Chakrabarty, Provincializing Europe, 4.
See Chatterjee’s The Nation and Its Fragments and his Nationalist Thought and the Colonial World.
Selim, The Novel and the Rural Imaginary in Egypt, 59. In making this point Selim acknowledges her debt to Chatterjee’s The Nation and Its Fragments for her thinking on this question.
Selim, The Novel and the Rural Imaginary, 19–48.
For example, on land tenure see al-Wakil, Mulkiya al-‘aradi al-zira’iya fi misr khilal al-qarn al-tasi’ ‘ashr; Hamid and al-Dasuqi, Kibar al-mullak wa fallahin fi misr 1837–1952; Ghalwash, “Peasant Land Tenure in Mid-Nineteenth Century Egypt”; Barakat, Tatawwur al-milkiya al-zira’iya fi misr wa atharuha ‘ala al-haraka al-siyasiya; Hamid, “ ’Istiqrar al-mulikiya al-fardiya lil-’ard al-zira’iya”; Baer, A History of Landownership in Modern Egypt. On economic transformation and incorporation into the world system, see Owen, The Middle East in the World Economy; Tignor, Modernization and British Colonial Rule. On the institutions of nineteenth-century Egypt both before and after the ‘Urabi revolt, see Cole, Colonialism and Revolution in the Middle East; Tollefson, Policing Islam; Brown, “The Ignorance and Inscrutability of the Egyptian Peasantry,” “Law and Imperialism,” “Brigands and State Building,” “Peasants and Notables in Egyptian Politics,” and Peasant Politics in Modern Egypt; Hunter, Egypt under the Khedives. On the courts and legal changes, see Hoyle, The Mixed Courts of Egypt; Cannon, Politics of Law and the Court in Nineteenth-Century Egypt; and Brinton, The Mixed Courts of Egypt. On the press, publishing, and intellectual developments, see Hijazi, al-Wataniya al-Misriya fi al-‘asr al-hadith; Jaddane, Usus al-Taqaddum ‘ind mufakkari al-islam fi al-‘alam al-‘arabi al-hadith; and Hourani, Arabic Thought in the Liberal Age.
Luckily over the past few years there has been some attempt to fill this lacuna in work on Egypt and on Syria/Lebanon in the work of Lisa Pollard and Elizabeth Thompson. In Nurturing the Nation, Pollard shows how the “moral politics of colonialism” came to influence Egyptian identity formation through the institutions of the modernizing state and the reform-oriented press and new media. Thompson demonstrates in her work on colonial and postcolonial Syria and Lebanon that the modernizing state was able to effect changes in the cultural worlds of its subjects through the “colonial civic order.” See her Colonial Citizens.
Selim, citing Badawi, discusses the connections between the medieval shadow-play genre and writing about peasants in the nineteenth century. In this regard she notes that a “distinct and fully developed popular, local dramatic tradition . . . certainly existed in Egypt in the late nineteenth century ... as part of an innovative and resonant modern dialogue with an established popular tradition” (The Novel and the Rural Imaginary, 27). See also Badawi, Early Arabic Drama.
On the emergence of the ’afandi classes and their material culture see Lockman, “Imagining the Working Class.”
Eve Troutt Powell’s recent contribution looks at a similar phenomenon. In A Different Shade of Colonialism, Powell elucidates the role of the raced-other on the production of modern Egyptian identity. See also Lockman, “Imagining the Working Class”; Pollard, Nurturing the Nation.
A particularly interesting example of this genre is “Mata tamaddun al-muslimun [When Will Muslims Become Civilized]?” by Ahmad Bek Ajayif, published in the newspaper al-Umma, 26 April 1906,1.
The article, which was initially published in the Islamic newspaper Kasaba in Baku, posed the question, “Will Muslims accept the European civilizing process [madaniya] in the future or will they establish a new Islamic civilizing process [madaniya]?” This kind of thinking was at times a subset of the literature contrasting the “backwardness” of the East with the development or advancement of the West.
Throughout the following pages I use the English words “peasant,” “peasants,” and “peasantry” interchangeably with their Arabic equivalents fallah and fallahin.
See Dallal, “Appropriating the Past,” 325—358.
Dipesh Chakrabarty defines political modernity as the “rule by modern instructions of state, bureaucracy and capitalism.” Provincializing Europe, 4.
David Scott and Charles Hirschkind, eds., Powers of the Secular Modern, Stanford, Stanford University Press, 2006, 12–30 and 206–242.
See Scott, “Colonial Governmentality,” 191–220.
Mehmet ’Ali ruled Egypt between 1805 and 1848. One can find innumerable books on his life and regime. Some of the more noteworthy recent works are Dayqah, Dawlat muhammad ‘ali wa-al-garb; Fahmy, All the Pasha’s Men; Fargette, Méhémet ’Ali; Lawson, Social Origins of Egyptian Expansionism; and Sayyid-Marsot, Egypt in the Reign of Muhammad Ali.
See Hitta, Tarikh misr al-iqtisadi fi al-qarn al-tasi‘ ‘ashr; the same author’s Tarikh al-zira‘a al-misriya fi ‘ahd muhammad ‘ali al-Kabir; and Rivlin, Agricultural Policy of Muhammad Ali.
Cuno, The Pasha’s Peasants.
Fahmy explores the experience of conscripted peasants in the army as well as their efforts to avoid conscription. See also Cuno, Pasha’s Peasants, 140–141; Hunter, Egypt under the Khedives, 124–126.
Ghalwash, “Peasant Land Tenure in Mid-Nineteenth Century Egypt,” 171–175.
Ghalwash, “Peasant Land Tenure,” 31–78.
See Owen, Cotton and the Egyptian Economy, 309.
See Cuno, Pasha’s Peasants, 184.
Baer, History of Landownership in Egypt, 34; Schölch, Egypt for the Egyptians, 117.
Pollard, Nurturing the Nation; see especially Chapter 3.
See Hunter, Egypt under the Khedives, 187, 193, and 212.
See Brown, Peasant Politics in Modern Egypt, 35.
See Hoyle, Mixed Courts of Egypt, 9; Brinton, Mixed Courts of Egypt, 25.
See Hoyle, Mixed Courts, 42.
See Cuno, Pasha’s Peasants.
Barakat, Tatawwur al-milikiya al-zira‘iya fi misr wa atharuha ‘ala al-haraka al-siyasiya, 291.
A faddan is equal to 1.038 acres.
Hunter, Egypt under the Khedives, 40–41, 100–109; Barakat, Tatawwur al-milikiya, 294; Cuno, Pasha’s Peasants, 161–162.
See Cuno, Pasha’s Peasants, 187–188; Hunter, Egypt under the Khedives, 104—105.
See Shalabi, Al-Rif al-misri fi nisf al-thani min al-qarn al tasi‘ ‘ashr 1848–1891, 149.
See Hunter, Egypt under the Khedives, 103–109, on this practice during the 1860s and 1870s.
“Min al-Zari‘,”Al-Kawkab al-Misri, 26 June 1879, 4.
Ibid.
See Cuno, Pasha’s Peasants, 62.
Cuno, Pasha’s Peasants, 187. Barakat discusses the negative reaction of these Egyptians toward Syrians in the nineteenth century in Tatawwur al-milikiya . See also Brinton, Mixed Courts, 18. On the statistics of immigration to Egypt with a particular emphasis on Syrian Christians, see Philipp, “Demographic Patterns of Syrian Immigration to Egypt in the Nineteenth Century,” 171–195.
See Zayn al-Din, Al-Zira‘a al-misriya fi ‘ahd al-ihtilal al-biritani, 151—184.
See Baer, History of Landownership, 68–70, 102–110; al-Nadim, ed., Sulafat al-Nadim, 127; Brinton, Mixed Courts, 70.
See Cannon, Politics of Law and the Court, 41–45. See also Shalabi, Al-Rif al-misri fi nisf al-thani, 149–155; Barakat, Tatawwur al-milikiya, 190–199.
Baer, History of Landownership, 67.
See Baer, History of Landownership, 10–12.
Shalabi enumerates some ninety taxes to which Egyptians were subject in Al-Rif al-misri fi nisf al-thani, 215; see also Villiers-Stuart, Egypt after the War, 275–276.
Hunter, Egypt under the Khedives, 38–39. On the Suez Canal, see also Sayyid Husayn Jallal, Qanat al-Suwis wa al-atma’ al-istamariya al-dawliya; Karabell, Parting the Desert; and Burchell, Building the Suez Canal.
See Baer, History of Landownership, 28–29; see also Cuno, Pasha’s Peasants, 180.
See Hunter, Egypt under the Khedives, 108–110.
See Hunter, Egypt under the Khedives, 264–265; see also Barakat, Tatawwur al-milikiya, 233, and al-Waqa’i‘ al-Misriya, 22 August 1871. See also ‘Azabawi, ‘Ummud wa mushayikh al-qura wa dawruhum fi al-mujtama‘ al-misri fi al-qarn al-tasi‘ ‘ashr, 68–88; Baer, History of Landownership, 55.
See Hunter, Egypt under the Khedives, 57–59 and 208–209. Fairly typical examples of such complaints and observations may be found in “Hal al-fallah,” Misr, 7 November 1879, 4, and “Hal al-fallah,” al-Tijara, 3 November 1879, 1–2. On the corruption of tax collectors, see “Sayarifat al-‘ariyaf,” al-Tijara, 5 November 1879, 3.
“Fallahin misr—fallahu misr,” al-Kawkab al-Misri, 17 October 1879, 3; see also Shalabi, Al-Rif al-misri fi nisf al-thani, 216.
See “Sayarifat al-‘ariyaf” in al-Tijara, 5 November 1879, 3; “Hal al-fallah,” Misr, 7 November 1879, 4; “Fallahin misr—fallahu misr,” al-Kawkab al-Misri, 17 October 1879, 3. Villiers-Stuart wrote that fallahin who requested receipts for the taxes they paid were beaten; Egypt after the War, 439.
“Hal al-fallah,” Misr, 7 November 1879, 4.
“Fallahin misr—fallahu misr,” al-Kawkab al-Misri, 17 October 1879, 3.
Al-Tijara, 5 May 1879, 4.
The agreement was finalized in 1875 and the courts began formal operations in 1876. See Hoyle, Mixed Courts; Cannon, Politics of Law and the Court; and Brinton, Mixed Courts.
Brinton, Mixed Courts, 6.
Hoyle, Mixed Courts, 6.
See Barakat, Tatawwur al-milikiya, 123–133. Baer noted that the company [Kom al-Akhdar] became insolvent in 1888. History of Landownership, 68.
Cannon, Politics of Law and the Court, 83.
Brinton, Mixed Courts, 70; Hoyle, Mixed Courts, 14.
Egyptian peasants, however, were almost certainly accustomed to government officials, merchants, agents, and moneylenders speaking languages other than Arabic. The Egyptian countryside had been crisscrossed for millennia by armies and traders from around the Mediterranean and Africa. Under the Ottoman Mamluks, Turkish became the bureaucratic language for centuries.
See Barakat, Tatawwur al-milikiya, 55–70. The quotation comes from page 66.
Barakat, Tatawwur al-milikiya, 69.
The standard work on the modern history of cotton cultivation in Egypt remains Owen’s Cotton and the Egyptian Economy.
According to ‘Abd al-Fattah Jalal, al-Nadim almost single-handedly brought the “peasant question” into the consciousness of the writers, activists, and other public intellectuals, including Mustafa Kamil, the nationalist leader of the early twentieth century. See al-Nadim, ed. Sulafat al-Nadim, 143–148.
