AUC theatre students were involved in over 20 different plays and workshops brought to Cairo from around the world as part of the 26th annual Cairo International Festival for Contemporary and Experimental Theatre. Students majoring and minoring in theatre volunteered their time to help translate, organize workshops and volunteer both behind the scenes and on stage at one of largest theatre festivals in the region. 

Senior Ali El Shourbagy's experience took an unexpected turn when he ended up performing in a supporting role in the American musical The Fantasticks, which was brought to Cairo from the U.S. through sponsorship by the U.S. Embassy. El Shourbagy was working as a volunteer backstage for the production when one of the main actors got sick during dress rehearsals. The director and cast recognized his talent and asked El Shourbagy to join the company in the role of Mortimer. He performed at the Cairo Opera House and then traveled to Alexandria to perform with the company and fellow theatre students Laila Ghoneim and Yara Adel Mohamed, who worked backstage on the production.

Other students were involved in workshops and masterclasses in addition to supporting the many other plays from Uganda, France, Switzerland, Saudia Arabia, Syria, Brazil, Portugal, Bulgaria, South Africa and Egypt. Students gained first-hand knowledge about touring productions, performance techniques and theatre traditions from around the world as they represented AUC.

Distinguished University Professor of Egyptology Salima Ikram's Death and Burial in Ancient Egypt (AUC Press, 2015) appears among Book Riot’s 100 Must-Read Books About Ancient History. It shows how death and burial and the afterlife were so important to the ancient Egyptians and digs into their beliefs, mummification and funeral procedures as well as the logic behind the construction and decoration of the tombs.

"I am absolutely delighted and thrilled that the book has made it to the 100 must-reads about ancient Egypt. The book serves as an introduction to ancient Egyptian ideas about death and the hereafter — something that concerned them deeply as they wished to extend their lives into a perfect and fun eternity."

With more than 150 new photographs, diagrams and maps describing the Nubian temples including Abu Simbel and how they were moved, Nigel Fletcher Jones, director of the AUC Press and Bookstores, sheds the light on ancient Egypt through the Abu Simbel and the Nubian Temples, which came about through observing visitors at the famous site on Lake Nasser. 

"Guides are not allowed to enter either of the two temples. So, for example, when tourists go in to the Great Temple, after that first 'wow!' moment when they see the colossal statues of Rameses II, there is no way for them to know what it is important for them to see," noted Jones. "I have a PhD from Durham University in archeaological anthropology, so I was able to take my academic research on the temples and describe — in non-technical language — what is important from a historical perspective about the Great and Small Temples and Rameses II, and what the visitor shouldn't miss seeing at Abu Simbel."

Stay tuned for more AUC Press's releases coming your way including Jones' new book on ancient Egyptian jewelry. Visit the AUC Press website for their latest publications and offers. 

Thirteen of AUC’s master’s programs have topped the 2019 Eduniversal Rankings, with six being ranked the first in Africa and all among the top 200 worldwide.

No. 1 in Africa

• Executive Master of Business Administration
• Master of Arts in Economics
• Master of Business Administration (Operations Management)
• Master of Global Affairs
• Master of Science in Finance
• Master of Science in Sustainable Development (Green Technologies)

No. 2  in Africa

• Master of Business Administration
• Master of Public Administration
• Master of Laws (LLM) in International and Comparative Law 
• Master of Science in Computer Science
• Master of Science in Electronics and Communications Engineering 

No. 3 in Africa 

• Master of Arts in Journalism and Mass Communication 
• Master of Engineering in Electronics and Communications Engineering (Management of Technology) 

Each year, Eduniversal helps more than 4.2 million students all over the world in their search for the right graduate program.

Founded in 1994, Eduniversal uses three main criteria in its master’s rankings methodology: reputation of the program, salary of first employment post-graduation and a student satisfaction survey. Read here a full list and description of AUC's master's programs in the 2019 Eduniversal rankings. 

“I am very excited about this year’s results of rankings for a number of graduate programs at AUC, particularly about the number of AUC graduate programs ranked among the top three in Africa — increasing to 13 programs from 10 programs in the 2018 ranking. ,” said Adham Ramadan, dean of graduate studies at AUC. "These rankings reflect the quality of graduate studies at AUC and the success of our graduate programs in maintaining quality." #MakingAUCProud

Bernard O'Kane, professor in the Department of Arab and Islamic Civilizations, has released his latest book Mosques: The 100 Most Iconic Islamic Houses of Worship, where he went on a journey through different centuries and continents to explore 100 of the most iconic and beautifully made architectural designs that are also meant to be home to worshippers in Islam. 

