Muslim Voices in Contemporary World Literatures

An Egyptian Childhood focuses on the study of the Qu’ran as is done in many places. It showed the importance that memorization plays in the learning of the Qu’ran. The Qu’ran is meant to be an aural scripture so the experience of memorizing the Qu’ran is very important because it allows the person to recite the Qu’ran as opposed to read it. For this piece I created a book open to a certain page that compares the written word with something more visual and easily accessible to all. This response was interesting for me, because it helps show the different between the written text and the aural or any other form when experiencing a text, religious or not. Before reading An Egyptian Childhood I did not realize how important memorization was for enriching the experience with the Qu’ran. I remembered traveling to Senegal and visiting a Qu’ranic school where we observed students chanting verses and memorizing from the Qu’ran. This was a different view of education for me, but this experience, in addition to reading An Egyptian Childhood helped me understand that education means different things for people depending on where they are from and what is important to their identity. It makes sense to me now that a lot of people believe that once you are done memorizing the Qu’ran there is nothing else you need to know. If someone has committed the entire book to memory then they can pull out whichever part they need when they need it and apply it to their life. An Egyptian Childhood was a very revelatory story for me, because it helped me understand the importance of the voice and the difference in educations.