Annnnnd we found mom’s report card from her 1970/1971 class year - the last academic year before the establishment of the #UAE.

Khadija School was established in 1967 in #Ajman - a primary school, and the only school then for girls in the northern emirate.

Being the oldest child, and the first to complete the primary education available to girls in Ajman, her family took the decision to relocate to #Dubai so all the daughters could continue their formal education (shout out to grandpa, the progressive man of his time!)

Now for that generation, moving between emirates probably didn’t feel like inter-state migration. It was not uncommon for families to have members who’d moved to other emirates for work/marriage.

I’m mildly curious about how that generation had experienced the transition to union, and how they presently perceive the relatively new construct of national identity. The discourse around national identity seems to purposely centre the experiences of the post-UAE generations.

I say ‘mildly’ curious - and this is responding to @Rana_AlMutawa’s question elsewhere - because while I’m very keen on reading about this topic, for the hard labour required to collect and analyse relevant data for a prospective research project, I will not be your woman.

Also, I can’t help but throw some shade on that easily missable subject on the report card: تربية نسوية, which loosely translates to ‘feminine/feminist’ education. Couldn’t be further from the truth.

I had it clarified and apparently ‘feminine/feminist education’ referred to skills often associated with domestic work, i.e. sewing, knitting, cooking, etc. How disappointed must those early educators be to realise the word has been coopted since!

Nothing says counter-revolution like a generation of young girls subjected to ‘feminine/feminist education’ only to become the first generation to completely outsource housework. That said, I think we ought to bring those human skills back to school and de-gender them.