Illiterate Egyptian soldiers resisted Mehmed Ali’s power through small everyday acts

Evidence

Besides being a study of nationalism and nationalist historiography, therefore, this is a book on power and resistance. Looking at the army as the modern institution of power par excellence this book attempts to see how power with its modern manifestations and institutions is perceived, accommodated and resisted by its subjects. While finding Michel Foucault’s notions of power useful and insightful, this book critiques a particular reading of his work that stresses the monolithic nature of the institutions of power and accepts the inevitability of its forms. Instead of an impressive and consistent picture of how modern power objectifies its subjects, what is offered below is an attempt to present a more complex, and – intentionally – more blurred picture of power, one that can incorporate fractures, dissonance and resistance. By highlighting the small acts of defiance and resistance undertaken by the soldiers in this army, the intention is to undermine the impressive representations of power and its unceasing desire to silence its subjects. These small, every-day acts of resistance, while not grand or heroic, were still effective in challenging the attempts of power to control and manipulate the soldiers’ lives and bodies, and alarmed the military authorities precisely by showing them that, through these small acts of resistance the soldiers managed to distance themselves from the Pasha and his grand projects. — Khaled Fahmy, All the Pasha_s Men_ Mehmed Ali, his…, 25

Categorization

• XREF: Relates to the reader’s existing threads on resistance and subaltern history, echoing themes from One Square Inch of Silence and The Frankfurt School on how ordinary people resist institutional power and control over bodies. — connects to: Egyptian peasants strongly resisted conscription into Mehmed Ali’s army. — Khaled Fahmy, All the Pasha_s Men_ Mehmed Ali, his…, 92; Egyptian peasants maimed themselves to escape conscription into Mehmed Ali’s army; Mehmed Ali’s conscripted soldiers resisted his modernizing project — Khaled Fahmy, All the Pasha_s Men_ Mehmed Ali, his…, 1702 (+3 more)
• yield-rescued: below the book’s yield-target cutoff, included anyway for connecting to: Egyptian peasants strongly resisted conscription into Mehmed Ali’s army. — Khaled Fahmy, All the Pasha_s Men_ Mehmed Ali, his…, 92; Egyptian peasants maimed themselves to escape conscription into Mehmed Ali’s army; Mehmed Ali’s conscripted soldiers resisted his modernizing project — Khaled Fahmy, All the Pasha_s Men_ Mehmed Ali, his…, 1702 (+3 more)

Broader Connections

• Mehmed Ali’s army was an institution of coercive power that transformed Egyptian society #complicates (0.72) — Khaled Fahmy, All the Pasha_s Men_ Mehmed Ali, his…, 24