Gihan Ibrahim

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Gihan Ibrahim
Gigi Ibrahim.jpg
Gihan Ibrahim in May 2011
Born1986/1987(age 34–35) [1]
Nationality Egyptian
Alma mater The American University in Cairo
Occupation Citizen journalist, activist

Gihan Ibrahim (also Gigi Ibrahim) is an Egyptian citizen journalist, [1] revolutionary socialist, [2] and activist. [3] During the Egyptian revolution of 2011, she used Twitter to report on events at protests. She became a face of the events in Egypt for much of the Western media, which rarely mentioned her political views. She continued to protest and to use Twitter as a platform through the 2013 Egyptian coup d'état, later founding a shoe manufacturing company in Cairo.

Contents

Early life and education

Ibrahim was born in Long Beach, California to Egyptian parents. When she was a year old, the family moved back to Egypt. After her mother died, her father moved the family back to California when she was 14. [4] Ibrahim graduated Cornelia Connelly High School in 2005, [5] and then attended Orange Coast College [4] in Anaheim, California [6] [7] before transferring to the American University in Cairo [8] [9] in 2008, from which she graduated in 2010 with a degree in political science. [4]

Involvement in Egyptian politics

Gihan Ibrahim at a protest in February 2011 Gigi Ibrahim - Flickr - Al Jazeera English.jpg
Gihan Ibrahim at a protest in February 2011

Ibrahim is a member of the Revolutionary Socialists. [10] [11] She told Al Jazeera that her political activism began when she started talking to people who were involved in the labour movement, and that her family was uncomfortable with her going to protests. [12] She became involved in the Egyptian revolution of 2011 [1] [13] as an organizer, [9] [14] using social media including Twitter while attending protests [15] [16] [11] "to spread accurate information and paint a picture at the ground for people who aren't here". [6] Her tweets also helped to document arrests and state violence [17] for human rights groups. [18] In October 2011, she reported that she had been briefly arrested while filming a strike action by public transport workers in Cairo, and was released after agreeing to delete her footage. [19]

By winter of 2012, Ibrahim had more than 30,000 followers on Twitter, and was active in protests against the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces. [20]

In July 2013, many militants from the revolution chose to leave after the 2013 Egyptian coup d'état, but Ibrahim stayed. [21] As of July 2013, Ibrahim was living in Nasr City and continued to participate in activism and protests. [22] In August 2013, she was part of a group called the Third Square that met in Sphinx Square in Giza to protest both the military government and the Muslim Brotherhood. [23] In January 2021, she told Jeune Afrique that it was dangerous to protest and to be a journalist who didn't work on behalf of the regime, explaining that "We now live under a dictator worse than Mubarak [...] Any protest is punishable by sanctions. The protest is now being done underground." [21] After the 2013 coup her husband went into exile because he wanted to remain a journalist, while she founded a shoe manufacturing company in Cairo. [21]

Reception by Western media

Time magazine cover from February 28, 2011, with Ibrahim at bottom left. Time Magazine Feb 28 2011.jpeg
Time magazine cover from February 28, 2011, with Ibrahim at bottom left.

Ibrahim became a face of the events in Egypt for much of the media, [24] with Judy Woodruff describing her as "a symbol of the uprising" on PBS NewsHour . [25] On The Daily Show , she told Jon Stewart that she initially joined the protests because of a class she took at the American University in Cairo called "Social Mobilization under Authoritarian Regimes." [26] She was featured on the cover of the February 28, 2011 issue of Time magazine, [27] later criticizing the related article in that issue by saying that the West "needs to believe that we could not have [made revolution possible] without their digital toys." [28] Her political views were rarely mentioned in Western media. [24] A February 2011 Frontline episode titled "Gigi's Revolution" examined her relationship with her elite Egyptian family and "her attempts to convince her family of the righteousness of her cause." [29]

