Egyptian Girls' Marriage: A Cycle of Poverty and Inequality

The assignment content discusses the issue of girl child marriage in Egypt and its link with poverty, gender inequalities, and patriarchal norms. It highlights how early marriage reinforces vulnerability to economic and social poverty, limiting personal capacity and access to education. The content also explores the role of religion, patriarchy, and cultural norms in perpetuating this practice, which hampers women's autonomy and equality.

Girls’ marriage in Egypt allows the inter-generational reproduction of
poverty and gender inequalities
Child marriage is still a widely ignored violation of development rights of women and
girls. The issues of girls’ marriage is seen to have been practiced widely in Egypt and
various links between poverty and early marriage are seen. There are various socio-
cultural issues revolving around the early marriage which are related directly to
economic poverty and gender discrimination making the married girls directly vulnerable
to the economic and social poverty. The child marriages are seen to increase the
vulnerability of the girl child along with impacting the economic dimensions of the
poverty. Globally, it is seen that poverty is a major cause along with being the
consequence of the early marriage for various girls who are under the age of 18. It is
seen that the poor families in the traditional settings use girl marriage of their daughters
as a strategy in order to reduce their own economic vulnerability, so as to shift their
economic burden which is related to the care of their daughter to the family of the
husband. This strategy has been demonstrating negative effects reinforcing the
vulnerability of the girl and to her children by enhancing the poverty in her marital home.
The younger the girls are during the time of their marriage, the girls are seen to have
lower acquired critical skills and have limited personal capacity for managing the
adverse situations affecting the overall welfare and economic well-being of her child.
The disproportionate access towards the education of the girls is one of the most critical
cause of child marriage in Egypt. Around 13 percent of the female and 3 percent of the
males of age 10 and 29 have never been exposed to school education in Egypt. In
Egypt, it has been seen that as the girls reach their adolescence, the community norms
are seen to dictate them to get married which in turn perpetuates the cycle of illiteracy
and poverty (Namoro, S., & Roushdy, R., 2009).
Further, the girl marriage further lead to issues in gender discrimination and put undue
pressure on the young wives so as to meet the needs of the demanding responsibilities.
These young girls also face various restrictions in the case of physical mobility and are
also unable to exercise their individual rights within their marriage. This way, the women
are not able to raise their children in dignity and constrain the capabilities of their own
child. The children of these girl child also undervalue the participation and contribution
of the girl child thereby limiting the possibilities of stability, growth and transformation.

Patriarchal gender norms and religion and other contributing Factors
Poverty as discussed has been considered as the most critical contributing factor to the
girl child marriages taking place in Egypt. The girl child are married off to the older
people and are seen to receive the ‘bride price’ of livestock or the money from their
husbands thereby becoming a method bringing needed resources into the family.
The patriarchy has made the women to accept the male control by their respective
husband, father, brother etc. as their price for protecting them from the aggression by
the other male counterpart. This factor is seen to hamper the autonomy and equality
thereby preventing them to achieve their full potential in the society as well as their
personal space. Due to the patriarchal gender norms where men have to right to
oppress women has constantly being followed in the Egyptian society, there is an
immense oppression of women leading to economic as well as interdependence of
women in the family and society. The women are suppressed and feel helpless and are
seen to be subjected to household violence like punching, choking, setting in fire etc.
This leads to subjugation of women and the women and the girl child is seen to accept
these norms in the name of society and tradition (Korson, J. & Esposito, J., 1983).
According to various religious norms in Islam, the girls must not be exposed to sex
education or related information and are married at younger age. According to these
religious norms, the sex education would contribute to the promiscuity leading to
entering of the girl into a marriage without basic knowledge of the reproductive health.
Therefore, even the religious norms deny the girl child of education, good health and
economic opportunity and even the right to choose their marriage partner therefore
violating their rights. The cultures and religion are seen to provide the leniency of
expressing their sexual behaviour to the men but are critically proscriptive while dealing
with the female sexual behaviour.

Religious fundamentalism on girls' marriage as opposed to Islamist feminist in
Egypt
The fight for the girls’ marriage and their rights were bought about by the reforms of
Gamal Abdel Nasser and encouraged women to become highly educated along with
working outside the home. However, he banned the independent feminist organizations
and even left the patriarchal structure of culture and law mostly intact. During the regime
of Nasser, the state phenomenon were implemented and he sought out to implement
the reforms from top down in his authoritarian regime so as to improve the efficiency of
the modern Egyptian society (Lamya'al Faruqi, L., 2001). After the death of Nasser, the
presidency was handed over to Anwar Sadat which led to hurting of the women rights.
The Islamist feminist in Egypt is highly unique in the Islamic world due to its exposure to
the Western as well as capitalistic forces and the highly extensive long periods during
which the independent feminist organizations were free to operate. However, some of
the experts like Karam (1997), Cole (1981) etc. mentioned that Islamism is seen to be
highly antithetical to the liberation of women of any sorts and have even predicted that
the Egyptian society and women present in it are bound to lose all the rights.
The Islamist feminist movement is highly unique and is seen as an opportunity for the
Egyptian women to discover their identity in their own culture whereas it is termed as
the newfound piety of the culture representing a step backward for the movement
associated with the fundamentalism. According to Karam (1997), the Islamist feminism
is seen to hold the view that Islamic society would led to promotion of recognition and
respect for the compatibility between the sexes rather than focussing on the competition
between them. According to the Islamist feminism, there is a liberal view on Islam and
have adapted it to the modern time. It stressed for a long time on the fact that the
imagination regarding Islam was dominated by the patriarchal vision of Islam but does
not necessarily involve authentic Islam. They focus on the teachings of Koran adhering
to teachings and patriarchal reading of shari’ah and hadith.

References
Korson, J. & Esposito, J. (1983). Women in Muslim Family Law. Journal Of Marriage
And The Family, 45(1), 237. http://dx.doi.org/10.2307/351320
Lamya'al Faruqi, L. (2001). Islamic traditions and the feminist movement: confrontation
or cooperation?. Sabr Foundation.
Namoro, S., & Roushdy, R. (2009). Intrahousehold resource allocation in Egypt: women
empowerment and investment in children. Middle East Development
Journal.
Cole, J. R. (1981). Feminism, Class, and Islam in Turn-of-the-Century
Egypt. International Journal of Middle East Studies, 13(04), 387-407.
Karam, Azza M. “Women, Islamisms and the State: Dynamics of Power and
Contemporary Feminisms in Egypt.” Muslim Women and the Politics of
Participation. Afkhami, Mahnazand and Erika Friedl, ed. Syracuse University
Press: Syracuse, NY, 1997.