Reproducing, mothering and caretaking
Forms of resistance in Ahdaf Soueif's In the Eye of the Sun
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 2179221 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Nada Ayad |
| Year | 2019 |
| Volume | 55 |
| Issue | 2 |
| Pages | 228-239 |
| Publication date | 2019-03-04 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Journal of Postcolonial Writing (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 1744-9855 • E-ISSN: 1744-9863 |
| Publisher | Informa UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1080/17449855.2018.1510459 |
| OpenAlex | W2890119673 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 10 |
Spanning the years 1967 to 1980, Ahdaf Soueif’s novel In the Eye of the Sun narrates the period in Egyptian history when family planning had shifted from being almost exclusively the domain of domestic agencies to a programme that received much of its funding from western donors. Analysing Soueif’s representation of the protagonist Asya al-Ulama as well as village women’s family planning and reproductive decisions, this article argues that these decisions put into crisis the demands of the Egyptian state. That is, in both cases, women dis-identify child reproduction from the regulatory demands of the institution of marriage and its reproductive expectations, on the one hand, and the state economic development agenda, on the other. Furthermore, the article proposes that these failed attempts at regulating women’s bodies uncover alternative, non-biological forms of kinship structures informed by their Muslim faith
Biology · Epistemology · Faith · Institution · Kinship · Political science · Politics · Representation (politics · Reproduction · Resistance (ecology · Sociology · State (computer science · Islamic Studies and History · Jewish and Middle Eastern Studies · Postcolonial and Cultural Literary Studies · Ecology · Gender Studies · Law
| Citation velocity | historical |
|---|---|
| Highly cited | No |