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Margot Badran. Feminists, Islam and Nation: Gender and the Making of Modern Egypt. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1995. xv + 352 pp. with notes, bibliography and index. Hardcover $35.00
Reviewed by Salwa Ismail
Feminists, Islam and Nation narrates the story of Egyptian feminism as it unfolds from the turn of the Twentieth Century until the 1950s. The author divides the history of the movement into three stages: the first is marked by poems and stories voicing "feminist consciousness"; the second and third are characterized by women's public activism, their entry into society and the establishment of the Egyptian Feminist Union (EFU). Badran's stated focus is on the second and third stages. To this end, the book provides a chronicle of women's efforts in acquiring formal education and gaining access to institutions of higher learning. It also documents their struggle for citizenship rights, their attempt to improve the family code, their engagement in the international feminist movement and their position on various issues such as prostitution.
Badran identifies the feminist movement as an upper and middle class phenomenon. As such, she locates the first stirrings of feminism in the cultures of these classes and particularly of the upper class. The Harem becomes a starting point for this narrative and Badran finds a point of entry in the salon of Princess Nazli Fazil. This,...