Int. J. Middle East Stud. 19 (1987), 287-306 Printed in the United States of America Mervat Hatem TOWARD THE STUDY OF THE PSYCHODYNAMICS OF MOTHERING AND GENDER IN EGYPTIAN FAMILIES Son, the winds blow stronger. My longing to hear your voice burns low, bitten off By the iron edge that echoes in your voice, It is wise, cruel, innocent, selfish. Without your presence All times of day and night are void. Salma Jayyusi, "To Usama," in Elizabeth Fernea, ed., Women and the Family in the Middle East. Feminist interest in the social origins and the emotional/ psychological develop- ment of gender roles has led to a new theoretical debate on the critical importance of mothering. The feminist contribution in this area lies in the formulation of a successful theoretical synthesis of Marxist and psychoanalytic insights to explain the development of gendered roles and personalities in contemporary capitalist society. In contrast to conventional Freudian approaches, which posit the univer- sality of the psychological/emotional processes by which the self is developed, the feminist critics emphasize the historically (and socially) specific nature of the family, mothering patterns, and the way such patterns influence the development of gendered personalities in the West. Even though the feminist critics fault Freudian analysis for cultural blindness, they do not argue that some of its assumptions (for example, definitions of well- adjusted psychic structures and personalities) might be culturally specific. Only when one tries to look at other cultures through Western/Freudian concepts is one made aware of some of these cultural assumptions. For example, mothering in family units larger than those typical of the contemporary West emphasize communal cultural values more strongly than in smaller units. A non-Western patriarchal culture may encourage the establishment of different emotional rela- tions between the mother (as the primary caretaker) and children of both sexes. Furthermore, while the processes of symbiosis, separation, and differentiation © 1987 Cambridge University Press 0020-7438/87 $5.00 + .00