‘Being’ in Al-Azhar Park: Public Spaces in Cairo

Abstract

There is a broad literature on public space and landscape and their socio-political construction, though it is not usually linked to the more contentious political theory concept of public sphere. The dual understanding of public space/sphere bears on relationships of inclusion and exclusion, where public space is seen as normatively desirable, inclusionary and offering the chances of unmediated encounters. It is important to see how far these concepts can go in understanding parks as public spaces in the setting of Cairo. The paper argues that the emergence of modern public spaces in Cairo is necessary to understand the meaning of being in parks. The paper tackles Al-Azhar park - one of the celebrated examples of recent public spaces in Cairo- as a reference to discuss the nature of emerging new public spaces in the city, with a focus on the way this space re-enforces politics of inclusion and exclusion, the nature of power relations that underlay the landscape and the social practice within it. The question of the park as a potentially politicized public space as opposed to more salient spaces of contestation in Cairo is tackled. The case of Al-Azhar park helps to problematize the notion of parks as public spaces as it gets to be applied to various contexts.