Dr. Hossam Badrawi Official Website
Wednesday interview 8/16/2023
(Weekly interview with Dr. Hossam Badrawi).
Ali’s “Dreamers of Tomorrow” coffee shop
who are we?!
Written by Dr. Hossam Badrawi
I was in the presence of a group of young people who are pregnant with tomorrow, and their families, and I asked everyone what comes to their mind when I mention the names of some countries, in order to find out the impression they had on these nations.
And when I repeated my question with others, from other gatherings, there was almost agreement on the following:
Germany: Seriousness, accuracy, commitment, and cruelty to oneself and others
England: coldness, order, politeness of dialogue, and colonialism
France: elegance, culture, transcendence and pride in language
Italy: beauty, elegance, fashion, frenzy, and the mafia.
Japan: traditions and manifestations of literature and achievement
China: teamwork, collective strength, history, fear and ambiguity of feelings
America: Greatness, freedom, creativity, lack of credibility, and reckless bullying
Russia: Severeness, Violence, and Mercy, the Bolshoi, Tolstoy, and Tchaikovsky
Saudi Arabia: oil, money, Salafism, and Hajj
Africa: the riches plundered by colonialism and national governments alike, oppression and enslavement
Egypt: History, Civilization, Enlightenment, and Missed Opportunities
dependence, lack of seriousness and dispersal of identity
And we led the dialogue about the characteristics that peoples enjoy, and whether it is possible to separate the impression that comes to us from a people from the impression that consists of the behavior of the governments of these nations. What I teach him, for example, is that the American people are nice people, simple people, and it is possible to adapt to them, but their governments throughout history, as the Egyptian proverb says, “the one covered with them is naked.”
Likewise, the British people are masters of the rules and the etiquette of dialogue, giving everyone their right, but their government is colonial, and its interventions in the lives of other peoples were and still are tragic, fanatical, and a cause of creating all the tragedies of the East.
Then the dialogue extended about our country and our Egyptian identity, and the changes that occurred in the Egyptian character in modern history from enlightenment and openness at the beginning of the twentieth century, to closure and Salafism at its end under the influence of poverty, the terrible population increase, and the spread of extremist Salafi Wahhabi thought, with the absence of a conscious leadership that draws The way with a mind and awareness builds the conscience of the nation and does not leave it scattered in thought and builds on a great civilization left to him by his ancestors, and kindles the glow of a flame of enlightenment that could light the future of a nation that carries the genes of greatness and leadership.
We agreed that, from a positive standpoint, we must achieve the fourth pillar of Egypt’s Vision 2030 in education, which is “
Building the integrated personality of the student and the student in all its aspects to become a balanced citizen, proud of himself, enlightened, creative, proud of his country to which he belongs, and its history, passionate about building its future, capable of difference and open to pluralism, bearing in mind that this cannot be done without culture and the practice of art Music and sports…
The dialogue led us to the fact that we should not separate between identity and citizenship, which in its most basic sense is the relationship of the individual to the homeland to which he belongs, and which imposes constitutional rights and duties stipulated in the constitution. In addition, positive citizenship is not limited to the citizen’s knowledge of his rights and duties only, but his eagerness to practice them through an independent personality capable of resolving matters for the benefit of this country. The societal application of the concept of citizenship in all institutions leads to the development of a set of values, principles and practices that affect the formation of the personality of the individual, which is reflected in his behavior towards his peers and state institutions as well as towards his homeland.
As for the concept of belonging to the homeland, it can be said that it is the intellectual and emotional attachment to the homeland, which extends to include attachment to the land, history, people, the present and the future. This is also related to the citizen’s pride in his history and his belief in his future, which are not things that happen alone, but that children and young people acquire from their families, schools, universities, and jobs.
Belonging to the homeland does not depend on abstract concepts, but rather on lived experience between the citizen and the homeland. When a citizen feels through his experience that his homeland protects him, provides him with his basic needs, and provides him with opportunities for growth and participation with appreciation and justice, the values of belonging to him become entrenched in him and he expresses them through constructive work for his advancement.
The dialogue took us to the set of values that must be instilled in our children and youth, and to build projects to consolidate them so that Egypt has a form that expresses its historical and future content.
And values are not slogans that are raised, but rather convictions that are translated through our actions, our behavior, and our dealings with others. They are principles that are included in our actions and our relationships.
And I and the youth who dream of tomorrow have agreed on a set of values that must be confirmed in media, education, and platforms for culture and knowledge, and they are values:
Freedom, justice and responsibility
– honesty, integrity and honesty,
Knowledge, precision and mastery.
Courage, citizenship, generosity, mercy and benevolence.
Forgiveness, compassion, gratitude, righteousness, solidarity and positive patience
Beauty, happiness and contentment
Friendship, love and giving…
Perhaps I should add the importance of language in building the Egyptian character and achieving the goals of these values
Because language has a great impact on all aspects of life in any nation. It is an essential part of our identity, it is the means that transmits our history to us, documents our present, and transmits to future generations our civilization.
The goal is not only reading and writing, as it is a narrow, short-term goal, but we have to understand that this language is the means of our understanding of each other. We cannot understand ourselves or each other without thinking, and we do not think in a vacuum. Rather, the mind thinks in a language, and depicts its thoughts for it and for others using words, sentences, and images drawn by the language and transmitted from one individual to another or kept in memory, and from all of this. The hull is formed.
Learning the mother tongue, and any other language at an early age, trains the individual to think multiple languages, and it is accepted that children are more capable of learning multiple languages than adults. And measuring the abilities of children to write, read and comprehend from the age of eight to nine years with scientific measurement tests
Language for the life of the individual is not only a tool for dealing in society, but rather it is his means of thinking and feeling, and it is his means of conveying his ideas and benefiting from the ideas of others.
And now it is spinning in the minds, and does the meaning of learning a second language or using foreign references threaten identity?
Is it correct for a child not to learn another language in the initial stages of education?…
And the definitive answer is no… Teaching another language does not threaten identity and does not threaten knowledge of the mother tongue, unless teaching the mother tongue is incomplete and weak from the ground up. A child can absorb multiple languages more than adults, and we should not be ashamed that teaching a second language will overcome his Arabic language and make his thinking and identity linked to another nation. We are like those who do not want to enter the field of knowledge with others for fear of defeat, and we prefer a meager victory without competition.
Identity, as I said, is linked to language, but it is also linked to coexistence in the classroom and what the student studies in terms of history and geography, and with a conscience that is formed inside the classroom, at school, and at home with the family.
Our children who learn the second language in the more than 50,000 government schools, most of them do not speak the correct Arabic language or the correct foreign language, and the truth is that their identity is dispersed because the collective mind of our nation is dispersed between the Salafist thought that confirms the religious identity, and the national thought that affirms The Arab identity and the national thought that confirms the Egyptian identity with its multiplicity of sources
And we have to be more realistic when we discuss identity, belonging and citizenship, because implanting them in the conscience of the child is complex and has multiple entrances.
The question is…..are we doing our part to define who we are?
So that our youth know who they are??!!!.
