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Tagged: Egypt

Ghost Writers of Upper Egypt: A Paradigm Shift in Archaeological Knowledge Production

By Wendy Doyon. Within the global archive of archaeology created by the past two centuries of excavation in the Middle East and North Africa, a significant portion of archival documents, notes, and photos form a shadow archive of Middle Eastern history. It documents the knowledge transfer, techniques, craftsmanship, apprenticeship, material studies, and linguistic community of Arabic-speaking co-producers of archaeological knowledge. Rayyis Sayyid Ahmad Sayyid Dirāz and his family are the “Ghost Writers” par excellence of Upper Egypt. Their first-hand narrative of excavation over thirty years of work in the field is the best documented example we have of the fundamentally multilingual process of archaeological knowledge production in Egypt and Sudan.

“Affectueusement, Laila”: Being a Communist “Foreign” Woman in Post-colonial Egypt

By Rim Naguib. Naguib’s research surveys a process of securitization of nationality and foreigners’ residence, whereby the right to Egyptian nationality and to residence in Egypt were instrumentalized in the colonial and post-colonial policing of leftist internationalist ideas and movements. While analyzing state practice, Naguib also inquires into how this particular policing technique impacted the lives of individuals, and how those who were the most likely targets of deportation resisted their remov-al in different ways. The story of Noémie Canel is one such account.

Woman, Femininity, Body, & Medicine in Nawal El Saadawi’s novella Memoirs of a Woman Doctor (1960)

By Dalia Said Mostafa. Nawal El Saadawi (1931-2021) was a renowned Egyptian feminist activist, physician, writer, and novelist. But she was also a controversial figure who caused much disturbance to authorities in Egypt. This article focuses on her first short fictional work Memoirs of a Woman Doctor.

“But knowledge is not only desire; it is also necessary to commit to what we know” – 5in10 with Eman Elnemr

Eman Elnemr received her PhD in modern and contemporary history (2017) from the University of Tanta, Egypt. Her research interests address hegemonic elite projects and so-called modernization transformations, their effects on society, modes of resistance or responses to them, and public/people’s interventions in shaping them.

Egypt’s Football Revolution: Emotion, Masculinity, and Uneasy Politics

By Carl Rommel. One does not have to spend a long time in Egypt to apprehend that football is a serious matter that stirs powerful emotions across the male population. Match shirts of Cairo’s two giant clubs, al-Ahly and al-Zamalek, are omnipresent in streets and squares throughout the country; club rivalries are a source of passionate controversies and banter in cafés, workplaces, and social media.

Affective Readings: Emotion and Society in/of Egyptian Literature, 1990 to 2020

By Christian Junge. What are the social functions of reading literature? While many studies approach Arabic literature primarily through the lens of authors, the literary field, or sociopolitical discourses, my interdisciplinary postdoctoral research project, “Affective Readings”, shifts the focus to the readers. I ask: What do readers read, and how and why?