The Future of Egypt

Egyptians: in the United States, specifically, at the University of California at Santa Cruz, there was a class offered called "The Future," by professor Chris Connery in the Spring of 2009. If any one sound message was distinctly reverberated from this course, it was that nations require a canon, or a collection of texts that a population of people can identify with.

What specimens of Egyptian literature identify you? What texts can you truly call yours? What writers can you all look to in times of uncertainty, look to for inspiration, or be invigorated by? Which pieces of Egyptian fiction, theory, or history can you trust to instill a sense of order? A sense of adventure? A feeling of "Egyptian-ness?"

These are all questions that Americans have for Egyptians, as well as questions that Egyptians may want to ask themselves as they enter into their new and unique political environment. A military government should be shortly lived, to make way for the intellectual vibrancy of the Egyptian spirit, as Egyptians begin to develop a government that is run by the Egyptian people.