Coming of age in a global Egypt : the politics of transnational humanitarianism, childhood, and youth
Abstract/Contents
- Abstract
- This ethnography investigates the social effects of transnational humanitarianism in the lives of vulnerable children and youth in Egypt. It argues that new relations between the Egyptian state and transnational NGOs are emerging over the governance of child and youth life and the ethical management of young and poor populations. Based on over 27 months of fieldwork conducted in Egypt (2007-2009, 2010) and three months of follow-up ethnography in France (2010), the research demonstrates how international discourses of children's rights, based on the 1989 UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, inform local understandings of embodiment, personhood, and the family in Egypt. By examining the everyday practices of humanitarian workers (lawyers, child rights activists and administrators) and medical experts (physicians, psychiatrists and nurses) in relation to street children and village girls, this study reveals how philanthropic care produces social distinction such as class, race, gender and generation. Anthropologists have engaged with questions of childhood and adolescence, or how persons come to be certain kinds of political and cultural subjects, since the publication of Margaret Mead's now classic Coming of Age in Samoa. Coming of Age in a Global Egypt extends this scholarly trajectory into the context of the contemporary Arab world, tracing how new forms of child and adolescent humanity are being constructed in Egypt at the critical nexus of global biomedicine, children's rights, and humanitarian ethics and practice.
Description
| Type of resource | text |
|---|---|
| Form | electronic; electronic resource; remote |
| Extent | 1 online resource. |
| Publication date | 2011 |
| Issuance | monographic |
| Language | English |
Creators/Contributors
| Associated with | Sweis, Rania Kassab |
|---|---|
| Associated with | Stanford University, Department of Anthropology |
| Primary advisor | Yanagisako, Sylvia Junko, 1945- |
| Thesis advisor | Yanagisako, Sylvia Junko, 1945- |
| Thesis advisor | Beinin, Joel, 1948- |
| Thesis advisor | Ferguson, James, 1959- |
| Thesis advisor | Kohrman, Matthew, 1964- |
| Thesis advisor | Malkki, Liisa H. (Liisa Helena) |
| Advisor | Beinin, Joel, 1948- |
| Advisor | Ferguson, James, 1959- |
| Advisor | Kohrman, Matthew, 1964- |
| Advisor | Malkki, Liisa H. (Liisa Helena) |
Subjects
| Genre | Theses |
|---|
Bibliographic information
| Statement of responsibility | Rania Kassab Sweis. |
|---|---|
| Note | Submitted to the Department of Anthropology. |
| Thesis | Ph.D. Stanford University 2011 |
| Location | electronic resource |
Access conditions
- Copyright
- © 2011 by Rania Kassab Sweis
Also listed in
Loading usage metrics...