| ID | 103464 |
| Title Proper | National socks and the nylon woman |
| Other Title Information | materiality, gender, and nationalism in textile marketing in semicolonial Egypt, 1930-56 |
| Language | ENG |
| Author | Reynolds, Nancy Y |
| Publication | 2011. |
| Summary / Abstract (Note) | he specific ways that cloth-"foreign silks," "durable Egyptian cottons," and "artificial silks"-emerged as a potent and visible symbol through which to contest the relations of colonialism and establish national community in Egypt varied with the changing realities of Egypt's political economy. The country's early importation of textiles despite its cultivation of raw cotton, the growth of its state-protected local mechanized industry working long- and medium-staple cotton for a largely lower-class market, and that industry's diversification into artificial silk technologies all helped structure a shift from "foreign silks" to "the nylon woman" as tropes in popular and political discourse defining the limits of the national community and the behaviors suitable for it. Although artificial fibers considerably lowered the cost of hosiery and other goods, thereby expanding consumption, the use of synthetics like nylon rather than cotton subverted the goal of national economic unity between agriculture and industry. |
| `In' analytical Note | International Journal of Middle East Studies Vol. 43, No. 1; Feb 2011: p49-74 |
| Journal Source | International Journal of Middle East Studies Vol. 43, No. 1; Feb 2011: p49-74 |
| Key Words | National Socks ; Materiality ; Gender ; Marketing ; Egypt ; Artificial Silks ; Agriculture ; Women |