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Qasim Amin (pronounced[ˈʔæːsemʔæˈmiːn], Egyptian Arabic: قاسم أمين; 1 December 1863, in Alexandria – April 22, 1908 in Cairo)[1] was an Egyptian jurist,[2] Islamic Modernist[3] and one of the founders of the Egyptian national movement and Cairo University. Qasim Amin has been historically viewed as one of the Arab world's "first feminists", although he joined the discourse on women's rights quite late in its development,[4] and his "feminism" has been the subject of scholarly controversy. Amin was an Egyptian philosopher, reformer, judge, member of Egypt's aristocratic class, and central figure of the Nahda movement. His advocacy of greater rights for women catalyzed debate over women's issues in the Arab world.[5] He criticized veiling, seclusion, early marriage, and lack of education of Muslim women.[5] More recent scholarship has argued that he internalized a colonialist discourse on women's issues in the Islamic world, regarded Egyptian women as objects serving to achieve national aspirations, and in practice advocated reforms that diminished the legal rights of women in marriage contracts.[6][5][7]
Greatly influenced by the works of Darwin, Amin is quoted to have said that "if Egyptians did not modernize along European lines and if they were 'unable to compete successfully in the struggle for survival they would be eliminated." He was also influenced by the works of Herbert Spencer and John Stuart Mill who argued for equality of the sexes; Amin believed that heightening a woman's status in society would greatly improve the nation.[8] His friendships with Muhammad Abduh and Saad Zaghloul also influenced this thinking. Amin blamed traditional Moslems for Egyptian women's oppression saying that the Quran did not teach this subjugation but rather supported women's rights. His beliefs were often supported by Quranic verses.[9]
Born in an aristocratic family, his father was a governor of Diyarbekir Elayet, and his mother was the daughter of an Egyptian aristocrat. Amin finished law school at 17 and was one of thirty-seven to receive a government scholarship to study at the University of Montepellier in France. It was said that there he was influenced by Western lifestyles, especially its treatment of women. This would soon be his role model in his struggle to liberate Egyptian women. His crusade began when he wrote a rebuttal, "Les Egyptiens. Response a M. Le duc d'Harcourt" in 1894 to Duke d'Harcourt's work (1893), which downgraded Egyptian culture and its women.[10] Amin, not satisfied with his own rebuttal, wrote "Tahrir al mara'a" (The Liberation of Women) in 1899, in which he blamed Egyptian women's "veiling," their lack of education, and their "slavery," to Egyptian men as being the cause of Egypt's weakness.[11] He believed that Egyptian women were the backbone of a strong nationalistic people and, therefore, their roles in society should drastically change to better the Egyptian nation. Amin is known throughout Egypt as a member of the intellectual society who drew connections between education and nationalism leading to the development of Cairo University and the National Movement during the early 1900s.
^Political and diplomatic history of the Arab world, 1900-1967, Menahem Mansoor
^^ Nelson, Cynthia (1996), Doria Shafik, Egyptian feminist: a woman apart, American Univ in Cairo Press, p. 27, ISBN 977-424-413-3
^Kurzman, Charles, ed. (2002). "The Emancipation of Woman and the New Woman". Modernist Islam, 1840-1940: A Sourcebook. Oxford University Press. pp. 61–9. ISBN 9780195154689. Retrieved 12 November 2014.
^Hatem, Mervat F. The Nineteenth Century Discursive Roots of the Continuing Debate on the Social-Sexual Contract in Today's Egypt, pp64-66.
^ abcJohn L. Esposito, ed. (2014). "Amin, Qasim". The Oxford Dictionary of Islam. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-512558-0.
^Ahmed, Leila (1992). Women and Gender in Islam. New Haven and London: Yale University Press. pp. 160. ISBN 0-300-05583-8.
^Hatem, Mervat F.: The Nineteenth-Century Discursive Roots of the Continuing Debate on the Social-Sexual Contract in Today’s Egypt. Hawwa, 2004, 2:1, pp82-86.
