Ending subjugation: Dr. Nawal El Saadawi, activist, scholar and Egyptian presidential candidate, has long been a voice for Arab women's rights

Black Issues in Higher Education, May 5, 2005 by Angelique Shofar

Dr. Nawal El Saadawi, a leading contemporary Egyptian feminist, physician and dissentient writer, has long been a powerful voice speaking out in support of women's rights, particularly in the Arab world.

By 1980, her long fight for Egyptian women's rights and intellectual freedom was temporarily interrupted when she was imprisoned for criticizing the policies of Anwar Sadat.

Says El Saadawi: "I was arrested because I believed Sadat. He said there is democracy and we have a multi-party system, and you can criticize. So I started criticizing his policy, and I landed in jail."

Yet prison did not discourage El Saadawi, or prevent her from carrying out her life's work. She founded the Arab Women's Solidarity Association, an organization promoting women's participation in social, economic, cultural and political life. She continued writing in prison and in 1984 published the experience in her book, Memoirs From the Women's Prison.

In 1992, after her name appeared on an Islamic fundamentalist group's death list, El Saadawi left Egypt and went into exile. She became an international speaker and a scholar-in-residence at American University in Washington, D.C., and, most recently, at Scripps College in Claremont, Calif., where she was until March.

El Saadawi caused a stir in her home country when she declared her candidacy for the presidency of Egypt in early January, making her the first woman to seek the office.

She has published numerous fictional and non-fictional works, many considered controversial. Many of her writings have delved into the highly taboo and provocative subjects of female sexuality, religion and politics. Much of her work is banned in Egypt and so must be published in Lebanon. Her books have explored cruelty towards women under Islam, women in African literature, the nature of cultural identity and challenges facing the internationalization of the women's movement. El Saadawi has been awarded several national and international literary prizes, and her works have been translated into more than 30 languages worldwide.

Before returning to Egypt in March, El Saadawi spoke with Black Issues about her candidacy for president of Egypt, stereotypes of Arab women and the upcoming 7th International Conference of the Arab Women's Solidarity Association, which she is organizing.

BI: In your groundbreaking book, The Hidden Face of Eve, you scrutinize the practice of female circumcision. Please share with our readers your thoughts on the practice.

El Saadawi: Female circumcision is prohibited now in Egypt after a long struggle, which is continuous because it is an old tradition related to the class patriarchal slave system (like male circumcision). It is not related to Africa or Islam or any other culture; it is related to the old slave system. But neocolonial capitalist powers can revive it with their revival of reactionary political religious fanatic groups, whether Islamic or Jewish or Christian.

BI: In Egypt, you suffered professional ostracism after speaking out about women's rights. What galvanized you to be a voice for change?

El Saadawi: Most women like me who speak up are severely punished by local and global powers. What galvanized me is awareness of the roots of oppression locally and globally, and how women are oppressed at all levels--from the family level up to the national and international levels.

BI: You've thrown in your name as a candidate for the Egyptian presidency. Do you think the country is ready for a female candidate, or a female president for that matter?

El Saadawi: Yes, Egypt is ready for a candidate for the presidential campaign, and we are straggling now to change the constitution and laws to have a free election for all.

BI: What issues in higher education do women in Egypt and other Arab nations face? And how do your students inspire you and how do you inspire your students to be creative in a world where creativity is traditionally limited?

El Saadawi: I teach creativity and dissidence. The education system locally and globally should be based on breaking all class patriarchal religious taboos and building a critical mind. You cannot be creative in a system that is very unjust, like the system we live in, unless you are a dissident. Because when you are creative, you are for justice, for freedom, for love. It's by nature like that. You feel that you want to do something.

BI: Given the historical and existing Euro-American stereotypes of Arab women, there has been an increase in the number of Arab women writers in the West. In your opinion, how is this revolutionizing the Arab world?

El Saadawi: The Euro-American stereotypes of us as Arab women are part of the neocolonial war (economic, military, media, etc.) to exploit our resources and justify our submission. We have to expose the lies of false democracy and false liberation of women propagated by global dictators like G.W. Bush and his men and women.

BI: With the arbitrary and artificial division of the (African) continent between north and south, how can women above and below the Sahara form linkages that unite rather than divide?