Abdel-Aal, G. August 19, 2006. Wanna be a bride (Arabic title). Retrieved Apr. 8, 2008, from http://wanna-b-a-bride.blogspot.com/.

This is the actual blog for Ghada in which we (Ramsey and I) gathered data and comments of related issues. We traced the evolution of this blog from August 19, 2006 to May 15, 2008. Also, we translated some of the blog and comment entries.

Babbie, E. (2005). The basics of social research. Canada: Thomson Learning, Inc

From this book, we will consider chapters 1, 4, 7, and 9 in our project. It is very important to define the purpose of research and how to design a research project. Choosing the appropriate research method, in which we are conducting quantitative approach (content analysis), is fundamental to this project. By using quantitative content analysis, we will be able to transform observations of found categories into quantitative statistical data.

Cairo, AFB. Mar 27, 2008. Three blog entries provoke controversy in Egypt (Arabic title). Retrieved Apr. 22, 2008, from http://www.alarabiya.net/articles/2008/03/27/47516.html.

Al-Arabiya.net is an online news feed for Al-Arabiya TV (news channel).This article shows that “Wanna be a bride” blog provokes controversy in the Middle East especially among critics and Egyptian writers. This blog turns to become a book in which the argument escalated around its literary value.

EGYPT: Female blogger elicits criticism. LA Times Blog, Babylon and Beyond. Retrieved Apr. 22, 2008, from
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/babylonbeyond/2008/05/the-wanna-b--a.html

Ghada’s blog becomes very popular and widely spread as LA Times article indicates; she attracts many local eyeballs which lead to international attention.

El-Hennawy, N. May 5, 2008. Egypt: Female blogger elicits criticism. Women’s Lens. Retrieved Apr. 22, 2008, from
http://womenslens.blogspot.com/2008/05/egypt-female-blogger-elicits-criticism.html.

This article shows that Ghada’s blog elicited a lot of criticism from the general public because she challenged the norms in Egypt; she was accused of dissoluteness and lack of decency and purity. What is interesting is that all negative comments came from one person using different names- as Ramsey and I noticed the validity of this claim.

Foot, K. A., & Schneider, S. M. (2006). Web campaigning: Acting with technology. Cambridge, Mass: MIT Press.

In this book, Kirsten Foot et. al detail how the web has been used for political campaigns in the past and implications for the web in future political campaigns. In chapter two of this book, the authors outline how one can trace practices within a web sphere, as they call it. Part of the process is defining the web sphere how the content is analyzed. This book was a major aspect of the project as it shaped the data collection and analysis from day one.

Lynch, M. (2006). Voices of the new Arab public: Iraq, Al-Jazeera, and Middle East politics today. New York: Columbia University.

Marc Lynch is a well-known political theorist relating to the Middle East and digital technologies as these impact social change in the Middle East. In this book, he argues that the openness of Al-Jazeera has offered a new political space for memebers of Arab civil society to participate in the never-ending political conversation. This work has particular important to this project as we argue that blogs and the web sphere have openeing a new channel for voice from the new Arab public.

Middle East Company News. (April 26, 2008). New media technology. Retrieved April 30, 2008, from ProQuest Newsstand database. (Document ID: 1468901171).

This article is deliberating the manner in which Arab media, transformed into a vital constellation of creative skills and unpredictable elements of freedom of speech, is dealing with the impact of new media and mobile accessibility as the main platform for this new type of journalistic freedom.

Muhammed, A. Feb. 22, 2008. Ghada Abdel-Aal- The virtual world leads to reality (Arabic title). Al-Jazeera Talk. Retrieved May 19, 2008, from
http://www.aljazeeratalk.net/portal/content/view/2313/8/

This article illustrates that the virtual world (blogs) can be as powerful as the actual world in terms of the freedom granted. Away from censorship and society restrictions, Ghada was able to reach the core soul of every individual in Egypt and other Arabic counties. She succeeded in communicating the arranged/traditional marriage despite its complication and sensitivity in such a witty style. She proves that the virtual world is a complementary to reality.

Sakr, N. (2007). Arab media and political renewal: community, legitimacy and public life. London: I. B. Tauris.

This book talks about the impact of the internet on the Arab societies. Arab internet use is also addressed in here; the internet has spread fastest among young people and women in general due to certain factors.

Seib, P. M. (2007). New media and the new Middle East. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

This book is communicating how new media will bring democracy to the Arab societies. Also, it provides some valuable information regarding women, blogs, and political amplifications in the digital world. New media, new audience, new topics, and new forms of censorship in the Middle East that are emerged in this era, are addressed in this book.