| Summary: | This thesis explores the development of women's education in pre-independence Egypt from the mid-nineteenth century to 1922. It looks at women's educational facilities and women's access to education through the reigns of Muhammad Ali, Said, Ismail and the British occupation. While the rise in women's educational concerns on a formal level parallels the growth of modernist, Islamic reformist, and proto-feminist thought in the late nineteenth century, the relationship among the three groups vis a vis their respective positions on women's education differs and is therefore examined in the thesis. === Research on this topic reveals a correlation between the early women's movement, a strong proponent of women's education, and Egypt's national and Islamic reform movements. As each group espoused a vision of change for Egypt, one secular and the other decidedly more religious, the common denominator for social progress was the unanimous support for advancements, although conditional, in educational policies regarding women. Couched in a context of modernism, the pursuit of freedom from foreign control and the desire for Egypt to develop into a fully productive society, were indispensable aspects of the development of women's education.
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