Atef Shahat Said - "Revolution Squared" - Professor Barbara Ransby, Professor Jessica Winegar, and Mr. Karim Nagi

Atef Shahat Said will discuss Revolution Squared: Tahrir, Political Possibilities, and Counterrevolution in Egypt. He will be joined in conversation by Professor Barbara Ransby, Professor Jessica Winegar, and Mr. Karim Nagi. 

A Q&A and signing will follow the discussion.

Presented in partnership with UIC Sociology Department, UIC Social Justice Initiative, UIC Institutes for Study of Race & Public Policy (IRRPP), and Global Middle East Studies at the UIC Institute for the Humanities. 

At the Co-op

RSVP HERE (Please note that your RSVP is requested but not required.)

About the Book: In Revolution Squared Atef Shahat Said examines the 2011 Egyptian Revolution to trace the expansive range of liberatory possibilities and containment at the heart of every revolution. Drawing on historical analysis and his own participation in the revolution, Said outlines the importance of Tahrir Square and other physical spaces as well as the role of social media and digital spaces. He develops the notion of lived contingency—the ways revolutionary actors practice and experience the revolution in terms of the actions they do or do not take—to show how Egyptians made sense of what was possible during the revolution. Said charts the lived contingencies of Egyptian revolutionaries from the decade prior to the revolution’s outbreak to its peak and the so-called transition to democracy to the 2013 military coup into the present. Contrary to retrospective accounts and counterrevolutionary thought, Said argues that the Egyptian Revolution was not doomed to defeat. Rather, he demonstrates that Egyptians did not fully grasp their immense clout and that limited reformist demands reduced the revolution’s potential for transformation

About the Author: Atef Shahat Said is an Associate Professor of Sociology at the University of Illinois at Chicago and the author of two books in Arabic. His research engages with the fields of sociological theory, political sociology, historical sociology, and sociology of the Middle East.

About the interlocuters: Professor Barbara Ransby is the John D. MacArthur University Chair, and Distinguished Professor  in the Departments of Black Studies, Gender and Women’s Studies, and History, University of Illinois at Chicago. Professor Barbara Ransby is the author of Making All Black Lives Matter: Re-imagining Freedom in the 21st Century (2018).

Professor Jessica Winegar is the Hamad Bin Khalifa Al-Thani Chair in Middle Eastern Studies, at Northwestern University; and author of Creative Reckonings: The Politics of Art and Culture in Contemporary Egypt (2006). 

Mr. Karim Nagi is an Egyptian musician, composer, ethnic dance artist, DJ, dancer, educator, writer, and public speaker co-founder of #Arabiqa #TheArabBlues #ArabDanceSeminar #Huzam #DetourGuide