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This book provides a concentrated view on the emergence of modern Jewish female education in Iraq under Ottoman rule prior to World War I. The girls' schools were opened by the Alliance Israélite Universelle (AIU), a philanthropic body founded by French Jews in 1860 to promote education and welfare among Jewish communities in non-European regions. The teaching staff was usually sent from France. This study is unique in terms of using AIU's Iraq files to disclose the main facts concerning the foundation of the first Jewish girls' schools in the region, the difficulties encountered by the female directors sent by AIU's Paris center while stabilizing these institutions, and the impact of the AIU female schools on the social life of the Iraqi Jews.
Sciarcon's study consists of five chapters. Chapter 1 surveys the beginnings of the modern Jewish instruction in Ottoman Iraq, which initially focused on boys' education. Though the AIU founded the boys' school in Baghdad in 1864, the resistance of conservative local rabbis prevented the opening of a female institution until 1895. It was J. Danon, the director of the boys' school, who established a girls' primary school, while his wife Rachel Danon became the first director of this institution.