archive has been selected in order to highlight the magazine’s recurring and core concerns: women’s rights in Pakistan, fashion, the domestic realm, and the careers of Pakistani women and artists, as well as critiques of the political and social hierarchies in Pakistan and their effects on women’s power and mobility.

These feminist aspirations and negotiations in SHE morphed and evolved not only within the content of written articles but also across the magazine’s design and layout, its fashion features, and its supplements throughout the decades of publication. The selected snippets reflect the anchoring voice of editor and founder Zuhra Karim in her biweekly / monthly column, profiles of eminent Pakistanis, and literary feminist critiques of the state, such as the Women’s Action Forum’s opposition to the Hudood Ordinances.

The selection also showcases imagery and design across changing fashions in SHE, from hand-drawn illustrations to the use of space and alignment within the magazine’s design, at a time when SHE had to continually revamp itself and, in its early years, lead in style and relevance.