Egyptian elites built Westernized schools to forge a protonationalist identity

Evidence

In al-Tahtawï’s book, the Sudanese were ultimately most important as targets of Egyptian colonialism. After his return to Egypt from the Sudan, Muhammad Alï began to bring the children of Sudanese shaykhs and leaders to Cairo, to educate them in the basics of agriculture or in the language schools.The point of this, wrote al-Tahtawï, was “to give them a taste of the food of learning and civilization, so that they could then spread this in their country.” As they became increasingly “civilized,” these Sudanese children offered proof of Egypt’s political and cultural hegemony. Upon them was written the text, therefore, of Egyptian achievement. — <cite>Eve M. Troutt Powell, A Different Shade of Colonialism_…, 241</cite> (#expands`, via linked claim)

Categorization

Category: Factual Claims

Related

• Muhammad Ali educated Sudanese children in Cairo as instruments of Egyptian colonial hegemony (similarity 0.89)
• Educating Sudanese elites’ children in Cairo served as a tool of Egyptian colonial hegemony (similarity 0.84)
• Egyptians learned empire by drawing sharper distinctions from Sudan (similarity 0.84)
• Egyptian colonialism used educated Sudanese children as proof of its civilizing hegemony (similarity 0.82)
• Some Egyptians saw themselves as empire builders in Sudan, not merely colonial subjects (similarity 0.82)
• Egyptian intellectuals studied British imperial success to emulate it. (similarity 0.81)
• Egyptians produced their own Orientalist discourse about the Sudan and Africa (similarity 0.81)
• Egyptian intellectuals increasingly racialized identity against African societies (similarity 0.81)
• Al-Tahtawï viewed European colonialism as a model for Egypt to emulate in Sudan (similarity 0.81)
• Egyptian nationalists reproduced stereotypes about Sudan paralleling Orientalist imagery (similarity 0.81)
• Egyptian nationalists claimed primacy among all colonizers of Sudan. (similarity 0.81)
• Egyptian nationalism combined anti-imperialism with its own imperial claims over Sudan (similarity 0.81)
• Egyptian nationalists held a Janus-faced worldview of being colonized yet colonizing. (similarity 0.81)
• Egyptian elites accepted Sudan as Egypt’s by right despite opposing Ismail’s methods (similarity 0.81)
• Egyptian nationalist elites reproduced imperial language themselves (similarity 0.80)

Broader Connections

• Muhammad Ali educated Sudanese children in Cairo as instruments of Egyptian colonial hegemony #expands (0.70)
• Educating Sudanese elites’ children in Cairo served as a tool of Egyptian colonial hegemony #expands (0.60) — Eve M. Troutt Powell, A Different Shade of Colonialism_…, 241
• Muhammad Ali’s secular schools created a new colonial intellectual class #corroborates (0.60)
• The Egyptian nation was created rather than pre-existing #corroborates (0.60)
• Egyptians learned empire by drawing sharper distinctions from Sudan #corroborates (0.55)
• Egyptians produced their own Orientalist discourse about the Sudan and Africa #expands (0.50)
• Egyptian intellectuals increasingly racialized identity against African societies #expands (0.50)
• Egyptian nationalism reproduced colonial racial hierarchy toward the Sudan internally #expands (0.50)
• Egyptian writers saw adopting European ways as a path to imperial power #corroborates (0.50)
• Egyptians produced their own Orientalist-style stereotypes about Sudan and Africa. #expands (0.50) — Eve M. Troutt Powell, A Different Shade of Colonialism_…, 75