Trajectories of Education in the Arab World: Legacies and Challenges

Trajectories of Education in the Arab World gives a broad yet detailed historical and geographical overview of education in Arab countries. Drawing on pre-modern and modern educational concepts, systems, and practices in the Arab world, this book examines the impact of Western cultural influence, the opportunities for reform and the sustainability of current initiatives.

The contributors bring together analyses and case studies of educational standards and structures in the Arab world, from the classical Islamic period to contemporary local and international efforts to re-define the changing needs and purposes of Arab education in the contexts of modernization, multiculturalism, and globalization. Taking a thematic and chronological approach, the first section contrasts the traditional notions, approaches, and standards of education with the changes that were initiated or imposed by European influences in the nineteenth century. The chapters then focus on the role of modern state-based educational systems in constructing and preserving national identities, cultures, and citizenries and concentrates on the role of education in state-formation and the reproduction of socio-political hierarchies. The success of educational reforms and policy-making is then assessed, offering perspectives on future trends and prospects for generating institutional and organizational change.

This book will be of interest to graduate and postgraduate students and scholars of education, history, Arab and Islamic history and the Middle East and North Africa.

Osama Abi-Mershed is Assistant Professor of History at Georgetown University, where he currently teaches classes on the medieval and modern histories of the Middle East, North Africa and the Western Mediterranean world. His current research focuses on the processes of cultural transformation in colonial Algeria.