ABSTRACT
Most scholarly accounts of architectural modernism in the Global South attribute its dissemination beyond Europe and North America to colonial agencies or limit the scope of their investigation to the postcolonial phase of the ex-colonised regions of the world. Al-‘Imara Journal (1939–1959), the first architectural magazine of its kind in Arabic, and its modern campaign during Egypt’s so-called “Liberal Era” (1922–1952) offer a different perspective. This chapter argues that al-‘Imara’s modern campaign, while not subscribing to Marxist ideals, was pushed leftwards by the socialist tide that engulfed the country in the 1940s–1950s. Although the journal played a central role in the development and dissemination of this modern architectural vision in Egypt and the Arab region, the Anglo-American academic field is largely unaware of its existence. Through examining selected articles and debates from al-‘Imara’s pages, this chapter seeks to outline the socialist leaning of the magazine’s local perspective on modern architecture. This local perspective challenges the exclusivity, if not the importance, of colonialism and postcolonialism as the sole discourses informing the examination of architectural production in the Global South.
