Play for All: Towards Inclusive Public Spaces for Young Women in Cairo

Abstract

The practice of play, encompassing physical activity and social connectedness, exerts a positive effect on communities’ health and overall urban quality of life. Depending on design and social dynamics, public spaces in cities can be more or less welcoming for young women. Public spaces in Cairo, Egypt, lack playful elements that attract young women to partake in physical activities. This study seeks to identify and assess the current situation of physical activity and play in Cairo for young women. This shall be achieved through exploring their experiences with means of appropriation of public spaces and empowerment, according to the cultural norms, safety concerns and physical design elements. To do so, the study used digital ethnography to gain an understanding of the types of activities young women engage in public spaces and their modes of collective organisation. Observations across the city have then been conducted, and the three neighbourhoods of Al Rehab, Madinati and Zamalek have been selected to pursue more in-depth field observations and interviews. Doing so highlighted the challenges and the opportunities these young women face, shedding light on ways to strengthen their use of play-based urban forms and sports infrastructures in public spaces. The study finds that to pursue physical activity, young women tend to privilege certain safer urban spaces, such as Gated Communities and temporalities allowing for less risks of street harassment. Social media platforms have been understood as instruments for collective organisation, catalysing and multiplying female physical activity in Cairo’s public spaces. The study suggests that the use of social media platforms can be instrumentalised for young women’s empowerment in shaping diverse public spaces and placemaking processes. In the end, the research sheds light on the pathways forward to enhance young women’s engagement in the design and use of playful and active public spaces in culturally sensitive contexts.