E475 | Nationalism is often seen as a natural political desire or as a modal form spread around the world by modern technologies and conditions, such as literacy or print media. In this episode, Aaron Jakes reframes the history of the nation-state by looking at the British occupation of Egypt which began in 1882. He shows how the specific conditions of colonial rule, as well as the ups and downs of finance capital in an early moment of globalization, shaped how people thought about sovereignty, territory, and emancipation. Looking at peasant petitions, spy reports, and writing in the Arabic press, he explains how many people came to believe that territorial nationalism was the secret to a better life in the decades leading up to the Egyptian Revolution of 1919.
Aaron G. Jakes is Assistant Professor of History at The New School, where he teaches on the modern Middle East and South Asia, global environmental history, and the historical geography of capitalism. His first book, Egypt’s Occupation: Colonial Economism and the Crises of Capitalism, was published by Stanford University Press.
Susanna Ferguson is Assistant Professor of Middle East Studies at Smith College. She writes and teaches on the history of gender, sexuality, and political thought in the modern Arab world.
CREDITS
Episode No. 475
Release Date: 8 September 2020
Recording Location: New York, NY / Cambridge, MA
Audio editing by Susanna Ferguson
Music: "Fifteen Street," Blue Dot Sessions
Images and bibliography courtesy of Aaron Jakes available at https://www.ottomanhistorypodcast.com/2020/09/jakes.html