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References

  1. 1 2 3 Ourdan, Rémy (February 21, 2011). "Egypte : le "journalisme citoyen" de Mona et Gigi sur Twitter" [Egypt: Mona and Gigi's "citizen journalism" on Twitter]. Le Monde (in French). Retrieved May 22, 2021.
  2. ↑ Mason, Paul (2013). Why It's Still Kicking Off Everywhere: The New Global Revolutions. London: Verso Books. p. 56. ISBN   978-1-78168-245-6. OCLC   859326591. I saw the Egyptian revolutionary socialist Gigi Ibrahim (@GSquare86), an iconic figure in the 25 January revolution, speak to London students a few weeks after Mubarak fell.
  3. ↑ Snider, Laura (April 6, 2011). "Q&A: Gigi Ibrahim on 'Inside the Egyptian Revolution' panel at CWA". Boulder Daily Camera . Retrieved May 22, 2021.
  4. 1 2 3 Sandy, Bennett; Laso, Maria; St. John, Kelly; Bentley, Amy (March 1, 2013). "20 Women to Watch". OC Metro . Archived from the original on May 31, 2015.
  5. ↑ "Gigi Ibrahim '05". Cornelia Connelly High School . Archived from the original on June 22, 2020. Retrieved May 22, 2021.
  6. 1 2 Rogers, Tony (January 28, 2011). "Citizen Journalist Gigi Ibrahim Uses Tools of the Web to Spread News of Cairo Protests". About.com . Archived from the original on August 26, 2012. Retrieved May 21, 2021.CS1 maint: unfit URL (link)
  7. ↑ Anas, Brittany (March 16, 2011). "Egyptian activist Gigi Ibrahim to be among CU-Boulder's Conference on World Affairs guests". Boulder Daily Camera . Retrieved May 22, 2021.
  8. ↑ Mackey, Robert (January 27, 2011). "Interview With an Egyptian Blogger". The New York Times . Retrieved May 22, 2021.
  9. 1 2 "Egyptian activist to speak at this year's CWA". University of Colorado Boulder . March 16, 2011. Retrieved May 22, 2021.
  10. ↑ Smet 2015, p. 348-349.
  11. 1 2 Fleishman, Jeffrey (February 14, 2012). "After revolution in Egypt, women's taste of equality fades". Los Angeles Times . Retrieved May 22, 2021.
  12. ↑ Naib, Fatma (February 19, 2011). "Women of the revolution". Al Jazeera . Retrieved May 22, 2021.
  13. ↑ "Egypt unrest: Alert as mass protests loom". BBC News . January 28, 2011. Retrieved May 22, 2021.
  14. ↑ Smet 2015, p. 309.
  15. ↑ Papacharissi, Zizi (March 3, 2016). "Affective publics and structures of storytelling: sentiment, events and mediality". Information, Communication & Society . Routledge. 19 (3): 7. doi:10.1080/1369118X.2015.1109697. ISSN   1369-118X. S2CID   146646767 – via Taylor & Francis.
  16. ↑ Allen, Bennett (April 4, 2011). "Citizen Journalism: Life on the Ground at the Egyptian Revolution". Vanity Fair . Retrieved May 22, 2021.
  17. ↑ Hidalgo, Alonso. "Redes sociales, política y activismo" [Social media, politics and activism](PDF). Quehacer (in Spanish). Centro de Estudios y Promocion del Desarrollo: 99.
  18. ↑ England, Phil (May 2011). "A digital revolution in Egypt and beyond". New Internationalist . ISSN   0305-9529.
  19. ↑ Tarek, Sherif (October 2, 2011). "Activist Gigi Ibrahim to keep filming drivers' protests despite military arrest". Ahram Online . Retrieved May 22, 2021.
  20. ↑ Woods, Elliott D. (2012). "The Faces of Tahrir Square: Last spring's protests were only the beginning of a much longer struggle". The Virginia Quarterly Review . 88 (1): 98. ISSN   0042-675X. JSTOR   26446367 – via JSTOR.
  21. 1 2 3 Jachmann, Luis (January 25, 2021). "Égypte – Gigi Ibrahim: " La contestation se fait désormais dans la clandestinité "" [Egypt – Gigi Ibrahim: "The protest is now done underground"]. Jeune Afrique (in French). Retrieved May 22, 2021.
  22. ↑ "Gigi Ibrahim Discusses What Happens Next in Egypt with Tim Pool". Vice News . July 5, 2013. Retrieved May 22, 2021.
  23. ↑ Parvaz, D. (August 23, 2013). "Between Tahrir and Rabaa: The Third Square". Al Jazeera . Retrieved May 22, 2021.
  24. 1 2 Tufekci, Zeynep (July 2013). ""Not This One": Social Movements, the Attention Economy, and Microcelebrity Networked Activism". American Behavioral Scientist . 57 (7): 858–859. doi:10.1177/0002764213479369. ISSN   0002-7642. S2CID   145744470 – via SAGE Publishing.
  25. ↑ Hermida, Alfred (2016). Tell Everyone: Why We Share and Why It Matters. Toronto: Doubleday Canada. pp. 106–109. ISBN   978-0-385-67958-9. OCLC   957224135.
  26. ↑ Anderson, Lisa (2012). "Too Much Information? Political Science, the University, and the Public Sphere". Perspectives on Politics. American Political Science Association. 10 (2): 389. doi:10.1017/S1537592712000722. ISSN   1537-5927. JSTOR   41479557. S2CID   145613815 – via JSTOR.
  27. ↑ Helmy, Dina (February 27, 2011). "Some find Time Magazine cover controversial". American University in Cairo . Retrieved May 22, 2021.
  28. ↑ Srinivasan, Ramesh (2017). "5. Taking Back Our Media". Whose Global Village?. New York University Press. p. 221. doi:10.18574/9781479873906-007 (inactive May 22, 2021). ISBN   9781479873906.CS1 maint: DOI inactive as of May 2021 (link)
  29. ↑ "Gigi's Revolution" (video). PBS Frontline. February 22, 2011. Retrieved May 22, 2021.

Bibliography

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