Oral history remains a largely untapped source in research on the Arab world. Simultaneously, women’s activism in the post-independence period remains relatively understudied, despite a heightened interest in women’s involvement in the Arab uprisings.
Based on personal narratives of women activists of different generations in Egypt, Lebanon and Jordan, this lecture explores the history of women’s activism in the Arab world from the 1950s onwards. It demonstrates the ways in which this activism has changed over time and what this tells us about the gendered dimensions of geopolitics in the region. The lecture highlights the significance of women’s activism and women’s rights within radical political projects that resisted Western influence from the 1950s until the 1970s and the gendered consequences of the defeat of radical popular movements by the West and its local allies.
Nicola Pratt argues that the demise of radical, secular movements has led to a decoupling of secular women’s rights agendas from local popular projects, paving the way for their cooption and instrumentalization by authoritarian regimes and international actors and undermining the credibility of secular women’s rights agendas.
Event Details
Speakers: Dr Nicola Pratt, University of Warwick
Chair: Dr Aitemad Muhanna-Matar, LSE
Date: Wednesday 20 January 2016
Time: 18.00-19.30
Event Hashtag: #LSEPratt
Location: Sheikh Zayed Theatre, New Academic Building, LSE
Attendance: Registration for this event is now closed.
Admission is on a first-come-first-served basis for those who register. Not everyone who registers attends our events, so to ensure a full house, we allow more registrations than there are places. Our events are very well attended, so please make sure you arrive early. We cannot guarantee entry.
Speaker
Dr Nicola Pratt is Reader of the International Politics of the Middle East at the University of Warwick. Her research and teaching interests are located at the intersections between the politics of the Middle East and feminist international relations theory.