Culture and Hegemony in the Colonial Middle East

by Y. Noorani

Overview

This work is a study of the nature and origin of nationality and modern social ideals in the Middle East, particularly Egypt, in the late nineteenth to mid-twentieth centuries. Bringing together writings on political and social reform with literary works, Noorani challenges dominant assumptions about the emergence of modernity. It shows that while nationalist, liberal, and democratic ideals emerged in the Middle East under European influence, these ideals were nevertheless created out of existing cultural values by reformers and intellectuals. The central element of this process, the book argues, was the transformation of virtue into nationality.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781349384679
Publisher:	Palgrave Macmillan US
Publication date:	05/14/2010
Series:	Palgrave Studies in Cultural and Intellectual History
Edition description:	1st ed. 2010
Pages:	245
Product dimensions:	5.51(w) x 8.50(h) x 0.02(d)

About the Author

YASEEN NOORANI is an Assistant Professor of Near Eastern Studies at the University of Arizona, USA.

Table of Contents

Sovereign Virtue and the Emergence of Nationality The Death of the Hero and the Birth of Bourgeois Class Publicity Order, Agency, and the Economy of Desire: Islamic Reformism and Arab Nationalism The Moral Transformation of Femininity and the Rise of the Public-Private Division Fiction, Hegemony, and the Aesthetic Dimension of Citizenship Excess, Rebellion, and Revolution: Egyptian Modernity in the 'Trilogy' of Nagib Mahfuz