September 3 — “Youth Activism and Public Spaces: Social Change in Egypt and the Middle East”
Our image in the West of youth in the Middle East is all too often of unemployed male 20-somethings, waiting in frustration until recruited by the local chapter of al-Qaeda. The reality is of course much more complex, and perhaps Barbara Ibrahim can give us reason to hope that positive change is brewing in the region.
When: Wednesday September 3, 4:00 PM
Where: Lilly Auditorium, IUPUI University Library
Free and open to the public. Call the Center on Philanthropy at (317) 274-4200 for more information.
This blurb is from the Center on Philanthropy:
Barbara Ibrahim, Director of the John D. Gerhart Center for Philanthropy and Civic Engagement at American University in Cairo, will spend the fall semester with the Center on Philanthropy as a visiting scholar. An Indiana University alumna and former program officer with the Ford Foundation in Cairo, Ibrahim is an expert on international philanthropy, especially philanthropy in Arab nations, nations with strong Islamic communities, and diaspora philanthropy among Muslims in the United States and elsewhere. Part of a burgeoning collaboration between the Gerhart Center and the Center on Philanthropy — and American University in Cairo and Indiana University more broadly — Ibrahim’s visit this fall will include four public talks on various aspects of Arab philanthropy and civil society in the Middle East.
Why does Provocate think you should attend this event?
The topic of course merits careful analysis, and Barbara Ibrahim is well positioned to give first hand insights. She is married to Saad Eddin Ibrahim, Egypt’s most prominent (and yet again prosecuted) democratic activist. Press her on how youth activists in Indiana can link with their counterparts in the Middle East.
If you think this sounds interesting, be sure to check out …
Barbara Ibrahim’s other talks October 8, November 5, and December 10.
Know before you go:
Get some background in a paper about “Youth in the Middle East and North Africa,” and poke around the website of the Brookings Institution’s Middle East Youth Initiative.
And for your listening pleasure …
Sha’abi was a style of music that became controversial (lyrics that were often humorous, salacious and highly critical of social rules and respectable society) and thus very popular among young Egyptians in the 1970s and 1980s. Here’s an example.
