1. Skip to content
  2. Skip to main menu
  3. Skip to more DW sites

Headscarves and Boxing Gloves

October 12, 2021

More and more young women in Jordan are breaking with traditional roles. Wearing headscarves and boxing gloves, they enter the ring to spar.

https://p.dw.com/p/40GHy
Dokumentation | Kopftuch und Boxhandschuhe | Screenshots
Image: Medea

Training to fight isn’t just sport: it also teaches defense against violence and oppression.

Dokumentation | Kopftuch und Boxhandschuhe | Screenshots
Image: Medea

In religiously conservative Jordan, more and more women are breaking free of traditional gender expectations. The documentary follows 31-year-old Bedouin Reem al-Shammary, Jordan's featherweight champion. She trains alongside male boxers and with young female fighters in her own boxing gym, where a new generation of self-confident women is springing up. Very few of them will go on to a professional career in the ring. But the sport will teach them things they will carry with them for life.

Dokumentation | Kopftuch und Boxhandschuhe | Screenshots
Image: Medea

Away from the ring, Reem al-Shammary is also a fighter. As an elected city counselor, she takes on conservative men who want to confine women to outmoded roles. In a Palestinian refugee camp, she investigates the case of a girl who was forced into marriage, and gives her support. In the desert, she encourages young Bedouin women to defy their fathers and return to school.

Dokumentation | Kopftuch und Boxhandschuhe | Screenshots
Image: Medea


She even fights against entrenched ideas within her own family. In addition to all this, Reem al-Shammary has set her sights on training to qualify for the Olympics, a journey with ups and downs and some self-doubt. Can she make her dreams come true?


Broadcasting Hours: 

DW English

TUE 19.10.2021 – 01:15 UTC
TUE 19.10.2021 – 04:15 UTC
TUE 19.10.2021 – 18:15 UTC
WED 20.10.2021 – 09:15 UTC
SAT 23.10.2021 – 08:15 UTC
SUN 24.10.2021 – 12:15 UTC

Cape Town UTC +2 | Delhi UTC +5,5 | Hong Kong UTC +8
Lagos UTC +1 | Cape Town UTC +2 | Nairobi UTC +3 
San Francisco UTC -7 | Edmonton UTC -6 | New York UTC -4
London UTC +1 | Berlin UTC +2 | Moscow UTC +3

DW Deutsch+

WED 20.10.2021 – 09:15 UTC
SAT 23.10.2021 – 08:15 UTC

Vancouver UTC -7 | New York UTC -4 | Sao Paulo UTC -3