ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the intersections of gender, mobility, and violence by analysing gender as a key mediator of mobility in two urban areas of Pakistan: Karachi and the twin cities of Rawalpindi-Islamabad. Karachi is the commercial hub of the country, Islamabad is the federal capital, and Rawalpindi is the headquarters of the all-powerful Pakistani military. Much journalistic, and some academic, attention has been paid to the various kinds of violence in Karachi: terrorist activity, ethnic violence, and extrajudicial killings by law-enforcement agencies. As women and men move through public spaces-streets, neighbourhoods, and the larger city-they indicate different aspects of mobility. The chapter suggests that certain mobilities, mostly masculine, impact the immobility of other genders; and that these gendered mobilities are inextricably bound with social norms, class, ethnicity, and violence. The larger context of dominant masculinity inhibits women's mobility, as do its claims about the appropriate and "natural" behaviours of men and women in public and private spaces.
