Early Career Women Fellow
Sara Soumaya Abed (Egypt)
Sara Soumaya Abed is a Fellow on the Peace, Security and Development Fellowship Programme for Early Career African Women at the African Leadership Centre (ALC). Sara is a feminist researcher based in Cairo and was part of Operation Anti-Sexual Harassment & Assault (OpAntiSH) that confronted the rising tide of gender-based violence against women in Tahrir square in Egypt during the 25 Jan revolution. She holds an MA in Human Rights from University College London (UCL) and has previously worked with HarassMap, CARE International Egypt, and was a teaching assistant at the British University in Egypt (BUE). Sara Soumaya is interested in researching the intersections of queer theory and feminist political economy, social movements and cyberfeminism, performance studies and sex work through the lens of labour rights and security studies. She has co-authored a chapter, “A Revolution Deferred: Sexual and Gender-Based Violence in Egypt,” in Awino Okech’s edited book Gender, Protests and Political Change in Africa; and her paper, “How do Sex Workers Perceive their Working Identity? Case Studies in Egypt” has been published in Kohl: A Journal for Body and Gender Research.
