"Our inheritance was left to us by no testament" – René Char
Wired Citizenship: Youth Learning and Activism in the Middle East
I’m pleased to announce that our awesome new book – Wired Citizenship: Youth Learning and Activism in the Middle East – has been published by Routledge and is now available. Edited by Linda Herrera and Rehab Sakr. It includes a chapter (Chapter six) from me and Dina El- Sharnouby, titled Distorting Digital Citizenship: Khaled Said, Facebook, and Egypt’s Streets, the chapter examine the rise and fall of the the We Are All Khaled Said Facebook page and its implications of limiting youth problems to a security dimension.
Wired Citizenship examines the evolving patterns of youth learning and activism in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA). In today’s digital age, in which formal schooling often competes with the peer-driven outlets provided by social media, youth all over the globe have forged new models of civic engagement, rewriting the script of what it means to live in a democratic society. As a result, state-society relationships have shifted—never more clearly than in the MENA region, where recent uprisings were spurred by the mobilization of tech-savvy and politicized youth.
Combining original research with a thorough exploration of theories of democracy, communications, and critical pedagogy, this edited collection describes how youth are performing citizenship, innovating systems of learning, and re-imagining the practices of activism in the information age. Recent case studies illustrate the context-specific effects of these revolutionary new forms of learning and social engagement in the MENA region.
Other great chapters include:
Chapter two: Youth and Citizenship in the Digital Age: A View from Egypt – by Linda Herrera
Chapter three: Morocco On-Trial: De-colonial Logic and Transformative Practice in Cyberspace – by Charis Boutieri
Chapter four: Children’s Citizenship: Revolution and the Seeds of an Alternative Future in Egypt – by Chiara Diana
Chapter five: Cyberspace in Turkey: A “youthful” space for expressing powerful discontent and suffering – by Demet Lukuslu
Chapter seven: “Hungry for Freedom” Palestine Youth Activism in the Era of Social Media – by Mira Nabulsi
Chapter eight: Opening Networks, Sealing Borders: Youth and Racist Discourse on the Internet – by Miranda Christou & Elena Ioannidou
Chapter 9: Computer Intimacy: Digitally-Mediated Democratization of Arab Youth Culture – by Catherine Cornet
Chapter eleven: The Power of Online Networks: Citizenship among Muslim Brotherhood Cyber Youth – by Rehab Sakr