See the issues of al-Waqt for 12, 15, 25, 28, and 29 May 1880 (pages 1–2) for a series on the methods of jute growing and the profit potential of jute cultivation; see also the 21 March 1880 issue of Nashrat al-Jam‘iya al-Zira‘iya al-Misriya for an article on the benefits of steam engines for increasing the efficiency of summer irrigation, (6). On 8 May 1884, an article, “Dudat al-qutn,” appeared in al-Zaman describing the conditions that favored the spread of the cotton weevil and methods of containing it (3).
For typical pieces detailing the peasants’ toil, filthy living conditions, poor food and clothing, and exploitation at the hands of government officials, see “Fallahin misr–fallahu misr,” al-Kawkab al-Misri, 17 October 1879, 3; the untitled lead article in al-Watan, 10 April 1880,1; and “Hal al-fallah,” al-Mufid, 23 January 1882, 1–2. Before 1880 al-Tijara and al-Waqt reported commodity and share prices for markets in Alexandria, Cairo, London, and Paris.
La’ihat Idarat al-Jam‘iya al-Zira‘iya al-Misriya [Administrative Proposal for the Egyptian Agricultural Association], 1880.
See Di Tirazi, Tarikh al-sihafa al-‘arabiya, 3: 20–21. See ‘Abdallah al-Nadim’s review of al-Mufid in al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 16 October 1881, 303.
See Di Tirazi, Tarikh al-sihafa al-‘arabiya 2: 224–226; and Jayyid, al-Sihafa al-misriya wa thawrat 1919 [The Egyptian Press and the 1919 Revolution], 18.
See Di Tirazi, Tarikh al-sihafa al-‘arabiya 1, 22–23; Hartmann, Arabic Press of Egypt, 32, 73.
Nathan Brown has argued, concerning a slightly later period, that much of the concern for peasant cultivators found in the Egyptian press is best understood as an expression of the worries of what he terms the agricultural middle class. As he puts it, the agricultural middle class in the early twentieth century used “its position to cast its problems as the problems of the countryside as a whole” [146]. This point is certainly applicable to the 1870s and 1880s as well. See his “Peasants and Notables in Egyptian Politics,” 146–160.
“Hal al-fallah,” al-Mufid, 23 January 1882, 1–2.
“Al-fallah,” al-Mufid, 26 January 1882, 4.
For example, see Eder, Managing Egypt’s Poor; Ghalwash, “Peasant Land Tenure”; and Brown, “Peasants and Notables.”
Villiers-Stuart, Egypt after the War. See also Owen, Cotton and the Egyptian Economy, 148–151; Schölch, Egypt for the Egyptians, 73. See also Barakat, Tatawwur al-milikiya, 324–326; Shalabi, Al-Rif al-misri fi nisf al-thani, 108; Al-Nadim, Sulafat al-Nadim, 191–193.
“Madha sina‘ Muhammad Ali in al-Bustani, ed., Al-Urwa al-Wuthqa wa al-thawra al-tahriryya al-kubra lil-Jamal al-Din al-’Afghani wa Shaykh Muhammad Abduh, 12–13.
This was a commonsense accepted truth by the 1890s. In 1896 the Cairo daily al-Ikhlas, edited by a Christian, Ibrahim ‘Abd al-Masih, compared the debt, foreclosures, and formation of large holdings to the “old days” when the “Turks” were granted large tracts of land by Mehmet ’Ali; see “Wayl al-fallah min al-matami‘,” Al-Ikhlas, 12 February 1896, 3. In 1897 the newspaper al-Fallah described the “despotism” and “injustice, tyranny” of the 1890s as equivalent to the “time of abandonment” associated with Mehmet ’Ali; see ”Al-‘Umda wa al-fallah,” Al-Fallah, 8 October 1897, 1.
Jayyid, al-Sihafa al-misriya wa thawrat 1919, 157. See also Di Tirazi, 3: 18 and al-Tanahi al-Kitab al-matbu‘at bi-misr fi al-qarn al-tasi‘ ‘ashr: tarikh wa tahlil 1996, 112–115.
For example, see “Akhabar dakhaliya,” Misr, 23 October 1878, 4; “Al-Fallah,” al-Mufid, 26 January 1882, 4; and “Halat al-fallahin,” al-Zaman, 27 July 1884, 1.
“Muhtaj jahil fi id muhtal tami‘” [“The Needs of the Ignorant are in the Hands of Greedy Cheats”], Al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 6 July 1881, 11–12. See also “Hal al-fallah,” al-Mufid, 23 January 1882, 1–2.
For example, in “Fallahu misr” in Wafa Muhammad’s al-Kawkab al-Misri , 17 October 1879, 3, concluded that no difference existed between the current situation and “the era of Sa’id [viceroy of Egypt from 1854 to 1863].”
Villiers-Stuart reported that Muslim moneylenders (“usurers”) do not lend money at usurious rates; instead, they purchase the crops of the borrower before they are harvested at a “discount between 33%–50%.” Villiers-Stuart, Egypt after the War, 275.
Cuno, Pasha’s Peasants, 48–49.
Almost every book written about the countryside or peasants echoes these sentiments. See Shalabi, Al-Rif al-misri fi nisf al-thani, for a typical example. In English see Baer’s classic work, Fellah and Townsman in the Middle East, 274. Critchfield’s Shahhat: An Egyptian Peasant is more literary in its presentation of these ideas. Perhaps the definitive work in this genre is Ayrout, The Egyptian Peasant , first published in French in 1938. For critiques of these views of the peasants, see Mitchell’s work on Critchfield in “The Invention and Reinvention of the Egyptian Peasant,” 129–150; and his “Nobody Listens to a Poor Man,” in Rule of Experts: Egypt, Techno-Politics, Modernity, 153–178.
The Greeks were—and still are—often singled out for particular opprobrium. A fairly recent example is ‘Ashmawi’s al-Yunaniyun fi Misr. The book catalogs the putative excesses of the Greek grocery store owners. They are accused of lending money at usurious rates and “corrupting” Egyptians by encouraging depravity through the sale of alcohol.
The chief British official in Egypt, Evelyn Baring, later Lord Cromer, claimed that the Syrians treated the borrowers with more severity than other moneylenders Modern Egypt, 1:196–203); Also see Philipp, “Demographic Patterns of Syrian Immigration,” 184–189, on this point.
Al-Zaman ran a series of articles through June and July 1884 with the title “Halat al-fallahin.” The citation comes from an article published on 28 June 1884, 1.
“Hal al-fallah,”al-Mufid, 23 January 1882, 1—2.
See Barakat, Tatawwur al-milikiya, 397–398.
Al-Kawkab al-Misri, 17 October 1879, 3. See also “zulm al-musha’ikh lilahali” al-Waqt, 3 June 1880, 2–3, for the same sentiments.
“Al-Tajir al-himar wa al-fallah al-makkar,” al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 17 July 1881, 99.
See Cole, Colonialism and Revolution in the Middle East: Social and Cultural Origins of Egypt’s Urabi Movement,122—132; Jayyid, al-Sihafa al-misriya wa thawrat 1919, 167–71; 203–07; and 237–41.
See Asad, “Conscripts of Western Civilization.” See also Scott, Conscripts of Modernity.
Scott, Conscripts of Modernity, 210–215.
“Wasiya wataniya.” al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 16 October 1881, 294–296.
Ibid.
Jaddane, Usus al-Taqaddum ‘ind mufakkari al-islam fi al-‘alam al-‘arabi al-hadith, 20–22.
“Al-Ma‘arif,” al-Kawkab al-Misri, 3 June 1881, 1.
Al-Kawkab al-Misri,1 August 1879, 1–2.
Ibid.
On al-‘Afghani’s life, see Keddie, Islamic Response to Imperialism.
For al-‘Afghani’s ideas in this regard, see the translation of his speeches in Keddie, Islamic Response, 102–108. Al-‘Afghani denied claims by those who called his ideas secularist. See his rebuttal of this thesis in “Commentary on the Commentator” in Keddie, Islamic Response, 123–129.
Al-Kawkab al-Misri, 1 August 1879, 1–2.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ghanim, al-Iqtisad al-siyasi, 4.
Nizam al-Shura. See Hafez, Genesis of Arabic Narrative Discourse, 83.
One can cite a wide variety of these articles, such as “Al-‘adl wa al-huquq,” (Al-Mahrusa, 27 April 1886, 3), which reiterated a popular theme by highlighting the importance of qualified lawyers with the necessary educational preparation and the essential skills to “ensure the rule of equality.” Jaridat al-Fallah (14 June 1887, 1) in “Khidma wataniya,” promised to produce a list of lawyers, accountants and translators who “charge a low price ... and who provide services to the poor.”
The quote comes from “Al-Insaniya,” al-Mufid, 26 December 1881, 1. Nearly identical statements appeared in “Amani,” Misr, 7 November 1879, 2; and “Tabi‘at islah al-Azhar,” al-Mufid, 16 February 1882, 4.
See Hadidi, “ ‘Abdallah al-Nadim Adiban,” in Buhuth nadwat al-ihtifal bi-Dhikra murur mi’yat ‘amm ‘ala wafat ‘Abdallah al-Nadim, 165–176. See also ‘Imara, Tayyarat al-Yuqza al-islamiya al-haditha, 138.
Wahid, ‘Adib Ishaq: ‘ashiq al-hurriya, 32.
Blunt wrote a well-known memoir of the ‘Urabi uprising called Secret History of the English Occupation of Egypt.
See Keddie, Islamic Response, 181–187, for al-‘Afghani’s response to Ernest Renan’s accusations that Islam and science are incompatible.
See Wahid, Adib Ishaq: ‘ashiq al-hurriya. See also Goldschmidt, Biographical Dictionary of Modern Egypt, 89.
A review of Bab al-Funun can be found in al-‘Umda, 14 May 1896, 4. See al-Nadim, ed., Sulafat al-Nadim, 3–23.
Chakrabarty, Provincializing Europe, 2–23.
See Asad, Idea of an Anthropology of Islam, for a sense of the importance Muslims place on the Qur’an and the hadith. See also Sells, Approaching the Qur’an. Wadud’s Qur’an and Woman offers a critical perspective. See also Brown, Rethinking Tradition in Modern Islamic Thought for an examination of the ways that readings of the hadith have changed over time.
Hallaq shows that the contemporary understanding of taqlid as “blind imitation” is a recent phenomenon. See his Authority, Continuity and Change in Islamic Law, 86–120; and “Was the Gate of Ijtihad Closed?” 3–41.
See Gesink, “ ‘Chaos on the Earth,’ ” 710–733.
“Haqiqat al-insan wa haqiqat al-watan,” Misr, 30 December 1877, 1. Al‘Afghani expresses the same ideas in “Al-‘illa al-haqiqa li-sa‘adat al-insan,” in the same issue of Misr, 4. See also “Tarbiya,” Misr, 5 June 1879, 2; and “Hakim al-sharq,” Misr, 24 May 1879, 1–2.
“Hakim al-sharq,” Misr, 24 May 1879, 1–2.
On this point see Lockman, Contending Visions of the Middle East, 38—98.
See Keddie’s translations of al-‘Afghani’s work in Islamic Response, especially 152–167.
Lockman, Contending Visions, 38–98.
See Chakrabarty, Provincializing Europe, 2–23 and 237–255.
This approach to the notion of tradition draws heavily from Asad and MacIntyre. See MacIntyre, After Virtue; Whose Justice, Which Rationality?; and Three Rival Versions of Moral Enquiry.
“Inna allah yab’ath li-hadhihi al-umma ‘ala ra’s kull mi’at sana man yujaddid laha amr diniha,” Abu Da’ud Sulayman ibn al-As‘hath al-Sijistani, Sunan Abi Dawud, Book 37 (4278).
See Hunter, Egypt under the Khedives, 188; Shalabi, Al-Rif al-misri fi nisf al-thani, 217; Schölch, Egypt for the Egyptians, 60–61; Barakat, Tatawwur al-milikiya, 395–397.
