New from Syracuse University Press:
Modernizing Marriage: Family, Ideology, and Law in Nineteenth- and Early Twentieth-Century Egypt, by
Kenneth M. Cuno (University of Illinois). A description from the Press:
In 1910, when Khedive Abbas II married a
second wife surreptitiously, the contrast with his openly polygamous
grandfather, Ismail, whose multiple wives and concubines signified his
grandeur and masculinity, could not have been greater. That contrast
reflected the spread of new ideals of family life that accompanied the
development of Egypt’s modern marriage system. Modernizing Marriage explores the evolution of marriage and marital relations, shedding new light on the social and cultural history of Egypt.
Family is central to modern Egyptian history and in the ruling court did
the "political work." Indeed, the modern state began as a household
government in which members of the ruler’s household served in the
military and civil service. Cuno discusses political and
sociodemographic changes that affected marriage and family life and the
production of a family ideology by modernist intellectuals, who
identified the family as a site crucial to social improvement, and for
whom the reform and codification of Muslim family law was a principal
aim. Throughout Modernizing Marriage, Cuno examines Egyptian
family history in a comparative and transnational context, addressing
issues of colonial modernity and colonial knowledge, Islamic law and
legal reform, social history, and the history of women and gender.
A few blurbs:
"Eagerly anticipated, Cuno’s Modernizing Marriage more than
delivers on its promise. Drawing on compelling evidence and written with
great clarity, the book details the dramatic changes marriage underwent
in late nineteenth and early twentieth century Egypt. Anyone interested
in the study of law, society, family, and gender must read this
fascinating book."—Beth Baron
"Modernizing Marriage takes up a fundamental question for
political, social, legal, and cultural history: how did we become
moderns? Using marriage as his lens, Cuno weaves together a remarkable
account of this process within the Egyptian context of the long
nineteenth century."—Wilson Chacko Jacob
More information is available
here.