^Smith, Charles D. "Islam and The Search for Social Order in Modern Egypt: A Biography of Muhammad Husayn Haykal."Middle Eastern Studies. New York: State University of New York Press,1983 : 233.
^"The Liberation of Women and The New Woman. Two Documents in the History of Egyptian Feminism," trans. S. Sidhom Peterson, Cairo 2000.
^Les Egyptiens. Response a M. le Duc D'Harcourt, Cairo 1894.
^Tahrir al-mar'a ("The Liberation of Women"), Cairo 1899.
QasimAmin (pronounced [ˈʔæːsem ʔæˈmiːn], Egyptian Arabic: قاسم أمين; 1 December 1863, in Alexandria – April 22, 1908 in Cairo) was an Egyptian jurist...
teachers including Mustafa Kamil, disciples of Muhammad Abduh such as QasimAmin and Saad Zaghlul, and eventually Khedive Abbas II and Prince Ahmad Fu’ad...
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education of women in Islamic societies were Rifa 'a al-Tahtawi and QasimAmin. QasimAmin is considered the father of women's reform in the Muslim Middle...
Ismail Falaki, astronomer and mathematician Mustafa Manfaluti, writer QasimAmin, jurist and women's rights activist Hussein Bikar, painter Nonie Darwish...
and competed with the work of Muhammad Hussein Heikal, and challenged QasimAmin's call for women liberation. Her work came to a climax during the last...
Arab feminism was closely connected with Arab nationalism. In 1899, QasimAmin, considered the "father" of Arab feminism, wrote The Liberation of Women...
practice of purdah, the veiling and segregation of women. Egyptian jurist QasimAmin, the author of the 1899 pioneering book Women's Liberation (Tahrir al-Mar'a)...
Lutfi el-Sayed, Muhammad Loutfi Goumah, Tawfiq el-Hakim, Louis Awad, QasimAmin, Salama Moussa, Taha Hussein and Mahmoud Mokhtar. They forged a liberal...
would eventually evolve to conservative positions close to Wahhabism. QasimAmin was another reformer in Egypt and Abduh's disciple who was heavily concerned...
the works of Jurji Zaydan (1861–1914), Yagob Sarrof (died 1927), and QasimAmin (1863–1908) that relied on uniform ideas and lucid expressions to perform...
from West Virginia. Osama bin Laden (1957–2011), founder of al-Qaeda QasimAmin Rifa'a el-Tahtawi Rosemary Barkett (Syrian), first woman Supreme Court...
Muhammad Qasim Nanawtawi (1832 – 15 April 1880) (Urdu: مولانا محمد قاسم نانوتوی) was an Indian Sunni Hanafi Maturidi Islamic Scholar, theologian and a...
and she responded critically to major male writers of the time, like QasimAmin.: 66 Malak stayed with al-Basil for 11 years until she died of influenza...
Qasim Authority cricket team was a first-class cricket team which plays in the domestic circuit of Pakistan. The team is sponsored by the Port Qasim Authority...
anti-colonial pan-Islamic journal Al-Urwah al-Wuthqa, Abd al-Rahman al-Kawakibi, QasimAmin, and Mustafa Kamil were reformers who influenced public opinion with their...
the comprehensive reforms of Mohammad Abduh, Ahmed Lutfi el-Sayed and QasimAmin. One of his protégés was the historian Husayn Fawzi al-Najjar. Heikal...
independent Egypt, in addition to Muhammad Abduh and Ahmed Lutfi el-Sayed, were QasimAmin, Muhammad Husayn Haykal, Taha Hussein, Abbas el-'Akkad, Tawfiq el-Hakeem...
of 19th century Egyptian scholar, QasimAmin. He stated to him that he has not read a word of Amin, and that Amin was referring to niqab—the veil that...
ISBN 978-5-88433-477-9. Hoda A. Yousef (2022). "The Other Legacy of QasimAmin: The View from 1908". International Journal of Middle East Studies. 54...