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The use and abuse of rights-based approaches to furthering gender justice has been the subject of much debate and contestation in feminist scholarship. This paper engages with the feminist anti-imperialist critique of rights discourses, particularly when used as a theoretical lens to understand or evaluate women’s rights movements, or gender related campaigns for justice in non-democratic settings. The paper argues that anti-imperialist critique is caught up in a binary of universalism versus cultural relativism, a form of a meta-narrative that disregards the personal narratives of struggle and the fragments of history that are absolutely necessary for a holistic understanding of historical moments. Secondly, it argues that the anti-imperialist critics disregard insights gained from Edward Said’s important intervention on ‘Traveling Theory’, and how ‘travel’ to another context enables a new process whereby the theory or concept is assimilated and new meanings emerge. The paper engages with these issues by focusing on the issue of violence against women in Arab and/or Muslim societies, examining the struggle of women rights activists in Egypt to campaign and raise awareness. Ultimately the paper ends with a plea to historicise and stay focused on the global/local variations in power relations, requiring a constant reappraisal of the critical lens and tools for understanding and making sense of the world. By doing this it will help to avoid the pitfalls of interpretive frameworks becoming normative dogma.

This is a roundtable with reflections on Tahrir Square, Egypt; Syntagma Square, Greece; Rossio Square, Portugal; 15-M Puerta del Sol, Spain; Gezi Park, Turkey; and Occupy Wall Street, USA. Five yea...

Women in Egypt have always played key roles in society in different historical eras. In the modern period, women were at the forefront of the modernization project that gained momentum at the end of the 19th century and the first decades of the 20th century. “The woman question” occupied center stage in debates about the new modern nation in the making and against the background of colonial domination as Egypt became a British protectorate in 1882. The period from the 1920s to the early 1950s is noted as a period that was particularly vibrant in the history of the women’s movement and witnessed rapid developments in women’s participation in the public sphere. Women founded magazines, established civil society organizations in all fields, joined the national movement for independence, and contributed to key ongoing debates on the modernization project. In 1952, the Free Officers Revolution resulted in a radical shift in the political sphere: the end of British colonialism, the transformation of Egypt from a monarchy to a socialist republic, and the start of a new era. The new order promoted women’s education and access to the labor market but restricted political rights and freedoms in general, a new reality that inevitably impacted the development of an independent women’s movement. In the 1970s, women’s rights assumed center stage in international politics, a development that had an impact on women in general and Egyptian women in particular. Egyptian women entered the diplomatic corps and participated in drafting international conventions, in representing their country in international forums, and in joining international civil society campaigns for women’s rights. They also established a new generation of civil society organizations that advocated for women’s rights both locally and on the international stage. The year 2011 marks an important moment in the history of Egypt. The wave of revolutions that swept the Arab world resulted in the opening of the political sphere in an unprecedented manner. Women’s rights activists rose to the challenge, and more and more women were active participants in the movement for change. Women joined new political parties that were established in the aftermath of revolutions; they were active participants in numerous political and social initiatives and movements; and they played a prominent role in marches for political and social freedoms. In sum, women in modern Egypt have played key roles in the making of modern Egypt. The story of their contributions and achievements is the story of a movement for change toward a better future.

Jean Said Makdisi's Teta, mother and me: An Arab woman's memoir chronicles the lives of three generations of women, her grandmother, her mother and herself. The stories of three women are blended in one narrative about the historical transformations that took place in the Arab world as a consequence of an encounter between east and west. The story of the three women is the story of the plight of a Palestinian family living through tumultuous times: it is a story of high expectations, painful disillusionments and stoic struggles for survival amidst the raging conflicts and colonial interventions that beset the Arab world in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The memoir is also a conscious attempt to revisit and re-inscribe the implications of a crucial cross-cultural encounter, between the east and west through missionary schools, on the lives of women in the Arab world. A historical record narrated from a feminist postcolonial lens Teta, mother and me is a valuable contribution to contemporary public...

[On March 8, 2011, Egyptian women took to the streets to celebrate International Women’s Day, in response to a call that was sent out on Facebook for a million-person women’s march. Since January 25, 2011, Egypt had witnessed a momentous transformation in protest culture and power, wherein millions of people took to the streets to demand their political rights. Surprising to many, though, was the marked hostility and violence that was unleashed against women protesters, as they were harassed and shouted at by groups of men who gathered around them. They were accused of following western agendas, and of going against cultural values. Among the many reasons for this turn of events, this essay argues that one of the key obstacles that women’s rights activists will face in the months and years to come is a prevalent public perception that associates women’s rights activists and their activities with the ex-First Lady, Suzanne Mubarak, and her entourage—that is, with corrupt regime politics in collusion with imperialist agendas., On March 8, 2011, Egyptian women took to the streets to celebrate International Women's Day, in response to a call that was sent out on Facebook for a million-person women's march. Since January 25, 2011, Egypt had witnessed a momentous transformation in protest culture and power, wherein millions of people took to the streets to demand their political rights. Surprising to many, though, was the marked hostility and violence that was unleashed against women protesters, as they were harassed and shouted at by groups of men who gathered around them. They were accused of following western agendas, and of going against cultural values. Among the many reasons for this turn of events, this essay argues that one of the key obstacles that women's rights activists will face in the months and years to come is a prevalent public perception that associates women's rights activists and their activities with the ex-First Lady, Suzanne Mubarak, and her entourage—that is, with corrupt regime politics in collusion with imperialist agendas.]