"The book is unusual in the field of Islamic art and architecture for the breadth of its coverage. Mosques from four continents are illustrated, from North America to Europe, Africa and Asia," said Bernard O'Kane, professor in the Department of Arab and Islamic Civilizations.

In the book, O'Kane looks at some of the most iconic mosques from Indonesia to Spain and identifies how they've become more than just places for prayer, but have also meant to represent great historical architectural and design achievements. 

Speaking of golden iconic designs, O'Kane was also keen to highlight many of the mosques that date back to the golden age.

"Although those from the Arab, Turkish and Iranian heartlands receive the greatest attention, this breadth enables the reader to gain a fuller understanding of the worldwide distribution of mosques.  In addition, more emphasis is placed than is usual on the 19th and 20th centuries, with 21 out of 100 from those centuries," added O'Kane.

 

Dalia Abbas '13, political science graduate, earned her Master's in Education (EdM) — Technology, Innovation, and Education — from the Harvard Graduate School of Education. She received the Harvard Intellectual Contribution Award, which honors students "whose dedication to scholarship enhanced the academic life of the community and positively impacted their fellow students" at Harvard.

"When I found out I got selected for the Harvard Intellectual Contribution Award, I was mostly just really surprised and humbled. There are so many incredible individuals in my program, from those who have worked on Sesame Street to those who run their own companies in places like Pakistan, to those that have taken their educational ventures on shows like Shark Tank. I'm grateful for my experience as an undergraduate at The American University in Cairo in that I think it really helped me distinguish myself and my interests and use that experience to make an impact in the intellectual community here at Harvard."

Read Harvard's full interview with Abbas here.

AUC's Department of Political Science held its first summer school for the training of junior faculty from universities across Egypt. The candidates were mentored by some of the most accomplished scholars in the field including AUC Trustees Nathan Brown (CASA '84), professor of political science and international affairs at The George Washington University, and Tarek Masoud, professor of public policy and the Sultan Oman Professor of International Relations at Harvard University.

"This was an excellent opportunity to interact with junior faculty with very different backgrounds. I have the feeling that the quality of the research proposals of the participants in the summer school will improve considerably. Given the high commitment and the remarkable qualifications of the instructors in the school, participants are going to produce interesting and well-developed pieces of research."

— Pedro Riera, Universidad Carlos III de Madrid

"The political science summer school was a terrific experience, with some excellent Egyptian PhD students, a great team of AUC faculty and, of course, an excellent opportunity to come back to the University where I had my first job. While I didn’t get to see the new campus, the old campus certainly remains an oasis within busy Cairo."

— Anthony Lang, University of St. Andrews
Previously served as assistant professor of political science at AUC from 1996 to 2000

"It was my great pleasure to be involved in the political science summer school and to have the opportunity to help train the next generation of Egyptian social scientists. The program was a great demonstration of how AUC contributes to the development of intellectual and scientific infrastructure in Egypt. The seminar leaders, AUC Assistant Professors Amr Adly and Mostafa Hefny, are fast becoming the country’s leading scholars of politics and political economy, and I expect their voices to be deeply influential in the broader Egyptian social scientific field for decades to come. The fact that two energetic, brilliant young scholars chose to begin their careers at AUC is a testament to the ability of our University to draw on top global talent."

— Tarek Masoud, professor of public policy and the Sultan Oman Professor of International Relations at Harvard University

Find out more updates on AUC's Department of Political Science Facebook page.

“I've always loved the projects that bring a fresh look at history,” said Nagla Samir, associate professor of practice, Department of the Arts.

With a fresh unconventional take on history, AUC students have worked on producing an archival publication as part of the University's centennial celebrations to document the 1919 Egyptian Revolution while reproducing and recreating the ingenious songs of the Egyptian composer Sayed Darwish and poet Badie Khairy, who “informed as they entertained” Egyptians at the time.

This is What Has Come to Be is the outcome of a yearlong cooperation between graphic design students and the music program, where students have showcased their contemporary reflections and designs on the 1919 Egyptian Revolution as well as songs that both documented and started the first spark — inspiring the people to revolt against the British occupation.

