ABSTRACT
This chapter suggests that the recently coined concept of nassawiyya (feminism) is being associated with the West hence alien and suspect within Islamic and leftist discourses alike on Egypt. It outlines the major debates within historical analyses of the Egyptian women's movement in order to shed light on the continuities and disruptions of the significant parameters and discourses. Leila Ahmed, for instance, associates the westernizing and secularizing tendencies of the upper and upper-middle classes with the dominant voice of feminism for most of the century. She contends that it was only during the past decades that an ‘alternative voice’ gained ground by seeking a means to articulate female subjectivity and affirmation within a native, vernacular, Islamic discourse. In the various struggles and debates, Islamists and leftist-nationalists often reveal parallels concerning their rhetoric of ‘Western imperialism’ and ‘the Western conspiracy’. Finally, the chapter summarizes the debates about Westernism, national unity, secularism and civil society.
