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Mariam Narmah (1890-1972) was the first Iraqi journalist, she published (Fatat Al-Arab) in 1937 of which she considered it a gift to the women community.

Life and Family
Mariam Narmah is the first and the oldest Iraqi female journalist, full name: Mariam Narmah Rafael Yousef Romaia, born in Baghdad in 3 April 1890, other sources say she was born in 1885, her family was Chaldean and lived in Talkif. Narmah means in Persian a kind person. Mariam entered elementary school and finished it when she was 12, where she was living in a small house in AL-Qater Khana (now Al-Jaafraih high school in Wathba street). She was a bright student and started to write social articles in newspapers after the end of WWI, then she worked in teaching. When she was 23, she married Mansour Klozi a civil servant in custom service. Before she got married her mother wanted her to learn sewing and embroidery and to became a nun, her mother was known for her religiosity and reading religion and history books. She dedicated most of the books she collected to the Priestly Religious Institute of the Christian Denomination.

Career in Journalism
Mariam started writing in Dar Al-Salam magazine in 1921 and she worked in Al-Misbah newspaper and Sunday newsletter, she published Fatat Al-Arab in 1937 of which she dedicated it to the women community. This paper has 25 issues in six months, and the first issue was very good and contained 16 pages and the rest of the issues contained 8 pages. The paper was described as a social paper and was interested in reform and guide the Iraqi woman.

Narma is considered the first Iraqi woman to demand the rights of Iraqi women, and she was keen to criticize girls for their own good and wrote an article in the magazine (Majlat Al-Ahad) entitled The Dream of Spring. She lived in the eastern Karrada district of Baghdad and put a plaque on the door of her house on which Fatat Al-Arab was written. She has manuscript notes ready for printing, and they are in two volumes, each volume containing 250 pages. The first includes her family, political and literary memoirs, and the second is her opinion of Iraqi journalists.

Notability and Awards
The Iraqi Ministry of Culture and Information honored her in 1969 for being one of the pioneers of the women's press, during the celebration of the 100th anniversary of the founding of the Iraqi press and the publication of Al-Zawraa newspaper.

Maryam Narmah was at the forefront of the advocates of the renaissance and education of Iraqi women, and in 1924 she published an article in the Baghdadi magazine Al-Misbah entitled “The Married Life”, which she divided into two parts (Haniyya and Shaqyya) and said that the good life is based on love, obedience, chastity, praiseworthy qualities and good morals. It is with love and the union of the spouses with one heart and one soul, and the person with high morals must be a clever teacher and an active manager for his wife and strives to support his wife and children.

She considered that the wife should be an intelligent and discreet student who listens to her husband’s advice, implements his orders, does all the housework, raises her children well and manages the financial manners of the house in order to be a good wife and a virtuous mother. Passionate about ephemeral beauty and corrupt love, she eventually did not skimp on her advice on marriage and the formation of a good family based on morals, love and virtue.

Death
She died in Baghdad in 1972.

Reference
Category:Iraqi journalists Category:Arab journalists