“Each one of the students has made thorough research on the 1919 revolution and its songs," said Samir. "It was their first time to listen to these songs and the first time to learn about Sayed Darwish and Badie Khairy. It was an opportunity for them to get introduced to different Arabic colloquial languages and deep-dive into Egyptian history.”

The graphic design students — Haidy Helmy, Hana Zaher, Helen Bakhoum, Mariam Ismail, Merhan Amer, Sarah Azzab and Zeina Mansour — have had their own reflections on the revolution. Their works echo their diverse backgrounds and individual perceptions “My project was mainly inspired by the Egyptian sense of humor and the idea of making fun of a bad situation. I chose the songs that highlighted and proved this concept,” said Mansour.

It all started when Wael el Mahallawy, associate professor in the Department of the Arts, decided to do a reproduction of the 1919 songs as part of the This is What Has Come to Be centennial project. He started refining and researching the original lyrics of Sayed Darwish from old recordings, as some of the lyrics and music notations have changed over the years.

“The stories behind each song were the most interesting part of the research,” said Azzab. “For example, Aho Da Elly Sar song was originally written to respond to the British representative’s reaction when Egyptians took a stand against the British occupation.”

“You’d be surprised by how time has changed the songs, showing some cultural changes over the years,” added Samir. “For example, the national anthem used to be Masr Ya Set el Belad. Now, it is Masr Ya Om el Belad.”

Sarah Azzab: "What caught my attention the most were the songs made specifically for Saad Zaghloul by using hidden messages because people were prohibited from mentioning his name when he was exiled. So they sang for him indirectly in a way that only the Egyptian people would understand. I used that to divide the lyrics. I used the fact that the Arabic words don't make sense until they’re connected and then divided the lyrics into two layers."

Mariam Ismail: "My design is based on the concept of hope because I think that is what got people going at the time. I made all the pictures in black and white and added color to them to support the idea of hope — that you can still add life to the most monochrome and colorless things."

Haidy Helmy: "When I thought about Saad Zaghloul and the 1919 Egyptian Revolution, I thought how new it was back then. It was very experiential through different artworks, each showing hidden messages. The design indicates the Egyptian slogan that “numbers beat courage,” symbolizing huge numbers with lemons. This is what the design is all about."

Zeina Mansour: "The idea behind my design was to use humor to highlight the underlying meaning of the song, which in this case was making fun of the people who refused to accept different cultures under the umbrella of religion, but this was a facade."

“It is brilliant how these songs have indirectly contributed to the rise of the 1919 Egyptian Revolution, how these songs spread so that almost every Egyptian was singing them everywhere without the British occupation representatives getting the hidden messages — and eventually it resides under the radar and triggers the spark of the revolution because the people understand what this is about,” noted Samir.

All the lyrics were also professionally translated into English, all in one publication, and the music is on SoundCloud with easy access to the public.

The project is a joint collaboration between AUC’s Office of the Provost and Department of the Arts. 

For the whole playlist of songs, click here or scan the QR code below.

AUC graphic design graduate Maha Hesham ‘19 became a city sensation with her senior thesis: colorful postage stamps depicting historical Egyptian female pioneers, from Um Kulthum to Doria Shafik and Huda Sharawi. 

For Hesham, the project was an opportunity to raise awareness of these impactful women and the unequal representation they’ve been given within historical narratives and popular culture.

"We have so many female leaders to be proud of, and people have no idea,” she explained. “I wanted to create stamps that would value these women and discuss their significance -- bringing them some measure of equality.”

Picking Postage

So why did she choose stamps as her medium?

Hesham wanted to pursue a subject that could incorporate her passion for illustration. “My first idea was to design the stamps that go in passports,” she said. However, when she proposed the idea to her professor, the teacher thought she was referring to postage stamps.

“I thought it was an interesting idea, and I decided to look into it,” she confessed.

Hesham started her research broadly, first looking into the history of postage stamps and then focusing on Egyptian postage stamps specifically. Using the AUC Library as her main resource, Hesham discovered that something as seemingly innocuous as a stamp had a rich history and a variety of purposes.

“I found so many uses for postage stamps -- of course their primary function is to prepay mail, but they’re also a form of propaganda. They can advertise for things like the opening of a new hotel or the Art Deco movement,” she explained. “They also have touristic value. If you send a letter from Egypt to the US and it has Egyptian monuments on it, you can get a sense of what Egypt has to offer.”

