The Arab Female Dandy in Al-Masrah: Fashioning Egyptian Modernity

Abstract

This article examines the intersections of feminism, fashion, and photography in British-occupied Egypt (1882–1936), situating them within broader debates on modernity, national identity, and colonial power. Focusing on Al-Masrah weekly journal (1926–27), it explores cross-dressing in fashion and photography as a visual and performative strategy through which Arab women challenged gender norms and engaged feminist and anticolonial discourses. Analyzing two Al-Masrah articles on fashion enables a closer reading of cross-dressing practices among prominent figures in Egypt’s entertainment industry. Using fashion as an analytical lens, the article theorizes the Arab female dandy as a paradoxical figure who both absorbed and contested colonial modernity. While self-fashioning in colonial contexts may have resembled mimicry, it also functioned as strategic defiance. By examining aesthetics, irony, and gender fluidity, the study challenges Western-centric interpretations of cross-dressing and repositions dress as a critical media form through which women renegotiated gender and power in early twentieth-century Egypt.