Please, Come In: Furniture and National Identity in Postcolonial Egypt (1952-1981)

1952年，一场军事政变推翻了君主制，宣布脱离英国占领独立，建立埃及共和国。随后的几年形成了一个新的民族身份，其大致轮廓今天仍然存在。本研究将通过研究家庭家具的亲密和物质世界，探讨纳赛尔和萨达特时代后殖民埃及身份的形成和实践。这项研究将是第一个从自下而上的方法参与这一主题的研究，集中了普通埃及人-特别是妇女-在后殖民民族主义的历史叙事中的作用。这个跨学科的项目汇集了家庭，物质文化和设计历史，以质疑民族身份如何通过埃及家庭内的日常实践来生活。这项研究的影响超出了学术界，因为其研究结果将与埃及和该地区的当代身份叙述特别相关。

n 1952, a military coup d'état overthrew the monarchy, declared independence from British occupation, and established Egypt as a republic. The years that followed were formative to a new national identity, the broad outlines of which are still lived today. This research will investigate the formation and practice of postcolonial Egyptian identity during the Nasser and Sadat eras by studying the intimate and material world of domestic furniture. The research will be the first to engage with the topic from a bottom-up approach centralising the role of ordinary Egyptians -specially women- in the historic narrative of postcolonial nationalism. This interdisciplinary project draws together the home, material culture, and design history to question how national identity was lived through everyday practices inside Egyptian homes. The impact of this research extends beyond academia as its findings will be particularly relevant to contemporary narratives of identity in Egypt and the region.