According to Hesham, the first Egyptian postage stamps were ornamental and detailed with Turkish script. After becoming an independent country, the new motifs in Egyptian postage became symbols of the country’s vast history, like the Giza Pyramids and the Sphinx.”

“Looking at these stamps, you can see how Egypt saw itself and decided to represent itself,” she explained. “These stamps really are an important method to record history.” She also saw historical figures represented in these stamps -- leaders, scientists and changemakers who were contributing to society at the time.

A Commemorative Stamp

From her research, one thing stuck out to Hesham: You could learn a lot about a country’s values through its stamps. And by looking at Egypt’s historical stamps, she realized that they were used to pay more tribute to men than to women.

“This is when I decided to start researching Egyptian female leaders,” she stated. And for Hesham, this research was eye-opening. “I learned about so many female pioneers between the 1920s and the 1960s whom I had never heard about,” she exclaimed.

She decided to choose nine women to represent in her stamps, and she picked women whose stories moved her. These were Amina Al Said, a writer and magazine editor; Suhayr Al Qalamawi, an academic and journalist; Lutfia Al Nadi, the first female pilot; Doria Shafik, an activist and writer; Huda Sharawi, a feminist and activist; Moufida AbdelRahman, a pioneering female lawyer; Sameera Moussa, a nuclear researcher; Um Kulthum, the famous Egyptian singer; and Safiya Zahgoul, a political activist and revolutionary figure.

During the process, Hesham also sat in on a meeting of a philatelic (i.e. stamp-collecting) society in Cairo. “If I’m going to design something, I need to have a target market,” Hesham explained. Originally, she had considered making her stamps digital, since traditional postage has fallen out of use in Egypt. However, after meeting members of the philatelic society, she realized that there are people out there keeping stamps alive. “Maybe I should do something for them,” she posited.

Making Mail

Once Hesham decided the stamps would be physical instead of digital, she began the design process.

For the representation of women on the stamps, Hesham decided she wanted to incorporate all the colors of the rainbow. She drew the leaders vividly in bright hues -- symbolic of hope. She decided to number the stamps 1, 2, 3 and 5 since these were the most common values for vintage stamps at the time the women depicted on them were alive.

“I experimented with so many art styles from pointism to monochromatic, but then I started with lines, and I realized that minimalism is in right now and that just simplifying everything to lines was the way to go,” she said, explaining her stamps refined look.

Hesham's project touched a chord with people. After the final exhibition of her thesis, someone from Women of Egypt reached out, writing an article about her stamps for International Women’s month. Since then, Hesham has been interviewed by more than six news sources about her project.

“Even now it's very hard to process. It still feels like a dream -- so surreal,” Hesham exclaimed.

So where will Hesham go from here? “It would be so nice to see Egypt develop the production of these stamps,” she suggested. “There is still a debate over whether I should make then a collector's item, print them or sell them in local bookstores.”

According to Hesham, a lot of people are getting into stamps these days, even outside of the philatelic society. “Vintage things are coming back into fashion,” she explained. “More and more people are getting into it.”

And what else is on the horizon for Hesham? “I want to continue to create art that raises awareness about important issues,” she stated.

In the end, her stamps are at once an artistic homage to female leaders, a feminist story and a beautiful collector's item.

“They are like miniature paintings -- masterpieces,” she stated.

Want to learn more about Hesham and her work? Check out her website here.

For any budding Egyptologist, the opportunity to study the hieroglyphics and history of Egypt's ancient civilizations on-site is a chance not to pass up. Graduate student Julia Viani Puglisi, who is currently pursuing her PhD in Egyptology at Harvard’s Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations, decided to do just that — studying Egyptology for a semester at AUC as a recipient of the Simpson Endowed Scholarships for Year-Abroad Program in Egyptology. Puglisi came to AUC as the result of a recent partnership with Harvard University, facilitating student exchange and future collaboration between both institutions. 

Puglisi earned her bachelor's in classical languages from the University of California, Berkeley and her master's in Egyptology from Indiana University, Bloomington, where she won the Indiana University 2018 Distinguished Master’s Thesis Award. Titled The Mechanics of Egyptian Paronomasia: Applying Pattern Recognition Search to the Ramesside Dream Manual, Puglisi's thesis is the highest evaluated thesis in the Math/Physical Sciences/Engineering category. 