“Dars tahdhib tahawwur bi-hi tilmidh Ma‘ al-Nadim,” Al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit , 18 December 1881, 53–56.
Ibid.
“Alsun al-khutaba’ tahii’ wa tamit,” Al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 25 September 1881, 235–241.
See for example, “Al-taqaddum,” al-Kawkab al-Misri, 19 May 1881, 1; “Al-Jara’id,” al-Kawkab al-Misri, 5 June 1879, 5.
“Haqiqat al-insan wa haqiqat al-watan,” Misr, 14 January 1878, 1. Arguments that echo al-‘Afghani’s points can also be found in “Al-‘ilm,” al-Kawkab al-Misri, 8 October 1880, 1; “Al-Ma‘arif,” al-Kawkab al-Misri, 2 June 1881, 1; “Al-Thana’ al-haqiqi,” al-Mufid, 27 February 1882, 3; and “al-Huquq al-fuqara” al-Mufid, 17 April 1882, 4.
See Asad, Formations of the Secular, 222.
Fortunately, the question of slippages in the meaning of “public interest” as it took shape in modern Arabic political discourse is presently the subject of a research project by Dyala Hamzah of the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales being conducted at the Freie Universität Berlin.
See Mitchell, Colonizing Egypt.
See Cromer, Modern Egypt and Abbas II. See also Colvin, Making of Modern Egypt and Milner, England in Egypt. On this question also see Roger Owen, “Influence of Lord Cromer’s Indian Experience.”
See Cromer, Modern Egypt, 2: 148. The influential public commentator and journalist Edward Dicey wrote a typical piece of this genre. See Dicey, “England’s Intervention in Egypt,” 161–174.
This was how Cromer described the goals of British occupation in his memoir Modern Egypt, 2: 229.
Many of these notions had a long history and many have analogues in other peasant societies. On pre-nineteenth-century Egypt, see Baer, Fellah and Townsman; and al-Rahim, al-Rif al-misri fi al-qarn al-thaman ‘ashar. On the topic of city/country dynamics, see Williams, Country and the City.
See van Gelder, “The Nodding Noddles,” in Ostle, ed., Marginal Voices in Literature and Society.
Baer has a very useful context-providing discussion of the work in Fellah and Townsman, 3—38. Davies’s “Seventeenth Century Egyptian Arabic” discusses some of the linguistic features of the piece. Davies has also recently put together a new Arabic edition based on several manuscripts; see Davies, ed., Yusuf al-Shirbini’s Hazz al-Quhuf bi-sharh qasid Abi Shaduf, 2007, Vol. 1. Davies has also produced an English translation of this edition, Yusuf al-Shirbini’s Brains Confounded by the Ode of Abu Shaduf Expounded (Kitab Hazz al-Quhuf bi-Sharh Qasid Abi Shaduf), Leuven, Belgium: Peeters, 2007, Vol II.
See al-Tanahi, al-Kitab al-matbu‘at bi-misr fi al-qarn al-tasi‘ ‘ashr: tarikh wa tahlil , 94. The 1889 edition was produced by al-Maktaba al-Mahmudiya under the supervision of Muhmud ’Ali Sabih. See al-Tanahi, al-Kitab al-matbu‘at bi-misr fi al-qarn al-tasi‘ ‘ashr: tarikh wa tahlil, 1984, 49–50.
Cited in Hafez, Genesis of Arabic Narrative Discourse, 84.
Ayalon, Language and Change in the Arab Middle East, 15.
Hafez, Genesis of Arabic Narrative Discourse, 66.
Cole, Colonialism and Revolution in the Middle East, 123–124.
Mabadi fi-ma yata‘alaq bi-diyar al-tarikh min al-ahsa,’ 41.
Cole, “Rifa’a al-Tahtawi and the Revival of Practical Philosophy,” 29–46.
See for example “Sina‘a,” Misr, 5 June 1879. The piece is the text from a speech al-‘Afghani gave in Alexandria in which he echoed al-Ghazali by holding up moderation as the path to goodness. His “al-Din wa al-siyasa,” (Al-‘Asr al-Jadid , 15 April 1880) is a critical engagement with Ibn Khaldun’s notion of group solidarity [asabiya].
Peter Gran’s controversial biography of al-Attar’s is considered by many to be definitive. See Gran, Islamic Roots of Capitalism.
Al-Tahtawi, Manahij al-’albab., 309.
Manahij al-’albab, 249. According to Cole, al-Tahtawi proffered “two reasons for writing the Manahij: the need to clarify Egypt’s aims and purposes, and the necessity of doing away” with those “members” of society that do not benefit it.” Cole, “Rifa’a al-Tahtawi,” 31.
He cites a number of Qur’anic verses and a hadith of Abu Talha. See al-Tahtawi, 269.
Al-Tahtawi, Manahij al-’albab, 267.
See Manahij al-’albab, 16–18.
“Al-Sina‘a.” Misr, 5 June 1879.
“Al-Mawlid al-ahmadi,” al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 25 September 1881, 241–244.
See al-Nadim’s fictive exchange with a “student” in “Dars tahdhib tahawwur bi-hi tilmidh ma‘ al-Nadim,”Al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 3 July 1881, 53—56.
“Al-Mawlid al-ahmadi,” al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 25 September 1881, 241–244.
“Dars tahdhib tahawwur bi-hi tilmidh ma‘ al-Nadim,”Al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit , 3 July 1881, 53–56.
See Jadaane, Usus al-Taqaddum ‘ind mufakkari al-islam fi al-‘alam al‘arabi al-hadith, 11–24.
“Al-fallah misr,” al-Kawkab al-Misri, 18 November 1880.
Ibid.
See Villiers-Stuart for price comparison between steam engines and a saqiya or waterwheel. Villiers-Stuart, Egypt after the War, 75.
Al-Kawkab al-Misri, 18 November 1880.
Scott, “Colonial Governmentality,” 207.
Ibid., 200.
See Asad, “Conscripts of Western Civilization” and Formations of the Secular.
Asad, Formations of the Secular, 215.
The standard book in English remains Hourani’s Arabic Thought in the Liberal Age. Cole provides a sophisticated description of the way in which some of these ideas became part of the political calculus of the time in Colonialism and Revolution in the Middle East. Other commonly cited works are those of Adams, Islam and Modernism in Egypt and Kerr, Islamic Reform. Some of the better works in Arabic are Jadanne, Usus al-Taqaddum ‘ind mufakkari al-islam fi al‘alam al-‘arabi al-hadith and Abdel-Malek, Nahdat misr. Arabic readers often begin with Ahmad Amin’s Zu’ama’ al-islah.
See Scott, “Colonial Governmentality,” and Habermas, The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere.
These notions also had repercussions across the entire Arabic-speaking world. See Hourani, Arabic Thought, 161–221.
“Al-Tarbiya,” al-Tijara, 23 November 1878, 2.
Ibid.
“Al-Amani,” al-‘Asr al-Jadid, 8 January 1880, 1.
For a biographical sketch focusing on the period before 1900, see Gendzier, The Practical Visions of Ya’qub Sannu‘. In Arabic, see Awad, Tarikh al-fikr al-misri al-hadith, 267–332. Some of the standard references on Sannu‘’s life continue to be ‘Abduh ‘ A‘lam al-sihafa al-‘arabiya, 91–98 and Di Tirazi, Tarikh al-sihafa al-‘arabiya, 2: 281–286.
Gendzier, Practical Visions, 31–41.
Ibid. 31.
The use of colloquial Arabic was not as unusual in premodern Arabic writing as had once been believed. For example, Shirbini’s seventeenth-century Hazz al-quhuf fi sharh qasid Abi Shaduf is filled with colloquial expressions to such an extent that some scholars, such as Davies, consider it an important source of information on the dialects of the time. Shirbini was well aware of what he was doing, as he stated that he intended to “provide an exposition of the language of the countryside [lughat al-ariyaf].” Davies, “Seventeenth-Century Egyptian Arabic,” 10–11. In addition, Cachia points out that the dialogues contained in the thirteenth-century littérateur Ibn Danyal’s works “reflected everyday usage” when “character and situation demanded.” Cachia, Popular Narrative Ballads of Modern Egypt, 80..
See Di Tirazi, Tarikh al-sihafa al-‘arabiya, 2: 284; see also “al-Tarbiya,” al-Tijara, 23 November 1878, 2.
For works on al-Nadim’s life see Delanoue, “Abd Allah Nadim (1845–1896),” 161–174. In Arabic see Buhuth nadwat al-ihtifal bi-dhikra’ marur mi’at ‘am ‘ala’ wafat ‘Abd Allah al-Nadim; Hadidi, ‘Abdallah al-Nadim: Khatib al-wataniya; Amin, Zu‘ama’ al-Islah, 202–248; and ‘Abduh, ‘Alam al-sihafa al‘arabiya , 125–130.
See Berque, Egypt: Imperialism and Revolution, 109 and 116.
See ‘Abduh, Tarikh al-waqai’i‘ al-misriya.
Hafez, Genesis of Arabic Narrative Discourse, 115. On Masonic lodges in Egypt, see Wissa, “Freemasonry in Egypt 1798–1921,” 143–161. See also Kudsi-Zadeh, “Afghani and Freemasonry in Egypt,” 25–35; Cannon, “Nineteenth-century Arabic Writings on Women and Society,” 463–484.
See “Mata yastaqim al-zill wa al-‘awd a‘waj ayuha al-muharirun alqa’imun bi-tahthib al-nufus” [“When Will the Shadow Be Given Light and the Twisted Straightened? Oh, You Free Men Undertaking the Refinement of Souls],” al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 17 July 1881, 91–94.
Hadidi, ‘Abdallah al-Nadim, 85–86.
Ibid. 165–176.
“Al-sina‘a.” Misr, 5 June 1879, 3–4.
See Hafez, Genesis of Arabic Narrative Discourse, 113—129, for a discussion of al-Nadim’s contribution to development of modern literary Arabic prose. Also see Hamza, ’Adab al-maqala al-sihafiya fi misr, 2: 349–440; and Awad, The Literature of Ideas in Egypt, 335—433.
Al-Dasuqi, Nash’at al-nathr al-hadith wa tatawwurhu , 91.
See Cole, Colonialism and Revolution, 123–124. Al-Dasuqi, Nashat al-Nathr (91–97), describes al-Nadim’s popularity and his importance in the evolution of modern Arabic prose.
See “al-‘Arabi al-tafarnuj,” al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 6 June 1881, 7–8; and “Nihayat al-bilada,” al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 3 July 1881, 56–58.
“Tabsira,” al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 6 June 1881, 15.
Ibid.
Ibid.
“Jara’id al-ikhbar madaris al-afkar,” al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 11 June 1881, 21–22.
This notwithstanding, al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit did publish articles that were meant to be read symbolically. For example, see “Majlis tibi ‘ala mussab bilafranji,” al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 6 June 1881, 4–6. On the surface the piece is a discussion about the dangers of the spread of syphilis, but in the article the spread of the venereal disease symbolized the increasing depth and poisonous results of foreign domination of Egyptians. See also Amin al-‘Alim’s thoughts on this article and al-Nadim’s use of symbols in his writing in “Maqawimat al-mu‘asira fi fikr ‘Abdallah al-Nadim, 261–280.
Selim takes up some of these same themes with respect to al-Nadim and Sannu‘ in her The Novel and the Rural Imaginary in Egypt.
“Al-Wad al-mariq wa abu shaduf al-hadiq,” Abu Nazzara, 15 April 1880, 130–143.
This is a reference to the widely used dictionary, al-Qamus al-muhit, compiled by the famous medieval lexicographer, Muhammad ibn Ya‘qub Firuzabadi (1329–1414).
