Westernized Egyptian elites were torn between rejecting slavery and honoring slave-born kin

Evidence

Toledano writes that, by the 1870s, “patriotic, Westernized Ottomans were torn between a growing rejection of slavery and a deep attachment to their sociocultural heritage, of which they remained proud. They tried hard to reconcile the conflict between a system in which they were born and raised—often by mothers, wet nurses, nannies, and female relatives of slave origins—and the demands and principles of a foreign culture they grew to respect, wanted to acquire, and wished to be recognized by as equals.” — Eve M. Troutt Powell, A Different Shade of Colonialism_…, 648 (#expands, via linked claim)

Here, too, Egyptian elites emphasized the differences between Islamic slavery and Western slavery, and personalized the definition of domestic slavery. Many took pride in direct descent from slaves, a claim that became easier to make as more and more Egyptians entered the ranks of the elite and thus were able to marry (or were given in marriage) the freed slave-women of the Ottoman-Egyptian ruling classes, who were considered to be members of the nobility. There was thus honor and social mobility inherent in the intermarriage between women of the Ottoman-Egyptian households and ambitious Egyptians, demonstrating that a certain kind of slavery led to social mobility. This also created a level of society whose members were half Egyptian and half Circassian, like the lawyer and states- man Ahmad Shafïk. — Eve M. Troutt Powell, A Different Shade of Colonialism_…, 647 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

Categorization

Category: Causal Relationships

Related

• Ottoman elites downplayed domestic slavery despite most slaves being African (similarity 0.92)
• Egyptian elites reframed slave descent as honorable social-capital currency (similarity 0.91)
• Egyptian elites prized descent from slaves as social mobility (similarity 0.88)
• Descent from some slaves conferred honor and social mobility in Egypt (similarity 0.87)
• Egyptian elites externalized slavery onto Africa to reconcile abolitionism with their own households (similarity 0.86)
• Slavery can be redefined as martyrdom and honor through religious identification. (similarity 0.81)
• Egyptian antislavery debate conflated African and Circassian slave experience. (similarity 0.81)
• Egyptians reconciled domestic slavery by blaming distant African lands for it (similarity 0.81)
• Egyptian intellectuals defended Islamic slavery as inherently milder than Western slavery. (similarity 0.81)
• Elite Egyptian households absorbed Sudanese slaves so thoroughly that their origins became bedtime folklore (similarity 0.81)
• Elite Egyptian households used veiled truth and slave discipline to enforce parallel hierarchies (similarity 0.80)
• Egyptian social rank relied on race and ethnicity, not just wealth and family name. (similarity 0.80)
• Shafïk’s defense of Islamic slavery convinced no one and even backfired with European observers (similarity 0.80)
• Egyptian slavery discourse conflated African slaves with Circassian ones (similarity 0.80)
• Egyptian defenses of slavery glossed over the Sudanese slave trade’s harshness (similarity 0.79)

Broader Connections

• Westernized Ottoman elites were internally torn between rejecting and defending slavery. #expands (0.75) — Eve M. Troutt Powell, A Different Shade of Colonialism_…, 648
• Egyptian elites took pride in slave descent as a path to nobility. #corroborates (0.60) — Eve M. Troutt Powell, A Different Shade of Colonialism_…, 647