Puglisi is grateful for the opportunity to study Egyptology firsthand in the land of the Pharaohs. Speaking at AUC's Centennial Campaign launch in February 2019, Puglisi said:

“I am honored to be here representing my field and, now, two institutions as part of a new generation of Egyptologists empowered to learn from Egyptians and this country’s deep cultural heritage. I am here because I want to contribute to the dialogue of Egyptology’s future in Egypt. As a digital humanist and devoted student to Egypt’s past, I hope to push my discipline forward and encourage young Egyptologists to break convention. With the generous support of the Department of Egyptology and its fearsome faculty — my new mentors — I am able to know how it feels to study Egyptology in Egypt. I am here because I believe that the future of a discipline rests on its ability to reignite sparks of childlike wonder — when you’re too old to play anymore. Egypt has that magic. I am deeply grateful and thrilled for the opportunity to contribute to a strong legacy of Egyptology at The American University in Cairo."

News@AUC spoke with Puglisi about her passion for Egyptology and her learning experience at AUC:

Q: What originally got you interested in Egyptology?

Like most Egyptologists, my passion emerged when I was young and never went away. The hieroglyphic script caught my attention first, in particular, the inscriptions on monumental structures half-buried under layers of debris and sand. Although I could write my name with the hieroglyphic "alphabet" (snake - quail chick - mouth - reed - vulture

) I was dissatisfied with my inability to make sense of the enigmatic texts inscribed on tomb and temple walls. What did they truly say? It was my dream to read their language and to understand how they felt and expressed their world.

Q: What was your favorite part about attending AUC?

The Egyptology faculty is the primary reason why I chose AUC. I felt that there was a harmonious balance between my professors, which created a rich, open learning environment. I also greatly enjoyed the composition of my schedule and how the conversation and material explored in each course complemented and enhanced one another throughout the semester.

Thank you, Fayza Haikal, Salima Ikram, Lisa Sabbahy and Mariam Ayad for your endless support and the passion with which you shared your knowledge.

I also loved the bus rides and the University Garden with its rows of grapefruits, oranges and lemons. I loved that my backpack was packed with citruses of all kinds in March and April. I remember the transit in and out of New Cairo: I would arrive on campus as the sun was rising and leave when it was setting. Every day, the R9 bus was filled with dynamic and colorful conversations between students, professors and visiting scholars. Specifically, I remember connecting more with two of my professors during these commutes — I spoke about my dreams as a scholar and consulted them on my fears as I embark further on my path in my field. It was very therapeutic.

Q: Would you encourage other international Egyptology students to come to Egypt to study?

Yes, I would highly recommend the program and the opportunity to live in Cairo. I think it is essential for young Egyptologists to familiarize themselves with the culture and spaces that modern Egyptians inhabit and experience and to be able to see history in person in the place where it all happened.

Q: Do you have a hero?

My mother and father, who worked hard to do what they love and taught their children to chase their dreams to the end. They're the best people I know.

“Go clean is all about changing people's perspective on recycling so that their brains give them negative signs when they witness environmental hazards,” said Mohamed Hamdy ‘13, founder of Go Clean, a recycling solutions company aiming to increase public environmental awareness. Go Clean has recently won the European Union’s Most Promising Environmental Initiative Award at the Alex Go Green, hosted by the French Embassy in Egypt.

Hamdy studied philosophy at AUC, which he believes is directly proportional to whatever career he pursues.

"Philosophy is all about teaching people how to think," affirmed Hamdy. "Besides giving me credibility, studying philosophy at AUC gave me the mental power to negotiate for hours with CEOs of multinational companies with a concrete logic that I've gained during my undergraduate studies."

Go Clean gets people involved by allowing them to separate their own recyclables and rewarding them for it  “We give the consumers cash or household products in return or they can donate this cash through us, so it is a win-win situation," said Hamdy.

It all began in 2017 when Hamdy realized that Egypt needs more consideration and more practical steps toward recycling to save the environment. “We thought about an incentive to encourage people and change their mindsets regarding throwing their recyclables," he explained.

Go Clean started with only recycling for factories and companies, but expanded this year to a household door-to-door initiative, which includes first asking customers to sort their recyclables by separating plastics, metals, and papers, then having these customers send their locations to Go Clean for their recyclables to be picked up. The final stage is rewarding customers according to the weight of the recyclables by exchanging them with cash or household items.

“We are looking for more expansion," said Hamdy. "We want everyone to know us and call us. We want our services to reach every corner of Egypt. We are now covering Cairo, Giza and Alexandria, and more governorates are definitely in our future plans."