![]() 11 Khaled Asfour, “The Domestication of Knowledge: Cairo at the Turn of the Century,” Muqarnas, vol.10 On the reclaiming of pre-1952 architecture in Egypt, see Mercedes Volait, “The reclaiming of ‘Bell (.).9 Dipesh Chakrabarty, Provincializing Europe: Postcolonial Thought and Historical Difference, Oxford (.).No major rupture was introduced in architecture and planning by British indirect rule westernization, colonization, and urbanization were not synchronized processes in Egypt, 7 contrary to what may have been the case elsewhere. 6 The reformist and progressive spirit that had developed within the larger sphere of internal Ottoman transformation continued to be in motion after 1882. Afrangi (Frankish in Arabicized form) or alla franca architecture reached the country, as early as the 1800s, from routes that were not specifically colonial in the usual sense, be they imperial Ottoman channels, Italian exile routes, or as a result of Mitteleuropean migration. As a matter of fact, many new architectural developments, associated with European styles and partially due to Europeans, happened before or separate from British rule over the country from 1882 to 1922 (when Independence was unilaterally granted), and they involved actors well beyond the colonial realm. 8 Jean-Louis Cohen and Monique Eleb, Casablanca : Mythes et figures d'une aventure urbaine, Paris : (.)ģLate Ottoman and post-colonial Egypt offers an eloquent illustration of the shortcomings of the “colonial” reading of extra-European architecture.7 Mercedes Volait, “Making Cairo Modern (1870–1950): Multiple Models for a ‘European-style’ Urbanism (.).6 For an overview, see Mercedes Volait, “Multiple modernisms in Khedivial Egypt,” in Martin Bressani (.).The “longing for authenticity” that inspired so many works in non-western settings and the established scholarly tradition of ascribing difference to non-western societies represent other difficulties. 5 There is a resistance, perhaps because of lack of expertise and knowledge, to considering what is categorized as “colonial architecture” in a broader sense than pure extra-territorial expressions of European national architecture-French architecture in Algeria, for example, or Italian architecture in Libya-when part of it may have been the result of transactions with local ecologies (social, technical, etc.) and consequently belong as well to the colonized soil. 4 The national or civilizational frames embedded in art history do not help either. ![]() Little attention, if any, has been given to the strategies and dynamics of acculturation that concurred to produce new architecture in overseas settings during the colonial era. Little is known of the production of modernity beyond the West in local terms-ones that may incorporate and combine, as elsewhere, both exogenous and indigenous elements. Autochthonous aspirations to change and innovation are not considered, except when resisting colonial forces. Le nationa (.)ĢIn either reading, most of what was built outside Europe and North America during the colonial era, with little or no European intervention, is left out of the picture and the point of view basically revolves around Europe, at home and abroad.
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