This quote is in the opening editorial in al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 6 June 1881, 3. This may also be an indirect reference to Hazz al-quhuf fi sharh al-qasid abi shaduf; see Davies, “Seventeenth-Century Egyptian Arabic,” 9–10.
Verbs were fully conjugated and the rules of subject-verb agreement and of pronoun-subject agreement that are normally not followed in colloquial speech were adhered to strictly.
The ‘alif and ‘ayn are used interchangeably by these foreigners, as are the aspirated H and the non-aspirated H. At times the kha is substituted for the hah and vice versa.
Abu Nazzara al-Zarqa’, 20 February 1880, 79.
Van Gelder offers three alternatives to translating the first part of the title “Hazz al-Quhuf,” since the second part of title is easily translated as A Commentary on the Ode of Abu Shaduf: 1) The Nodding Noddles; 2) Jolting the Yokels; 3) Brandishing the Broad Branches.
Davies argues that al-Shirbini may have intended to mock the urban ‘ulama’ class’s mores and habits more than he meant to ridicule the fallah. See Davies, “Seventeenth-Century Egyptian Arabic,” 1–51.
As we saw in Chapter 1, Hazz al-quhuf fi sharh al-qasid abi shaduf was reprinted a number of times in the late nineteenth century—first in 1858 and then in 1872, 1878, 1889, 1892, 1894, and 1904); also see Baer, Fellah and Townsman in the Middle East.
Al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 6 June 1881, 11–12.
For the history and description of some of these heroic ballads, see Cachia’s Popular Narrative Ballads. For one rendition of tales of this sort, see Sells, Desert Tracings: Six Classic Arabian Odes.
See “takhrifa al-junun fanun [In Superstition Lunacy is an Art],” al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 6 June 1881, 10–11.
See “al-Takhrifa,” al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 11 June 1881, 27–29. See also “Sultanat al-takhrif,” in which a simple countrywoman said to have baraka [a blessing] becomes the absurd object of worship for the fallahin in the town of Dasuq (al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 15 August 1881, 157–159).
See “ ‘Arabi tafarnuj,” al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 6 June 1881, 7–8; and “Al-Wilaya al-khurafiya,” al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 11 September 1881, 211–215, in which a peasant fleeing the corvée is transformed into a local saint through an unlikely series of events. See a partial translation of “ ‘Arabi tafarnuj,” in Awad, Literature of Ideas in Egypt: Part I, 84–86. Awad translated the title as “On Gallicized Egyptians”.
The conception of health as a balance between extremes is recurrent throughout Islamic ethical literature, see, for example, Miskawayh, The Refinement of Character, 22–23.
Ibid. Al-‘Afghani wrote that the “biological sciences seek to discover that which maintains balance between its components.” And so too should those concerned with the state of the umma search for the “middle [al-wast]” between extremes because the middle is the key to human happiness. “Al-Tarbiya,” Misr, 26 November 1878, 1.
See ‘Azabawi, ‘Ummud wa mushayikh al-qura wa dawruhum fi al-mujtama‘ al-misri fi al-qarn al-tasi‘ ‘ashr.
“Lamhat zira’a,”Al-Mahrusa, 30 July, 1886, 1. Al-Mahrusa was another of the many publications of Adib Ishaq and Salim Naqqash.
See “al-rif bi-hurufiha,” al-Waqt, 21 March 1880, 2–3; and “min zari‘,”al-Kawkab al-Misri, 26 June 1879, 5.
Cromer, Modern Egypt, 1:192; See also Milner, England in Egypt, 314–317.
See Colvin, The Making of Modern Egypt, 281; and Elgood, The Transit of Egypt, 81, 204—05.
See Villiers-Stuart, Egypt after the War.
Cromer, Modern Egypt, 1:194. See also Elgood, The Transit of Egypt, 139.
See Wallach, Egypt and the Egyptian Question, 108–138.
“Dars al-tahdhibi bayna al-Nadim wa tilmidh,” al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 9 October 1881, 267–272.
See Abu-‘Arja, al-Muqattam: Jaridat al-ihtilal al-biritani fi misr, 34.
“halat al-fallahin” Al-Zaman, 27 July 1884, 1
“La inta inta wa la al-Mithil mithil,” al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 15 August 1881, 155.
See “Governmentality” in The Foucault Effect, 87–104
Omnia El Shakry has examined childrearing in the context of governmentality in detail. See her “Schooled Mothers and Structured Play,” 126–170. For an elaboration of this and related themes over a longer period, see Shakry’s The Great Social Laboratory.
See Asad, Formations of the Secular, 233; see also Ahmad, Women and Gender in Islam.
“La inta inta wa la al-Mithil mithil ayuha al-mutamaddun,” al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 15 August 1881, 156. For an interesting contemporary look at the question of nasiha, see Asad, “The Limits of Religious Criticism in the Middle East” in Genealogies of Religion, 200–236.
“La inta inta wa la al-Mithil mithil,” al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 15 August 1881, 156.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Al-Nadim used the words umma, bilad, and Misr to signify the political and moral community of Egypt seemingly interchangeably.
“La inta inta wa la al-Mithil mithil,” al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 15 August 1881, 157.
Ibid.
Ibid. Mitchell discusses the evolution of the term tarbiya at the end of the nineteenth century in his Colonising Egypt, 88–90.
“Wasiyat Nadim li-ahad ibna’ihi,” al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 21 August 1881, 180.
Ibid., 181.
“ ‘Arabi tafarnuj,” Al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 6 June 1881, 7–8.
Ibid., 7
Ibid., 7
Ibid., 7
Ibid.,7.
Ibid., 8.
Ibid., 8.
Ibid., 8.
“Haqiqat al-insan wa haqiqat al-watn” Misr, 30 December 1877,1.
Al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 21 August 1881, 181—183.
“ ‘Arabi tafarnuj,” al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 6 June 1881, 8.
Ibid., 8.
Ibid., 8.
Abu Nazzara al-Zarqa’, 15 April 1880, 130—143.
See “ ‘Ada qabiha al-fina’uha,” al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 3 July 1881, 58–59; “Ghafilat al-taqlid,” al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 6 June 1881, 13–15; “Nihayat al-bilada,” al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 3 July 1881, 56–58; and “Ra’ayt fawq ma sam‘at,” al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 3 October 1881, 263.
Abu Nazzara al-Zarqa’, 15 April 1880, 130.
Ibid.,133.
Ibid., 131.
Ibid., 142—143.
Al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 6 June 1881, 11–12.
Ibid.
“Taghfila wa jahala,” al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 15 August 1881, 162.
In her Nurturing the Nation Pollard shows that the British too viewed the politics of Egypt and what they described as the spendthrift ways of Egypt’s rulers through a similarly gendered lens.
“Muhtaj jahil fi id muhtal tami‘,” al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 6 June 1881, 11.
Hunter, Egypt under the Khedives, 179–226; and Owen, The Middle East in the World Economy, 122–152. Villiers-Stuart provides a partial list of such officials and their salaries in Egypt after the War, 461–464.
“Al-Najm dhu al-dhanib,” al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 10 July 1881, 70–73. See also “Hurr al-kalam wa kalam al-hurr,” al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 3 July 1881, 51–53.
See Cuno, Pasha’s Peasants, 55–58. Villiers-Stuart, who was traveling the Delta in 1882, observed the same practice, noting that Muslim moneylenders did not “lend money at usurious rates; instead they purchase crops at a discount of 33%-50%.” Villers-Stuart, Egypt after the War, 275.
“Muhtaj jahil fi id muhtal tami‘,” al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 6 June 1881, 11.
“Al-Najm dhu al-dhanib,” al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 10 July 1881, 70–73.
“Al-Tijara al-ba’ira,” al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 21 August 1881, 171—172.
“Muhtaj jahil fi id muhtal tami‘,” al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 6 June 1881, 11.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid.
“Amatak min islamtak lil-jihala,” al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 21 August 1881, 173–175.
See “Talmidh al-‘aja’iz,” al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 4 September 1881, 193–194.
See “Hadith khurafa,” al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 4 September 1881, 197–199.
“Sultanat al-takhrif,” al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 15 August 1881, 157–159.
Ibid., 157.
Ibid., 159.
“Muhtaj jahil fi id muhtal tami‘,” al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 6 June 1881, 11.
Ibid.
Ibid.
A partial list of these voluntary societies and their activities can be found in Nusayr, Harakat nashr al-kutub fi misr fi al-qarn al-tasi‘ ‘ashr, 424–433.
Landau, “Prolegomena to a Study of Secret Societies in Modern Egypt,” 135–186; see also his “Muslim Opposition to Freemasonry.” Dumont, “The Freemasons in the Ottoman Empire”; Rich, “Masonry and the Middle East,”; Wissa, “Freemasonry in Egypt 1798–1921”; Cannon, “Nineteenth-century Arabic Writings on Women and Society”; Kudsi-Zadeh, “The Emergence of Political Journalism in Egypt.”
Al-Mufid, “Al-Huquq wa-al-fuqara’,” 17 April 1882, 4.
Ibid.; see also “haqiqat al-insan wa haqiqat al-want,” Misr, 30 December 1877, 1; and “Jami‘yat al-‘atidal fi Misr,” al-Mahrusa, 16 June 1886, 1.
Ener charts these changes over the course of the nineteenth century in her Managing Egypt’s Poor.
See Singer, “Charity’s Legacies;” Ener, Managing Egypt’s Poor, 3–10.
For a description of the ways in which the Egyptian state redefined and circumscribed the institution of the waqf, see Ghanim, al-‘Awqaf wa al-siyasa fi misr.
Ener, Managing Egypt’s Poor, 135.
Established institutions were not immune from the pressures generated by Egypt’s new intellectuals. As early as April 1882, a reformer writing in al-Mufid called for the reform of the teaching methods at al-Azhar, the venerable center of Islamic learning. See “Al-Huquq wa-al-fuqara’,” al-Mufid, 17 April 1882, 4
See “ ’i‘tira’at ‘ala al-Tankit.” Al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 26 June 1881, 35. See also al-Dasuqi, Nash’at al-nathr al-hadith wa tatawwurhu, 92–93; and Hamza,’Adab al-maqala al-sihafiya fi misr, 349–440.
Al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 9 October 1881, 267–272.
Ibid., 268.
Ibid.
Ibid., 269.
Ibid.
Ibid., 270.
Ibid.
Ibid., 271.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid., 272.
Abu Nazzara al-Zarqa’, 20 February 1880, 65–74.
Ibid., 68.
Ibid.
Ibid., 67
Ibid., 68
Ibid., 70.
Ibid., 71.
Ibid., 72.
Ibid.
“La inta inta wa la al-mithil Mithil ayuha al-mutamaddun,” al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 15 August 1881, 155–157.
Ibid., 155.
Ibid., 157.
See, for example, “al-Sina‘a,” Misr, 5 June 1879, 3; “Al-Watan al-arabi,” al-‘Asr al-Jadid, 12 February 1880, 2; and “Al-Amani,” al-‘Asr al-Jadid, 8 January 1880, 1.
See Gorman, Historians, State and Politics in Twentieth-Century Egypt.
Tignor, Modernization and British Colonial Rule in Egypt, 48–94.
See Karpat, The Politicization of Islam; and Toledano, State and Society in Mid-Nineteenth-Century Egypt.
Selim, The Novel and the Rural Imaginary in Egypt.
On Yusuf, see Goldschmidt, Biographical Dictionary of Modern Egypt, 230–231; Di Tirazi, Tarikh al-sihafa al-‘arabiya, 3: 30–31 and 37–40; ‘Abduh, A‘lam al-sihafa al-‘arabiya, 130–137; Salih, al-Shaykh ’Ali Yusuf wa jaridat al-mu’ayyad; Jadane, Usus al-Taqaddum ‘ind mufakkari al-islam fi al-‘alam al‘arabi al-hadith, 174–179; and al-Kumi, Al-sihafa al-islamiya fi misr fi al-qarn al-tasi‘ ‘ashr, 44–61.
