Elizabeth Warnock Fernea takes her first foray into ethnography with her memoir Guests of the Sheik: An Ethnography of an Iraqi Village. She opens the book by clearly stating that she has no formal training or experience as an anthropologist. While accompanying her husband, Robert A. Fernea, in his fieldwork in Iraq, Fernea decides to keep a record of her time there. She offers her husband valuable insight into the lives of the women in the harem -- a place to which he has no access as a man. Her life in El Nahra is characterized by the relationships she develops with these women, since she rarely is allowed to spend time with her husband according to the customs of the community. Additionally, Fernea writes about her personal transformation in adapting to life in a foreign country as well as Shi'ite customs in particular.
Fernea's perspective in this book is fascinating because she has no experience in ethnography. Her amateur observations leave room for her personal experiences to blossom. She is, after all, writing simultaneously alongside her real experiences. Having never lived in a foreign country before, Fernea's time in Iraq is extremely challenging at first. She simply lays out the day's struggles and triumphs, noting every time she learns something new about the land or how the people think differently than she had originally expected.
Because of the strict regulations for women in the community, Fernea spends the majority of her time with the other women. She is granted access into an intimate and powerful group of women in the sheik's harem. These women rely upon one another so much for their survival and health, emphasizing the importance of family as paramount. By welcoming Fernea into their community, they demonstrate an openness to learning new ways of thought as well as establishing the kinship of their community upon gender, rather than association. They could have rejected Fernea because she is a foreigner, but instead they welcome her as another woman to be cared for. They look out for one another and readily adopt Fernea into their sphere of concern and love.
