For Better, For Worse

The Marriage Crisis That Made Modern Egypt

Hanan Kholoussy

• Publisher: Stanford University Press
• Year: 2010
• Print ISBN: 9780804769600, 9780804769594
• eBook ISBN: 9780804773539
• Edition: 1
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: Middle Eastern History
• Index: History

For many Egyptians in the early twentieth century, the biggest national problem was not British domination or the Great Depression but a "marriage crisis" heralded in the press as a devastating rise in the number of middle-class men refraining from marriage. Voicing anxieties over a presumed increase in bachelorhood, Egyptians also used the failings of Egyptian marriage to criticize British rule, unemployment, the disintegration of female seclusion, the influx of women into schools, middle-class materialism, and Islamic laws they deemed incompatible with modernity.

For Better, For Worse explores how marriage became the lens through which Egyptians critiqued larger socioeconomic and political concerns. Delving into the vastly different portrayals and practices of marriage in both the press and the Islamic court records, this innovative look at how Egyptians understood marital and civil rights and duties during the early twentieth century offers fresh insights into ongoing debates about nationalism, colonialism, gender, and the family.

Table of contents

• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• Acknowledgments
• Note on Transliteration, Translation, and Currency
• 1 - The Making and Marrying of Modern Egyptians
• 2 - The Grooming of Men
• 3 - The Wedding of Women
• 4 - Deterring Divorce, Modernizing Marriage
• 5 - Mentoring Mothers, Fettering Fathers
• 6 - Conclusion
• Notes
• Bibliography
• Index