Cyberspace as a forum for expression, mobilization, dissent and the organization of alternative social and political networks has been a distinct feature of the new global order since the 1990s. Cyberspace as a forum for alternative expression is also making inroads in the Arabic literary establishment. In 2008, Dar al-Shorouq, an established privately-owned Egyptian publishing house, published three collections of short stories by three women bloggers, Ghada 'Abd al-'Aal, Rihab Bassam and Ghada Mohamed Mahmoud. In this article, I argue that cyberspace, particularly the noted proliferation of literary blogs and blogging among Arab youth, has created new literary public spheres, or 'competing counterpublics', that are breaking the monopoly of mainstream literary spaces and changing tastes. I also argue that cyberspace has been particularly conducive to the participation of women in the literary field, and pose questions about the implications of the emergence of cyber counterpublics on the Arab literary establishment and the canon of Arabic literature.

The emergence of the New Woman in Egypt as a central trope in the nationalist narrative of nation-building and modernity has been the subject of scholarly interest for more than a decade, yet there has been little research on her logical counterpart: the New Man. Although representations of the New Man have always been a subtext in representations of the New Woman, the manifestations and implications of these constructed imaginings within the Egyptian nationalist narrative have yet to be explored. In this article I consider constructions of the New Man through what men say about women, about themselves, and about their conception of ideal manhood. I argue that overt discussions of masculinity ran parallel to discussions of femininity. They might not have dominated the cultural scene like the debates on “the woman question,” but they are revealing of the complexities of gender politics. I focus particularly on literary narratives published in the first four decades of the twentieth century.

This chapter maps out the space of translation within the political economy of contemporary protest movements, using the Egyptian Revolution as a case in point and extending the definition of translation to cover a range of modalities and types of interaction. It identifies themes and questions that arise out of the concrete experiences of activists mobilizing and reflecting on what it means to work for justice, both within and across borders, and to attempt to effect change at home while conversing with others who are fighting similar battles elsewhere. I argue that if our networks of solidarity are to become more effective and reflect the values of horizontality, non-hierarchy and pluralism that inform contemporary protest movements, translation, interpreting, subtitling and other forms of mediation must be brought to the centre of the political arena and conceptualized as integral elements of the revolutionary project. Translators, likewise, must be repositioned as full participants within non-hierarchical, solidary activist communities.

The first years of the 21st century in Egypt saw a marked movement by women activists and groups in Egypt to lobby for appointing women judges. The debate around the issue included arguments about women's "natural" roles, about their lesser abilities, and about the necessity of maintaining their place in the home to safeguard Arab cultural identity. In general, these debates posited domesticity as a marker of Arab identity and cultural specificity. I argue that domesticity is a modernist ideology that was transfigured into a representation of an essential Arab cultural identity which needed to be guarded and preserved. I also emphasize that discourses on domesticity were not the only existing discourses propagated in the nineteenth century. Zeinab Fawwaz's journey through history in search for women's participation in the public sphere can be interpreted as a clear challenge to the modernist binary opposition between a backward past and a modern, enlightened present. At the same time, it constituted a subversive narrative to the dominant narrative on domesticity. Similarly, Aisha Taymur's project did not dismiss tradition but sought to engage with it on its own premises in an attempt to argue for women's right.

This chapter sheds light on some of the interesting recent developments in the field of oral history of women in Muslim cultures. It highlights the political and material challenges that face some of the newly founded oral history projects in the twenty-first century. Oral history has been a key resource for reclaiming the voices of Palestinian women in the making of the history of Palestine. Nadje al-Ali's book Iraqi Women: Untold Stories from 1948 to the Present is a modern history of Iraq told through the eyes of women and their experiences, integrating their voices and revising official narratives. Digital oral history archives of the Middle East respond to major historical upheavals and transformations that affected specific communities or countries. Women's stories and experiences, as an example, are more widely represented and their voices are heard more loudly. Keywords: Middle East; Muslim cultures; Nadje al-Ali; oral history; Palestinian women

Do constitutions safeguard the rights of women? What is the importance of constitutions in the context of defending women’s rights? These questions are often raised within the framework of gender studies and organizations calling for women’s rights. Why is this the case? There are three considerations to bear in mind. First, there is the critique aimed at liberal feminism, on the grounds of the latter’s excessive focus on reforming and amending laws to secure women’s rights, while ignoring, to a large extent, the prevalent authoritative system and social norms which can obstruct the implementation of just laws that are beneficial to society. This can lead to unanticipated results that may not necessarily be in the interest of women and may not achieve the expected goal.

This chapter maps out the space of translation within the political economy of contemporary protest movements, using the Egyptian Revolution as a case in point and extending the definition of translation to cover a range of modalities and types of interaction. It identifies themes and questions that arise out of the concrete experiences of activists mobilizing and reflecting on what it means to work for justice, both within and across borders, and to attempt to effect change at home while conversing with others who are fighting similar battles elsewhere. I argue that if our networks of solidarity are to become more effective and reflect the values of horizontality, non-hierarchy and pluralism that inform contemporary protest movements, translation, interpreting, subtitling and other forms of mediation must be brought to the centre of the political arena and conceptualized as integral elements of the revolutionary project. Translators, likewise, must be repositioned as full participants within non-hierarchical, solidary activist communities.