The toiling coal miners of Iran
Faces blackened by coal, these men seem to have stepped out from a bygone era
Iran's Mazandaran province is only 80 miles from the country's capital, Tehran. But it is a world away from that modern metropolis.
In Mazandaran's mountains, more than 1,200 men spend their days tunneling deep into the ground to extract thousands of tons of coal each month, an important resource for the country's steel industry.
The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
Below, a look at these contemporary miners stuck in an old-school trade.
-
‘The surest way to shorten our lives even more is to scare us about sleep’Instant Opinion Opinion, comment and editorials of the day
-
Book reviews: ‘The Score: How to Stop Playing Somebody Else’s Game’ and ‘The Sea Captain’s Wife: A True Story of Mutiny, Love, and Adventure at the Bottom of the World’Feature Comparing life to a game and a twist on the traditional masculine seafaring tale
-
How Mississippi moved from the bottom to the top in educationIn the Spotlight All eyes are on the Magnolia State