See below for sketches of these figures’ lives.
‘Awad, Al-Nafahat al-zakiya fi al-nahda al-misriya: al-juz’ al-‘awwal al-fallah al-misri.
Fihris al-dawriyat al-‘arabiya allati taqtaniha al-dar [Index of Arabic-Langauge Periodicals Acquired by the National Library]. The full text of the law can be found in ‘Aziz, Al-Sihafa al-misriya wa mawqifuha min al-ihtilal al-injilizi, 339–343.
Dinshway is the village where an infamous encounter occurred between a group of British soldiers hunting pigeons and a group of Egyptian peasants. The violent incident and the British reaction became fodder for Egyptian nationalist agitation. See Chapter 5.
See, for example, al-Rafi‘i, Mustafa Kamil ba‘ath al-nahda al-wataniya.
For a detailed exegesis of his political positions, see Gershoni and Jankowski, Egypt, Islam, and the Arabs, especially Chapters 1 through 5; Wendell, The Evolution of the Egyptian National Image, 200–293.
His memoirs have been translated by Goldschmidt as The Memoirs and Diaries of Muhammad Farid.
On his life, see Goldschmidt Jr., Biographical Dictionary of Modern Egypt, 96–97; al-Jindi, ‘Abd al-Aziz Jawish min ruwwad al-tarbiya wa al-sihafa wa al-ijtima’.
A more recent edition of the book is al-Nadim, Kana wa yakun, eds. Ramadan and al-Jama‘i.
See al-Jama‘i. “Durus al-Wataniya allati akhadha mustafa kamil min al-nadim.”
This development was not a simple linear narrative. For example, Tollefson shows that every attempt to reorganize the police was fraught with difficulty. He carefully catalogues the story of Clifford Lloyd, who served as the magistrate in Ireland who helped to dismantle the Land League and reorganize the administrative districts prior to being called to Egypt. Due to opposition from many corners Lloyd was forced to resign and left Egypt within six months of his arrival in 1884. See Tollefson, Policing Islam, 11–18.
Ibid., 25–52.
See Brown, “Brigands and State Building,” 258–281.
See Zayn al-Din, Al-Zira‘a al-misriya fi ‘ahd al-ihtilal al-biritani; and Jayyid, Tatawwur al-khabr fi al-sihafa al-misriya, 245—270.
Zayn al-Din describes in great detail the efforts undertaken during the years of British occupation to expand Egypt’s agricultural capacities; see Al-Zira‘a al-misriya fi ‘ahd al-ihtilal al-biritani. See also Owen, Cotton and the Egyptian Economy; Tignor, Modernization and British Colonial Rule, 214–248.
‘Atiya, Kitab kamil al-najah lil-muzari‘ wa al-fallah fi al-‘aradi wa al-zira‘a al-misriya, 3.
See Hafez, Genesis of Arabic Narrative Discourse; Hamza, ’Adab al-maqala al-sihafiya fi misr; and Jayyid, Tatawwur al-khabr fi al-sihafa al-misriya.
See Cromer, Modern Egypt.
See Hafez, Genesis of Arabic Narrative Discourse.
“Tadhir,” al-Zaman, 10 May 1884, 1; “Rasala li-ahad al-‘udaba’ tahta hadha al-‘anwan ‘ihtiyajat al-bilad’,” Jaridat al-Fallah, 10 January 1887, 4; al-Watan , 23 March 1889, 1–2; and “Fi wajib al-jara’id,” al-Haqiqa, 8 May 1891, 1.
See Hourani, Arabic Thought in the Liberal Age; Mitchell, Colonising Egypt, 128–160; El Shakry, Great Social Laboratory.
See ‘Atiya, Kitab kamil al-najah lil-muzari‘.
‘Awad, Al-Nafahat al-zakiya fi al-nahda al-misriya, 14.
Ibid.
Al-Ustadh, 6 December 1892, 369–375.
Ibid., 370.
Ibid., 371. Sahiya is a difficult word to translate. A Dictionary of Egyptian Arabic translates the word as “someone who is deceptively innocent-looking.”
Ibid., 372.
Ibid., 373.
Williams, The Country and the City, 297.
Ibid., 289–290.
Al-Ustadh, 6 December 1892, 369–375.
Ibid., 373.
Ibid.
Ibid., 374.
Ibid., 372.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid., 374.
‘Awad, Al-Nafahat al-zakiya fi al-nahda al-misriya.
Ibid., 2.
Ibid., 4.
Ibid.
Ibid., 5.
Ibid., 7.
Ibid., 9.
See Tollefson, Policing Islam, 25–53 and 85–110; see also Hunter, Egypt under the Khedives, 264; and Lloyd, Egypt Sinc Cromer, 76–78 and 81–82.
‘Awad, Al-Nafahat al-zakiya fi al-nahda al-misriya, 7.
Ibid.
Ibid. The kurbaj or kirbaj was a whip with a number of lashes, usually fashioned from crocodile hides. It was the preferred instrument of tax collectors to help them persuade hesitant peasants to forward their levies. It was also infamous because village headmen and others used it liberally in “recruitment” for the army and the corvée. See Fahmy, All the Pasha’s Men; Mitchell, Colonising Egypt.
‘Awad, Al-Nafahat al-zakiya fi al-nahda al-misriya, 11.
Ibid., 14.
Ibid., 14–15.
Ibid., 16.
Ibid., 16.
Ibid., 16.
Ibid., 17.
Ibid., 17.
Ibid., 17.
Ibid., 12.
Ibid., 19.
Ibid., 19.
“Abu al-haul al-haqiqi fi misr,” al-Mu’ayyad, 9 May 1893, 1.
Ibid.
“The Sphinx of Modern Egypt,” New York Herald, 27 April 1893, 5.
“Abu al-haul al-haqiqi fi misr,” al-Mu’ayyad, 9 May 1893, 1.
Chatterjee, The Nation and Its Fragments, 158—159.
Cromer, Modern Egypt, 194.
See Abu-‘Arja, al-Muqattam: Jaridat al-ihtilal al-biritani fi misr, 123–170, for a look at al-Muqattam’s role as propagandist for the British. In regard to the putative benefits of occupation for the peasants and peasant support for the British, see al-Muqattam, 6 October 1889; 3 November 1893, 1; and 10 January 1894, 4.
This new combination of classical Arabic and modern syntactical structure and grammar developed over the course of the twentieth century into what has become to be known as Modern Standard Arabic. See Hafez, Genesis of Arabic Narrative Discourse, 82–105.
Muwaylihi, Hadith ‘Isa ibn Hisham, aw fatra min al-zaman. Roger Allen translated the work as A Period of Time: A Study and Translation of Hadith ‘Isa ibn Hisham by Muhammad al-Muwaylihi. See Selim, The Novel and the Rural Imaginary in Egypt.
“Abu al-haul al-haqiqi fi misr,” al-Mu’ayyad, 9 May 1893, 1.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid. On the traditional education system, see Heyworth-Dunne, An Introduction to the History of Education in Modern Egypt, 395–406.
“Abu al-haul al-haqiqi fi misr,” al-Mu’ayyad, 9 May 1893, 1.
Ibid.
Ibid. On the life of Artin Basha, see Goldschmidt Jr., Biographical Dictionary of Modern Egypt, 25–26.
“Abu al-haul al-haqiqi fi misr,” al-Mu’ayyad, 9 May 1893, 1.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid.
The column appeared from 1893 to 1895.
See Hafez, Genesis of Arabic Narrative Discourse, on the sociological implications of the development of modern literary Arabic. See also Badr, Tatawwur al-riwaya al-‘arabiya al-haditha; Sa‘id, Tarikh al-da‘wah ‘ila al-‘ammiya wa-athariha fi misr and ‘Abdallah al-Nadim bayna al-fusha wa al-‘ammiya.
On the emergence of national languages, see Anderson, Imagined Communities , 67–82. With specific reference to Arabic and the Nahda or Literary Awakening in Arabic, see Hafez, Genesis of Arabic Narrative Discourse; Hourani, A History of the Arab Peoples, 56, 99–100, 118, 299–300; and Hourani, Arabic Thought in the Liberal Age, 340–344.
See Hourani, Arabic Thought in the Liberal Age, 193–222.
The term milla traditionally referred to a religious community with a legal identity. This usage was perhaps most prominent under the Ottoman Millet system that recognized various religious sects and confessions as legal entities.
On the publishing scene in Alexandria see Kendall, “Between Politics and Literature,” 330–343. See also Ayalon, The Press in the Arab Middle East, 145–154, for a discussion of newspaper circulation, and 159–165 for a discussion of the relationship between newspapers and their readers. On al-Haqiqa, see ‘Uthman, Tarikh al-sihafa al-iskandariya 1873–1899.
See Abu-‘Arja, Al-Muqattam, 53–92, 1.
“Al-Buhayra li-fallah Maryuti,” al-Mu’ayyad, 11 July 1894, 1.
Ibid. See also “Lil-fallah Maryuti,” al-Mu’ayyad, 23 August 1894.
Selim, The Novel and the Rural Imaginary in Egypt, 58—59.
See Chatterjee, The Nation and Its Fragments.
See Gershoni and Jankowski, Egypt, Islam, and the Arabs, 3–22.
On the case of these particular women see Powell, A Different Shade of Colonialism, 1–8.
Al-Mu’ayyad, 11 July 1894, 1.
Ibid.
Al-Mu’ayyad, 23 August 1894, 1.
Al-Mu’ayyad, 11 July 1894, 1.
Brown, “Who Abolished the Corvée and Why?” 116–137.
Al-Mu’ayyad, 11 July 1894, 1.
Ibid.
Al-Mu’ayyad, 27 July 1894, 1.
See al-Mu’ayyad, 23 August 1894, 1.
Al-Mu’ayyad, 8 August 1894, 1.
Ibid.
Al-Mu’ayyad, 15 July 1894, 1.
Ibid.
Ibid.
See Schulze, “Mass Culture and Islamic Cultural Production in the Nineteenth-Century Middle East,” 189–224. See also Hafez, Genesis of Arabic Narrative Discourse.
Al-Mu’ayyad, 9 September 1894, 1.
Al-Mu’ayyad, 15 September 1894, 1.
Al-Mu’ayyad, 23 August 1894, 1.
Al-Mu’ayyad, 9 September 1894, 1.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid.
For example, see Falk Gesink, “ ‘Chaos on the Earth,’ ” on the misreading of nineteenth-century “traditionalists,” and Brown, Rethinking Tradition in Modern Islamic Thought, on the reinterpretation of the Sunna among modern Muslim thinkers.
A classic example is Kedourie’s Afghani and ‘Abduh. See Asad’s review, “Politics and Religion in Islamic Reform: A Critique of Kedourie’s al-’Afghani and Abduh,” 12–22.
See the introduction to Poovey, History of the Modern Fact.
On the labor movement in Egypt, see Beinin and Lockman, Workers on the Nile; Said, Tarikh al-haraka al-shuyu‘iya al-misriya; and Goldberg, Tinker, Tailor, and Textile Worker.
See Cromer, Modern Egypt, 280–300; also Colvin, The Making of Modern Egypt, 293–320.
On the epidemic and on British health policy in Egypt, see Tignor, “Public Health Administration in Egypt under British Rule 1882–1914.”
Samir was ‘Abdallah al-Nadim’s former collaborator in al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit and his eventual biographer.
See Kuhnke, Lives at Risk, 101–110.
