May Ziadeh in al-Ahrām Newspaper: Rethinking Education in 1920s Egypt

Abstract

Mary Elias Ziadeh, pen name “May Ziadeh”, was a Lebanese-Palestinian literary figure born in 1886 in Nazareth, Palestine. She migrated with her family to Cairo, Egypt, in 1907. She moved between Lebanon and Egypt but lived in Egypt for the greater part of her life. She died in Egypt in 1941. She started her career in journalism in her father’s newspaper, al-mahrusa, where she published articles and directed some of its sections. She then wrote in other newspapers, such as the Egyptian al-Ahrām newspaper, which serves as the primary newspaper for my thesis. In my thesis, I will shed light on May Ziadeh as a journalistic figure and her contributions in the al-Ahrām newspaper from 1929 to 1934. I will focus on the intellectual thoughts present in her articles understudy about the concept of education and its major issues in Egyptian academic institutions. In Chapter 1, I will give an overview of the Arab Nahda, Ziadeh’s intellectual relationships, Ziadeh as a journalist in her era, and the importance of women’s education throughout her articles. In Chapter 2, I will analyze the education system in turn-of-the-twentieth century in Egypt, the impact of colonialism, educational reforms in Ziadeh’s point of view, her criticisms on weaknesses of education on both social and economic levels, her new horizons for education, and the relationship between gender and education. In conclusion, Ziadeh played a key role in translation, literature, journalism, and education. The theme of education has manifested clearly in Ziadeh’s al-Ahrām articles in which they showed the weaknesses of the educational systems in Egypt and gave potential solutions to the problems presented in the late 1920s and 1930s. Further research can be done on Ziadeh’s articles because they are still relevant to the present day especially in the scope of education and social activism.