Update from AUC Press
Oxford University Press has asked AUC Press’s R. Neil Hewison to update them on the situation in Cairo.
February 2011
What Does the New York Times Think You Should Read about Egypt?
Indeed, the NY Times “Paper Cuts” section seems to have scrambled on board the “if not me, then chaos and hardline Islamism!” bandwagon. Their “Reading List for the Egypt Crisis” starts out with Max Rodenbeck’s perfectly acceptable Cairo: The City Victorious, but then quickly descends into offerings that focus on Islamists and Islam: Mobilizing Islam, The Muslim Brotherhood, Muslim Extremism in Egypt, and The Looming Tower.
Who is the New Egyptian Culture Minister?
Gaber Asfour—replacement for 25-year culture head Farouk Hosni—apparently met with department leaders in the Egyptian culture ministry and discussed future plans, according to Youm7. Various “mass culture” possibilities were reportedly under discussion; I hope at least someone thought to bring a fiddle and some re-arrangeable deck chairs.
Searching for the Secret of Egypt’s Uprising in Her Literature
Many have portrayed pre-#Jan25 Egypt to be passive or dormant, stupefied or sleeping. Thus, the search for “clues” to the 2011 protests. What could possibly lead these sleepy Egyptians (or, as The New Yorker Books Bench says, “‘innately’ docile”) to revolt against 30 years of stupid, cruel dictatorship?