Egyptian captives’ shared language and religion with Sudanese still could not erase rank injuries

Evidence

Neufeld asserted his European-ness as loudly as possible, in front of Sudanese guards who either ignored his assertions or punished them. Ibrahïm Fawzï, however much he borrowed from the narratives of Slatin Pasha and Neufeld, never adopted so aloof, or so combative, a stance with respect to the Sudanese. No matter how much he scorned and ridiculed the Sudanese, he included, in his text, moments in which the Sudanese deeply insulted him too. There were strong connections between Ibrahïm Fawzï and the Sudanese: Arabic was the native tongue and Islam the religion of both. His Sudanese contemporaries in Omdurman were as aware as he was of the traditional hierarchy of status long played out in the relationship between Egyptians and Sudanese. When the khalifa relegated him to the status of a servant, even a slave, it deeply bruised Fawzï’s acute sensitivity to rank and self-esteem. — Eve M. Troutt Powell, A Different Shade of Colonialism_…, 618

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to the reader’s frame of Egyptian vs Sudanese colonial hierarchies in the Nile valley, and echoes the humiliation/rank themes in A Midwife’s Tale’s attention to subtle status wounds.