Under the Public Debt Administration agreement of 1876 European advisors were placed in all ministries of the Egyptian government. These “advisors” were the de facto administrators of their ministries.
“Al-Salama wa al-waba’,” al-Burhan, 2 August 1883, 1.
See ‘Uthman, Tarikh al-sihafa al-iskandariya, 163–171, for a summary of the internal British politics and a sketch of the difficult times faced by the city of Alexandria in the early days of the occupation. On the difficulties for the British in the early years of occupation, see also Vatikiotis, The History of Egypt from Muhammad Ali to Sadat, 169–177; Tignor, Modernization and British Colonial Rule in Egypt, 48–93; Colvin, The Making of Modern Egypt, 238–246; Cromer, Modern Egypt, 349–381.
For a discussion of some of the political factors involved in the British occupation of Egypt, see Daly, “The British Occupation, 1882–1922”; Owen, “Egypt and Europe,” 111–124.
Volumes 4 through 8 are readily available and were recently republished in Cairo in 1998.
On the history of the Alexandrian press of the time, see ‘Uthman, Tarikh al-sihafa al-iskandariya, 110–152.
“Al-fallahin,” al-Zaman, 18 July 1884, 1.
Ibid.
Louis Awad translated this piece in his The Literature of Ideas in Egypt, 113–114.
On the Dinshway incident and its subsequent importance in the production of Egyptian nationalism see Chapter 5, 311–351.
“Al-Fallahin,” al-Zaman, 18 July 1884, 1.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid.
See al-Wakil, Mulkiya al-‘aradi al-zira‘iya fi misr khilal al-qarn al-tasi‘ ‘ashr, 665–685, on government landholdings and disposal of the royal family’s holdings. See Baer, A History of Landownership in Modern Egypt, 68–70, on foreigners purchasing land and the tendencies of landholding companies.
For a detailed look at the life of Arslan please see William L. Cleveland Islam Against the West: Shakib Arslan and the Campaign for Islamic Nationalism. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1985.
See Di Tirazi, Tarikh al-sihafa al-‘arabiya, 3: 81–83.
See “Amani iqtisadiya sina‘iya,” al-Zira‘a, 23 July 1891, 193–197; “al‘Umda wa al-‘umud,” al-‘Umda, 3 December 189, 26.
“Al-Fallahin,” al-Zaman, 18 July 1884, 1.
“Dirasa zira‘ iya fi tatbiq qanun al-ta‘ wid,” al- ‘Alam, 6 September 1888, 1.
See “Al-Bank al-‘aqari al-misri,” al-Zira ‘a, 8 May 1892, 70–80; “Al-Sa‘adat al-fallah al-misri wa shaqawahu,” al-Zira ‘a, 24 August 1894; “Al-Ta‘lim al-zira ‘a,” Al-Muqtataf, 1 October 1893, 4; and“Al-‘Umda wa al-‘umud,” al‘Umda , 10 December 1896, 2.
See “Al-Bank al-‘aqari al-misri,” al-Zira ‘a, 8 May 1892, 79–80; “Dirasa zira ‘iya fi tatbiq qanun al-ta‘ wid,” al-A‘ lam, 6 September 1888, 1; “Al-Zira‘a fi misr,” And al-Fallah, 25 February 1887, 1–2.
“Al-Zira ‘a fi misr,” Al-Fallah, 25 February 1887, 1–2.
This scenario as well as a number of variations was very common; one can find it in a variety of newspapers. See, for example, al-Zaman, 18 July 1884, 1 and 12 September 1884, 1; “Fi zawal al-sukhra.” Al-Fallah, 21 February 1887, 1–2 and “Zira‘a fi misr,” 25 February 1887, 1–2; “Al-musha’ikh al-bilad.” Al-Watan, 27 January 1889, 3; “Tharwat al-fallah aw tajir al-qutn,” al-Nil, 15 February 1893, 1–2 and 3 March 1893, 1–2; “Al-qanun ightisab al-aradi,” al-Zira‘a, 10 February 1891; “Musa ‘adat al-fallah,” al-Fayum, 20 December 1894, 3. Common derivations circulated via the innumerable articles, speeches, and general agitation for some kind of public lending institution for small landholders.
This idea was germinating in the mid-1880s. See “Hafz tharwat al-fallah,” al-Zaman, 12 September 1884, 1.
“Al-Fallahin,” al-Zaman, 18 July 1884, 1.
“Al-Zira ‘a fi misr,” al-Fallah, 25 February 1887, 1–2.
Owen, Cotton and the Egyptian Economy, 140 and 215–218.
See al-‘Atiya, Kitab kamil al-najah lil-muzari‘ wa al-fallah fi al-aradi wa al-zira‘a al-misriya, 24–25.
“Al-Bank al-‘aqari al-misri,” al-Zira‘a, 8 May 1892, 79–80. See also “Tanta fi ‘abril 26,” al-Zira‘a, 28 April 1892. Al-‘Ajyal spelled out a specific platform for educational reform and education in “al-Zira‘a fi misr,” 20 November 1897, 1.
Al-Fallah in an article entitled “al-Muzari‘un” declared on January 31, 1887, that the “general well-being was attached to [peasant] agriculture,” 2. See also (untitled) Al-Watan, 2 October 1889, 1; “Sakan al-fallah.” al-Zira‘a, 4 June 1891, 105; and “Al-ajmal al-Zira‘a.” al-Majalla al-Zira‘iya, 4 Rabie Thani, 1312H [22 October 1893].
Al-Zira‘a, 6 September 1891, 288–292.
For example, see al-Zira‘a, 15 February 1892, 539–540; al-Surur, 24 February 1894, 1; and al- ‘Alam al-Misri, 16 March 1894, 2.
“Al-Muzari‘un,” Al-Fallah, 31 January 1887, 2.
Ibid.
Gali, Essai sur l’agriculture de l’Égypte, 122–124.
“Al-Muzari‘un,” Al-Fallah, 31 January 1887, 2.
Ibid.
“Bashiri fi ziwal al-sukhra,” al-Fallah, 21 February 1887, 3.
“ ‘Alan: al-Najah lil- muzari‘ wa al-fallah,” al-Sadiq, 10 August 1887, 2.
The quote comes from the second and substantially reworked edition (al-Qahira: ’Ali Ahmad Sukr, 1902), 1.
‘Atiya, Kitab kamil al-najah lil-muzari‘ wa al-fallah fi al-aradi wa al-zira‘a al-misriya, 36.
“Taqalidna al-zira‘a,” al-Zira‘a, 7 October 1892, 258–262.
‘Atiya, Kitab kamil al-najah lil-muzari‘ wa al-fallah fi al-aradi wa al-zira‘a al-misriya, 35—36.
Ibid. See also al-Fallah, 31 January 1887, 2; 21 February 1887, 3; 25 February 1887, 1–2; (untitled) al-Watan, 27 November 1889, 1–2; and “al-fallah al-misri.” al-Zira‘a, 18 March 1892, 587–589.
“Taqalidna al-zira‘a,” al-Zira‘a, 7 October 1892, 258–262.
Ibid.
“Al-Zira‘a fi misr,” al-‘Ajyal, 20 November 1897, 1.
“Taqalidna al-Zira‘a,” al-Zira‘a, 7 October 1892, 258–262.
“Lil-mudir al-jarida,”Al-Zira‘a, 28 April 1892.
Ibid.
“Al-muhafizun wa al-ahrar fi al-Zira‘a,” al-Zira‘a, 12 June 1892.
“Taqalidna al-zira‘a,” al-Zira‘a, 7 October 1892, 258–262.
Ibid.
Ibid.
For works that discuss the construction of categories of knowledge over time, see El Shakry, The Great Social Laboratory; Eyal, The Disenchantment of the Orient; El-Haj, Facts on the Ground; Poovey, The Financial System in Nineteenth-Century Britain; also Poovey, The History of the Modern Fact; Hacking, The Taming of Chance; and Porter, The Rise of Statistical Thinking.
“ ’Afat al-Zira‘a,” al-Zira‘a, 19 August 1891, 225–228.
See Chapters 2 and 3 and the Conclusion on the concepts of al-tafrit wa al-ifrat.
“Lil-mudir al-jarida,” al-Zira‘a, 28 April 1892.
For example, see “Asbab al-ta‘un al-baqra,” al-Zaman, 2 April 1884, 3. This article tried to explain, in self-consciously simple language, the reasons for a devastating outbreak of cow typhus. “Lamha zira‘’iya,” al-Mahrusa, 20 July 1886, 1, questioned the traditional methods used by fallahin of eradicating the cotton worm; and “Al-isti‘ana bil-sabakh fi al-Zira‘a,” al-Sadiq, 1 December 1886, 1, described how the misuse of fertilizer and the ignorance of the “laws” of crop rotation adversely affected agriculture.
“Al-muzar ‘i al-misri wa hajatuhu,” al-Zira‘a, 9 July 1891, 177–178.
For standard definitions of fard al-‘ayn and fard al-kifaiya, see Encyclopaedia of Islam, ed. Lewis et al., 2: 790.
On the day-to-day application of the principles of Islamic jurisprudence, see Weiss, The Search for God’s Law.
“Al-Jam‘iya al-huriya al-islamiya,” Al-Zira‘a, 28 November 1895, 761; and “Mas’ila iqtisadiya ijtima‘iya,” Al-Zira‘a, 9 June 1891, 129–134.
“Amani iqtisadi,” al-Zira‘a, 4 June 1891. 97–100.
Poovey, A History of the Modern Fact.
See the 1983 edition of Hourani’s Arabic Thought in the Liberal Age 1798–1939, viii-x.
‘Abdallah Al-Nadim complained bitterly that the agricultural school did not use Arabic-language textbooks when it was set up in Giza. See Zayn al-Din, Al-Zira‘a al-misriya fi ‘ahd al-ihtilal al-biritani, 185–217.
See “al-Zira‘a fi misr,” al-Fallah, 25 February 1887, 1–2; “Dirasa al-zira‘iya tatbiq qanun al-‘awid,” al-‘Alam, 6 September 1888, 3; (untitled), al-Watan, 18 April 1891, 1; “Al-Muhafizun wa al-ahrar fi al-zira‘a,” al-Zira‘a, 12 June 1892; “Taqalidna al-zira‘a,” al-Zira‘a, 7 October 1892, 258–262; and “Al-‘Umda wa al‘umud,” al-‘Umda, 10 December 1896.
“Zira‘at al-qutn,” al-Zira‘a, 23 April 1891. “Amani iqtisadi,” al-Zira‘a, 4 June 1891, 97–100, makes the same point, but adds that part of the problem is the absence of media with which to communicate new developments to fallahin.
“Al-fallah al-misri,” al-Zira‘a, 18 March 1892, 587–589.
“Ta‘limat zira‘iya mufida,” al-Zira‘a, 28 September 1893.
On this point see El Shakry, The Great Social Laboratory; and Mitchell, The Rule of Experts.
“Al-muhafizun wa al-‘ahrar fi al-zira‘a,” al-Zira‘a, 12 June 1892.
Ibid.
For articles that compare Egyptian to European farming methods and (mostly) French peasants see “ ‘As‘ad hal al-fallah,” al-Zira‘a, 19 November 1891, 457–458; “Al-sa‘adat al-fallah al-misri wa shaqawahu,” al-Zira‘a, 24 August 1894; and “Al-‘Umda wa al-‘umud,” al-‘Umda, 10 December 1896.
“Al-fallah al-misri,” al-Zira‘a, 18 March 1892, 587—589.
“Amani iqtisadi,” al-Zira‘a, 4 June 1891, 97–100.
“Al-zira‘a fi misr,” al-Ustadh, 21 February 1893, 627—630.
“Al-muhafizun wa al-‘ahrar fi al-zira‘a,” al-Zira‘a, 12 June 1892.
