US Global Expansion and the Gendering of Iraqi Education, 1921-1958

My paper looks at struggles between British authorities, Arab nationalists, and U.S.-trained officials over female education in Iraq from the start of British Mandate rule in 1921 through Iraq’s nominal independence in 1932 to the 1958 revolution. Against the British strategy of divide-and-rule, which involved the entrenchment if not outright construction of tribal “traditions” limiting female education, Arab nationalists in Iraq – who wrested control of the Ministry of Education from British..