Middle East

Pathways Middle East Hub is led by the Social Research Center at the American University in Cairo. Research has mainly focused on Egypt and Palestine, but has also influenced other countries in the Arab region.

Projects undertaken by Pathways Middle East were selected for their promise and potential to impact the lives of women in the region. A notable achievement has been Pathways’ contribution towards creating a cadre of highly regarded scholars whose work is well-received in policy and activist circles.

Featured Research Projects

  • Research Project

    Talking Empowerment in Plain Arabic

    This project aimed to create the opportunity for Arabic speakers to set an agenda of priorities in a language that they can use to communicate and give a wider currency to their ideas. If, as has been often noted, women’s empowerment is a cause without a following and a message without an audience, then there is an obvious need to talk and tackle women’s empowerment and develop the coherence and capacity to do so in Arabic. The conflation between Arabic and Islam has focused researchers on religion as the equivalent of language. This project ran a series of workshops held in plain Arabic to discuss the agendas of women’s empowerment and the flows that influence, set, shape, critique and communicate them. …

  • Research Project

    Women's Political Participation in Egypt

    In June 2009, the Egyptian parliament passed a new quota law adding 64 additional seats, for which only women can compete in the 454-seat parliament. This project looked at the various instruments to support women's political participation in Egypt, including the National Council for Women’s political empowerment training programme, and asked how effective these have been in challenging power hierarchies and empowering women politically? …

  • Research Project

    Analysing the Egypt Labour Market Survey

    The researchers have used the Egypt Labour Market Panel Survey (ELMPS) of 2006 (and its predecessors) to foster both qualitative and quantitative studies on various aspects of gender and work in Egypt, as well as building research capacity in this area. …

  • Research Project

    Changing Focus Photography Competition

    The Changing Focus photography competition invited local photographers to visually present their visions of the exchanges between women and their communities and to capture their representations of women’s empowerment and agency. The project addressed a Pathways commitment to working with various modes of communication in an effort to grasp a broader and fuller idea of how women experience empowerment in their local contexts. …

Address

The Middle East Hub is based at:

The Social Research Center, American University Cairo, Egypt.

Social Research Center
The American University in Cairo
AUC Avenue, PO Box 74
Cairo
Egypt

Members

Mona Ibrahim Ali Ragui Assad Mona Bakr (Programme Administration) Lenka Benova Heba Gowayed Kristina Hallez (Communications Officer) Mohamed Hassan Dalia Hassanin (Accounts) Heba Nassar Hoda Rashad Mulki Al-Sharmani Sawsan Sherif Gunilla Soliman (Programme Administration)

Palestine:
Islah Jad
Penny Johnson
Eileen Kuttab
Aitemad Muhanna (LSE, London)
Randa Nasser
Nahda Shehada

Partners

Birzeit University, Palestine
The Women in Memory Forum, Egypt
Population Council, Regional Office