Ibid.
Ibid.
“Al-zira‘a al-misriya wa turuq tahsinha,” al-Zira‘a, 28 February 1893, 525–526.
‘As ‘ad hal al-fallah,” Al-Zira‘a, 19 November 1891, 457–458. See also “Zaqaziq,” al-‘Akhlas, 1 August 1895, 3, which reasoned that “newspapers are supposed to serve the people, for they are the voice [lisan al-’hal] of the people [’ahali].”
“Li-mudir al-jarida,” al-Zira‘a, 28 April 1892.
Ibid.
Ibid.
“Amani iqtisadi,” al-Zira‘a, 4 June 1891, 97–100.
Ibid.
Ibid.
See “Manhaj al-ta‘lim fi madrasa al-zira‘a,” al-Zira‘a, 12 February 1893, 482–484.
“Al-Zira‘a fi misr,” al-Ustadh, 21 February 1893, 627–630.
Ibid., 627.
Ibid., 628.
Ibid.
Ibid., 630.
See al-Kumi, Al-sihafa al-islamiya fi misr fi al-qarn al-tasi‘ ‘ashr, 39. “Wilkuks wa jaridatuhu,” al-Zira‘a, 26 December 1892, 405–410.
Al-Muqtataf, 15 January 1889, 7.
See Shafiq, Mudhakirati fi nisf qarn, 2: 88–92.
See also “Al-Zira‘a fi misr,” al-Ustadh, 21 February 1893, 627–630; Foaden et al., eds., Textbook of Egyptian Agriculture.
“Ijmal zira‘a,” al-Majalla al-Zira‘iya, Rabi‘ Thani 11, 1311H [22 October 1893].
See Di Tirazi, Tarikh al-sihafa al-‘arabiya I 224–227, for additional biographical notes.
“Ijmal zira‘a,” al-Majalla al-Zira‘iya, Rabi‘ Thani 11, 1311H [22 October 1893].
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid.
“Manhaj al-ta‘lim fi madrasat al-zira‘a,” al-Zira‘a, 12 February 1893, 483.
“Madrasat al-zira‘a al-misriya,” al-Zira‘a, 25 December 1892. Also see “al-Mistir Wilim Walas [Mister William Wallace],” al-Zira‘a, 6 June 1891.
“Madrasat al-zira‘a al-misriya,” al-Zira‘a, 25 December 1892.
“Al-jara’id fi bilad al-fallahin,” al-‘Alam al-Misri, 9 September 1892, 1.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid.
“Al-Muqaddima,” al-Ustadh, 24 August 1892, 2–3.
“Fasl fi akhlaq wa ‘adat,” al-Ustadh, 24 August 1892, 11–15.
Ibid.,11.
Ibid.
Ibid.,12.
Ibid.,14.
Ibid.,15.
See El Shakry, The Great Social Laboratory.
See Asad, Formations of the Secular, 13.
Al-Umma, 25 July 1906,1.
“Mata tamaddun al-muslimun [When Will Muslims Become Civilized]?” al-Umma , 26 April 1906,1. On Aghayev’s life see Shissler, Turkish Identity between Two Empires: Ahmet Agaoglu and the New Turkey.
Asad, Formations of the Secular, 225.
Ibid., 17.
See ‘Arja al-Muqattam: Jaridat al-ihtilal al-biritani fi misr. On Lufti al-Sayyid and the idea of modernity in Egypt, see Smith, Islam and the Search for Social Order in Modern Egypt. See also Sayyid-Marsot, Egypt’s Liberal Experiment ; Wendell, The Evolution of the Egyptian National Image.
See Shafiq, Mudhakirati fi nisf qarn.
See Gershoni and Jankowski, Egypt, Islam, and the Arabs. For a critique of this work that weighs the importance of Benedict Anderson’s work for scholars of the Middle East, see Smith, “Imagined Identities, Imagined Nationalisms.”
See “Khatr al-tamaddun al-gharbi,” al-Umma, 8 March 1906, 2. The article concluded by asking provocatively, “Do [you] not see the danger of Christians ruling over you? Is drinking alcohol to be counted among the morals of civilization?”
See Gershoni and Jankowski, Egypt, Islam, and the Arabsand Redefining the Egyptian Nation. See also Wendell, The Evolution of the Egyptian National Image. For a look at how Muslim reformers recast Islamic traditions, see Dallal, “Appropriating the Past.” On the appropriation of ancient Egypt in the service of modern politics, see Reid, Whose Pharaohs?; Colla, “Hooked on Pharonics.”
See DiCapua, “Jabarti of the Twentieth Century” and Crabbs, Writing of History in Nineteenth-Century Egypt. This paradox is at the center of Chakrabarty’s, Provincializing Europe.
See Gershoni and Jankowski, Egypt, Islam, and the Arabs.
There were some prominent exceptions to this generalization, including Muhammad ‘Abduh, Sa‘ad Zaghlul, and Ibrahim Hilbawi.
See Warburg, “The Sinai Peninsula Borders, 1906–47.” See also Gershoni and Jankowski, Egypt, Islam, and the Arabs, 7–10.
A number of scholars have looked at the sociological dimension of this question. See most recently Falk Gesink, “ ‘Chaos on the Earth’.” See also Schulze, “Mass Culture and Islamic Cultural Production”; Crecelius, “Non-Ideological Responses of the Egyptian Ulama to Modernization.”
“Al-jam‘iya al-zira‘iya fi mudiriyat al-jiza,” al-Insan, 23 April 1907, 3.
A typical article of that sort appeared in al-Sayyid Muhammad al-Salamuni’s Dumyat-based al-Qanbila in January 1909. See ‘Abd al-Hamid al-Radini, al-Qanbila, 9 January 1909. Al-Salamuni was an important figure in the small but vibrant Dumyat-based journalism scene. He had earlier published another Dumyati weekly called al-Nasr.
See Gershoni and Jankowski, Egypt, Islam, and the Arabs, 3–22.
“ ’Ili ‘ay tariq nahnu musawwaqun?” al-Umma, 4 July 1906,1.
Typical of this genre in al-Sayha are “Limadha taqaddum al-gharbiyun wa ta’akhir al-sharqiyun [Why Do Westerners Progress while Easterners Remain Backward]?” al-Sayha, 14 September 1903, 1–2; “Al-Khatr al-‘azim al-zira‘a [The Supreme Danger in Agriculture],” al-Sayha, 10 November 1905, 1.
“ ’Ili ‘ay tariq nahnu musawwaqun?” al-Umma, 4 July 1906,1.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid.
The concept of Ottomanism itself dates only to the late nineteenth century. See Mardin, The Genesis of Young Ottoman Thought.
“Great Britain Warned of Peril in Egypt,” New York Times, 6 July 1906.
“The Dread of a ‘Holy War’,” New York Times, 10 July 1906.
On Rida, see Hourani, Arabic Thought in the Liberal Age and Kerr, Islamic Reform. Salama Musa’s memoirs, Tarbiyat Salama Musa, were translated by Shuman in 1961. On Haykal, see Smith, Islam and the Search for Social Order in Modern Egypt: A Biography of Muhammad Husayn Haykal.
See, for example, “Intishar al-radha’il wa al-madaniya al-kadhib,” al-Hurriya , 12 April 1907, 1; “Madaniya al-sharq wa al-madaniya al-misriya,” al-Istana , 25 May 1906,1.
See Mardin, The Genesis of Young Ottoman Thought.
See Rida, Al-Khilafa. On Jawish, see Nasr, Misr wa harakat al-jami‘a al‘islamiya .
See Seikaly, “Prime Minister and Assassin: Butrus Ghali and Wardani.”
On the extent of these patriarchal attitudes carrying over to British administration of Egypt, see Owen, “The Influence of Lord Cromer’s Indian Experience on British Policy in Egypt 1883–1907.”
See Chatterjee, The Nation and Its Fragments.
Concern with preserving Egypt’s archaeological heritage began in the 1880s. This trend became even more pronounced after the turn of the century. See Reid, Whose Pharaohs?
See Kazziha, “The Jaridah-Ummah Group and Egyptian Politics.”
See Chatterjee, The Nation and Its Fragments.
On the village novel, see Selim, Novel and the Rural Imaginary in Egypt; Moosa, The Origins of Arabic Fiction; Elad, The Village Novel in Modern Egyptian Literature; Hafez, Genesis of Arabic Narrative Discourse.
‘Adhra’ Dinshway, like many books at the time, was originally serialized in a newspaper—in Muhammad al-Hahayawi‘s daily al-Minbar. The book was translated by El-Gabalawy in Three Pioneering Egyptian Novels as “The Maiden of Dinshway” in 1986. For a discussion of al-Haqqi and ‘Adhra’ Dinshway, see Lockman, “Imagining the Working Class.” Grinsted translated Zaynab under the title of Zainab: The First Egyptian Novel in 1989.
Al-Haqqi, ‘Adhra’ Dinshway, 13.
“Kalimat ‘an al-mar’a al-qaruwiya al-yum,” al-Ra’id al-‘Uthmani, 6 September 1906, 2. Al-Ra’id al-‘Uthmani was a Tanta weekly published in 1902 by Muhammad Tawfiq al-Azhari.
Haykal, Zaynab, 8.
See Selim, The Novel and the Rural Imaginary in Egypt; Moosa, The Origins of Modern Arabic Fiction; Elad, The Village Novel in Modern Egyptian Literature ; Hafez, Genesis of Arabic Narrative Discourse.
Qasim ‘Amin argued in his Liberation of Women that the only way for Egypt to progress was to educate girls and to loosen some of the social restrictions on middle-class urban women from which peasant women had already escaped.
On a range of perspectives on this question in general and in the Middle Eastern context see Scott, The Politics of the Veil; Joseph, ed., Gender and Citizenship in the Middle East; Abu-Lughod, ed., Remaking Women; Yuval-Davis, Gender and Nation; Kandiyoti, ed., Gendering the Middle East: Emerging Perspectives ; Kandiyoti, ed., Women, Islam and the State.
Thompson, Colonial Citizens, 7.
For example, see “al-jami‘iya difa‘ ‘an al-mar’a,” Al-Dustur, 6 January 1908, 2; “hamiyat al-nisa’ Al-Dustur, 13 January 1908, 2; “hamiyat taraqqiat almar’a” Al-Dustur, 4 February 1908, 3; “mail al-mar’a ila al-zina” Al-Dustur, 8 February 1908. On Wajdi, see Di Tirazi, Tarikh al-sihafa, I:189, fn. 4; Goldschmidt, Biographical Dictionary of Modern Egypt, 224.
Qasim ‘amin: al-‘amal al-kamila, ed. ‘Imara, 419–554, Al-Tahrir al-mar’a [The Liberation of Women] and al-Mar’a al-jadida. Some of these were later collected into a single book titled Asbab wa Nata’ij wa akhlaq wa muwa’iz [Reasons and Results and Morals and Spiritual Exhortations]. Both of ‘Amin’s books on women have been translated by Peterson, the first as The Liberation of Women, and the second as The New Woman.
“Kalimat ‘an al-mar’a al-qaruwiya al-yum,” al-Ra’id al-‘Uthmani, 6 September 1906, 2.
Ibid.
“Al-jami‘iya difa‘ ‘an al-mar’a,” Al-Dustur, 6 January 1908, 2.
Al-Hurriya,12 April 1907, 1.
See, for example, “Intishar al-radha’il wa al-madaniya al-kadhiba,” al-Hurriya , 12 April 1907, 1; “Bida‘ al-madaniya,” al-Umma, 5 October 1905, 2; “Sa’iat al-madaniya: al-‘intihar,” al-Dustur, 24 January 1908, 1.
