Egyptian Connections and the Nationalist Press

The chapter narrates the context Fawwaz entered in Egypt, the final third of the nineteenth century, a time of nationalist ferment before and in the wake of the British occupation (1882). It focuses on the little-studied figure of Hasan Husni al-Tuwayrani, who published many of Fawwaz’s essays in his newspaper al-Nil. The chapter considers the gender politics of al-Nil and the more prominent newspapers al-Mu’ayyad and Lisan al-hal in which Fawwaz also published, asking why she might have chosen to publish a majority of her essays in al-Nil, in the period 1892‒4. One likely factor was al-Tuwayrani’s adherence to the long-attested, rule-governed debate genre of munazara, explored here. The chapter also considers the reception through newspaper announcements of Fawwaz’s writings.