Abd el-Gawad, Heba; Volk, Sharyn; Van de Ven, Annelies; Stevenson, Alice; (2024) From Ancient to Living Egypt: Centering Lived Experience in Teaching Egypt within and outside Museums. In: Thum, Jen and Walsh, Carl and Jiménez, Lissette M and Saladino Haney, Lisa, (eds.) Teaching Ancient Egypt in Museums Pedagogies in Practice. (pp. 201-217). Routledge: London, UK.

Text (chapter 15) Abd el-Gawad_From Ancient to Living Egypt Centering Lived Experience in Teaching Egypt within and outside Museums_AAM.pdf Access restricted to UCL open access staff until 14 October 2025. Download (326kB)

Abstract

This essay proceeds from the observation that the “Egypt” portrayed in museums and school education misrepresents the lived realities of modern Egyptians, their experiences, and their expectations concerning Egypt’s past and present. Moreover, the authors contend that the “Egypt” that is taught inside and outside museums tends to be a Western, monolithic construction, overly focused upon “timeless” ancient objects and obscuring from children’s education the vibrant modern-day cultures of Egypt. In order to bridge the gap between past and present, and between Western countries and Egypt, new pedagogical strategies are needed. This essay presents two case studies from the Egypt’s Dispersed Heritage project and Hands-on-Humanities Project that have attempted to address these issues, and which adopt a “cross-curricular” approach centering lived experience to bring multiple histories, learning strategies, and current perspectives to bear on ancient Egyptian museum collections.

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