For a sampling, see “ ‘Arabi tafarnuj,” 6 June 1881, 7–10; “Huff ‘tala’ alnahar,” 19 June 1881, 22–24; “Jahil kadhab,” 18 September 1881, 228–229; “Al-Mawlid al-Ahmadi,” 25 September 1881, 241–244.
“Madaniyat al-sharq wa al-madaniya al-misriya aw al-farq baynahuma,” Al-Istanah, 25 May 1906, 1. Al-Istanah was printed at Matba‘t al-Islam and owned by Ahmad Shadhali al-‘Azhari. Al-‘Azhari published his own journal al-Islam ; he had previously edited William Wilcox’s al-Azhar. Evidently, al-‘Azhari resigned in the fray over Wilcox’s infamous call for Egyptians to replace classical Arabic with colloquial Arabic in all forms of communication, including writing. See Goldschmidt, Biographical Dictionary of Modern Egypt, 225; al-Kumi, Al-sihafa al-islamiya fi misr fi al-qarn al-tasi‘ ‘ashr, 38–41; and Sa‘id, Tarikh alda‘wah ‘ila al-‘ammiya wa-athariha fi misr.
“Madaniyat al-sharq wa al-madaniya al-misriya aw al-farq baynahuma,” Al-Istanah, 25 May 1906, 1.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid.
For example, see “ ‘Alim misr wa wahiduha,” al-Ra’id al-‘Uthmani, 23 June 1903, 1–2; “ ’Adab al-amma,” al-Hurriya, 24 November 1907, 1.
See “Da’im al-madaniya,” 20 March 1906, 1; “Dasa’is al-‘ada’ ” and”al-Tafarnuj wa sa’iatuha,” 20 March 1906, 2.
“Taqaddum al-dawla” al-Sa‘id, 8 October 1905, 1; “ ’Ikhtilat al-umma bighayruha, al-Sa‘id, 8 October 1905, 2; “al-Taqaddum al-hadith,” al-Hijra, 30 March 1905, 1.
“Khatr al-tamaddun al-gharbi,” al-‘Umma, 8 March 1906, 2.
“ ’Intishar al-radha’il wa al-madaniya,” al-Hurriya, 12 April 1907, 1.
“Sa’iat al-madaniya: al-intihar,” al-Dustur, 24 January 1908,1. There are a great number of books on al-Aqqad in Arabic. In English, see Semah, Four Egyptian Literary Critics; Goldschmidt, Biographical Dictionary of Modern Egypt, 24–25.
“Sa’iat al-madaniya: al-intihar,” al-Dustur, 24 January 1908,1.
“Bida‘ al-madaniya,” al-Umma, 5 October 1905, 2.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Al-Zayyat, Tamaddun al-fallah al-jadid.
Among the books to his credit are: Al-Samir fi al-hawadit wa-al-fawazir; Kitab nuzhat al-‘ashiq al-hayran fi al-anashid wa al-aghani al-mutriba al-hisan; and Waq‘iat hall wa-nawadir wa-mujun Hafiz Najib al-Muhtal wa-ma ‘atahu min al-nasb wa-al-ihtiyal.
An early description of a zar in English can be found in McPherson, Bimbashi McPherson, 239–246.The account was written by McPherson, an Englishman, in 1920 when he was serving as the head of the Egyptian government’s secret police.
“Hadith khurafa,” al-Tankit wa al-Tabkit, 4 September 1881.
Al-Zayyat described the contents in 1902 as “a literary, humorous ditty representing everything the zar shaykhs do that would embarrass any human being.”
See Beinin and Lockman, Workers on the Nile; see also Lockman, ed., Workers and Working Classes in the Middle East; Sa’id, Tarikh al-haraka al-istirakiya fi misr.
Al-Zayyat, Tamaddun al-fallah al-jadid, 2–3.
Ibid., 4.
Ibid., 4.
“Bida‘ ‘al-madaniya,” al-Umma, 5 October 1905, 2.
Al-Zayyat, Tamaddun al-fallah al-jadid, 5.
See Gershoni and Jankowski, Egypt, Islam, and the Arabs.
Al-Zayyat, Tamaddun al-fallah al-jadid,16.
Ibid., 4.
“Al-dhaka’ al-misri,” al-‘Umma, 25 July 1905, 1–2.
Ibid., 1.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid.
See Scott, “Colonial Governmentality”.
Ibid., 205 (italics in original).
Cromer, Modern Egypt, 1:5 and 1:131.
See Scott, “Colonial Governmentality,” 208.
Asad, Formations of the Secular, 205–256.
Talal Asad outlines the role of legal reform in constructing autonomous, self-regulating subjects through educating populations into a new public morality. See Asad, Formations of the Secular, 280.
This is reminiscent of arguments developed by Partha Chatterjee in his work on colonial and post-colonial political discourses. See his The Nation and Its Fragments and Nationalist Thought and the Colonial World.
“Mudama‘ al-aqlam al-wataniyi fi al-haditha al-dinshawiya,” al-Umma, 1 July 1906, 1.
Ibid. About a year later, in his famous work ‘Adhra’ Dinshway, Mahmud al-Haqqi was credited with developing the first inner monologue in a work of fiction in modern Arabic letters; see El-Gabalawy’s introduction to his translation of the work in his Three Pioneering Egyptian Novels, 5–48. Also on the novel, see Elkhadem, History of the Egyptian Novel. For a discussion of al-Haqqi and ‘Adhra’ Dinshway in relation to the development of notions of socioeconomic class, see Lockman, “Imagining the Working Class,” 157–190.
“Mudama‘ al-aqlam al-wataniyi fi al-haditha al-dinshawiya,” al-Umma, 1 July 1906, 1.
See Asad, Formations of the Secular, 212–213. Asad quotes the Egyptian judge and writer, Tariq al-Bishri, commenting on the imposition of new meanings on words as an outcome of Egyptian “mimicry” of Europeans resulting from “European coercion and the Egyptian elites’ infatuation with European ways.”
While some have questioned some of the elitist and liberal assumptions underlying his 1983 work, Benedict Anderson wrote about the importance of a collective imaginary created through print capitalism. In contrast, Chatterjee’s work describing the inner “spiritual” domain of the nation demonstrates the power of nationalist discourses to discipline subaltern groups through its “spiritual” inner domain. Marx has exploded the “illiberal” origins of nationalism in Europe and challenges the liberal “civic” model of inclusive nationalism that is part of a European “hagiography.” See Marx, Faith in Nation.
The articles on 20 July, 24 July, 26 July, 27 July, and 28 July 1906 all appeared on page one of al-Umma under the title “Haditha Dinshway.”
“Al-Riba’ wa al-murabiyun fi bilad al-dawla,” al-Huriya, 18 February 1906, 2.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Asad, Formations of the Secular, 205–256, and “Conscripts of Western Civilization.” Following Asad, Marx, and others, we should pause before we simply take this “opening” as an example of inclusive liberalism.
“Rudd fariya,” Al-Mu‘tasam, 2 August 1906, 1. Al-Mu‘tasam was a Cairo weekly published between 1898 and 1907. Its editor, Ahmad al-Majadi, described the paper as “a political, historical and critical weekly.” Al-Majadi was the publisher of two other short-lived weeklies: al-Islah (1903–1904) and al-Fa’iz (1907–1909).
Ibid.
“Rudd fariya,” al-Mu‘tasam, 2 August 1906, 1.
Cromer, 1908, Modern Egypt, II:132–133, 135. Just as was the case in India this was a source of great resentment among Egyptian nationalists. See Chatterjee, The Nation and Its Fragments and Nationalist Thought and the Colonial World.
“Rudd fariya,” al-Mu‘tasam, 2 August 1906, 1.
Quoted in al-Rafi‘i, Mustafa Kamil ba‘ath al-nahda al-wataniya, 534.
Al-Qanbila, 2 July 1909, 1–2.
Lisan al-Arab, 14 July 1909, 1–2.
“Limadha,” al-Insan, 11 June 1907, 1.
Ibid.
“Al-Murasalat,” al-Qanbila, 15 January 1909, 4.
“Al-‘umud mumathalin al-hukuma,”al-Qanbila, 25 June 1909, 1.
“Al-Hala al-zira‘iya fi bilad,” al-Ra‘d, 19 February 1909, 1.
Ibid.
Haykal, Zaynab, 153.
Lisa Pollard has discussed this same phenomenon with regard to women and their specific agenda for change that was sidelined in the events preceding and during the unfolding of the 1919 revolution. See Pollard, Nurturing The Nation.
Haykal, Zaynab, 234–235.
Ibid.
Ibid.
On the 1919 rebellion, see Berque, Egypt: Imperialism and Revolution; Lockman and Beinin, Workers on the Nile; Pollard, Nurturing the Nation, 166–211; Aqqad, Saad Zughlul: Za’im al-Thawra; al-Rafi’i, Thawrat 1919.
Pollard, Nurturing the Nation, 211.
Pierre Bourdieu “Une classe object,” 2–5.
Ibid., 4.
See Chakrabarty, Provincializing Europe, on this process in India. On the general phenomenon, see Anderson, Imagined Communities.
See Pollard, Nurturing the Nation; Fahmy, All the Pasha’s Men; Mitchell, Colonising Egypt
On the Entente Cordiale, see Rolo, Entente Cordiale. Chapter 1 includes an explanation of the capitulatory regime and about the British-French rivalry as a major factor in Egyptian affairs from the early 1870s until the signing of the Entente Cordiale in 1904.
See Watenpaugh, Being Modern in the Middle East on Aleppo; Hanssen, Fin de Siècle Beirut on Beirut.
Toledano, State and Society in Mid-Nineteenth-Century Egypt.
Wendell, Evolution of the Egyptian National Image, 18.
See Hijazi, al-Wataniya al-Misriya fi al-‘asr al-hadith, 504; Wendell, Evolution of the Egyptian National Image, 18–22.
On al-‘Afghani and ‘Abduh, see Jadanne, Usus al-Taqaddum ‘ind mufakkari al-islam fi al-‘alam al-‘arabi al-hadith; Keddie, Islamic Response to Imperialism ; Hourani, Arabic Thought in the Liberal Age; Kerr, Islamic Reform.
Al-’Afghani, “al-Mawt wa al-Faqa,” al-‘Asr al-Jadid, 29 April 1880.
“Al-zira’a al-misriya wa turuq tahsanha,” al-Zira’a, 28 February 1893.
“Amana iqtisad,” al-Zira’a, 4 June 1891.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid.
See Asad, Genealogies of Religion, 1–24.
Chakrabarty, Provincializing Europe, 4.
Thompson, Colonial Citizens, 6.
Makdisi, Culture of Sectarianism, 7–9.
Chakrabarty, Provincializing Europe, 255.
See Ayalon, The Press in the Arab Middle East; Gershoni and Jankowski, Egypt, Islam, and the Arabs and Redefining the Egyptian Nation; Schulze, “Mass Culture and Islamic Cultural Production;” Awad, Tarikh al-fikr al-misri al-hadith ; Smith, Islam and the Search for Social Order in Modern Egypt; Wendell, Evolution of the Egyptian National Image; Binder, In a Moment of Enthusiasm; Crecelius, “Non-Ideological Responses of the Egyptian Ulama to Modernization”; Ziadeh, Lawyers, the Rule of Law and Liberalism in Modern Egypt; Gendzier, The Practical Visions of Ya’qub Sanu’; Kedourie, Afghani and ‘Abduh; Kerr, Islamic Reform; Safran, Egypt in Search of Political Communit.
My argument here converges with Massad’s Colonial Effects and even Makdisi’s The Culture of Sectarianism: Community to some extent. Both writers argue against the strict bracketing of tradition and modernity in the study of the cultural history of the Middle East.
Chakrabarty, Provincializing Europe, 255.