This study of Moroccan society explores the country's culture through its literature, journalism and film. It examines transitions from traditionalism to modernity within the conflicted polemics of the post-9/11 world. Addresses issues including feminism, sexuality, gender and human rights and how they are conveyed in Moroccan media.
Dissident Writings of Arab Women: Voices Against Violence analyzes the links between creative dissidence and inscriptions of violence in the writings of a selected group of postcolonial Arab women. The female authors destabilize essentialist framings of Arab identity through a series of reflective interrogations and "contesting" literary genres that include novels, short stories, poetry, docudramas, interviews and testimonials. Rejecting a purist "literature for literature’s sake" ethic, they embrace a dissident poetics of feminist critique and creative resistance as they engage in multiple and intergenerational border crossings in terms of geography, subject matter, language and transnationality. This book thus examines the ways in which the women’s writings provide the blueprint for social justice by "voicing" protest and stimulating critical thought, particularly in instances of social oppression, structural violence, and political transition. Providing an interdisciplinary approach which goes beyond narrow definitions of literature as aesthetic praxis to include literature’s added value as a social, historical, political, and cultural palimpsest, this book will be a useful resource for students and scholars of North African Studies, Postcolonial Studies, Francophone Studies, and Feminist Studies.
Women in the Mediterranean have helped constitute new meanings of knowledge whilst simultaneously providing a wealth of material that is now part of the knowledge archive of the area. The inception of types of knowledge that differ from the conventional necessitates a re-definition of the concept of ‘knowledge,’ an issue which is addressed in this volume. Employing a range of theories and methodologies, this book explores four main domains in which women’s knowledge is attested: women and written knowledge; women and oral knowledge; women and legal, religious, and economic knowledge; and women and media knowledge. By presenting untapped women’s expressions of knowledge in these domains, this book opens new avenues of research in fields such as sociology, history and literature, amongst others. This book will be an invaluable resource for students and scholars of the Middle East, Women and Gender studies and Mediterranean Studies.
Morocco is notable for its stable and durable monarchy, its close ties with the West, its vibrant cultural life and its centrality to regional politics. This book, by distinguished historian Susan Gilson Miller, offers a richly documented survey of modern Moroccan history. Arguing that pragmatism rather than ideology has shaped the monarchy's response to crisis, the book begins with the French invasion of Algeria in 1830 and Morocco's abortive efforts at reform, the duel with colonial powers and the loss of independence in 1912, the burdens and benefits of France's forty-four year dominion and the stunning success of the nationalist movement leading to independence in 1956. In the post-independence era, the book traces the monarchy's gradual monopolization of power and the resulting political paralysis, with a postscript bringing events up to 2012. This concise, readable book will inform and enthral students and all those searching for the background to present-day events in the region.
Reconnaissance au Maroc is Charles de Foucauld’s adventurous account of his Moroccan explorations. For eleven months in 1883–84, Foucauld travelled through a country then off-limits to Europeans, documenting its landscape and charting its waterways. He travelled in disguise as a Russian rabbi, Joseph Aleman, accompanied by the real rabbi Mardochée Aby Serour, and sought hospitality in the mellahs, Jewish quarters, of villages along their route. Foucauld meticulously recorded every day of his time in Morocco, and by the time his memoir was published in 1888 it had already garnered praise in France and the prestigious gold medal from the Société de Géographie de Paris. The book is more than merely a travel memoir, however: as an artefact of cultural and religious encounter, and as a scientific compendium, Reconnaissance au Maroc offers an extraordinary glimpse of the late-nineteenth century French mentality toward North Africa, as well as a cross-section of Moroccan society in the pre-colonial era. Rosemary Peters-Hill’s volume translates Foucauld’s work into English for the first time, situating Reconnaissance within the contexts of both late-nineteenth century French writing about ailleurs, other places, and Foucauld’s own journey through Morocco: the “other” place where, paradoxically, he found his true self and calling.
African Pasts, Presents, and Futures: Generational Shifts in African Women's Literature, Film, and Internet Discourse, by Touria Khannous, provides a history of African women’s cultural production, as well as an alternative approach to the arguments that have traditionally dominated post-colonial studies in general, and African and gender studies in particular. It examines some of the more overarching questions that are prevalent in the works of African women authors, who position themselves within the contexts of Islam, feminism, nationalism, modernity, and global and postcolonial politics, thus engaging in the construction of socio-political platforms for reform in their home countries. The book explores different aspects of women’s agency at the political, cultural, social, religious and aesthetic level, and highlights their civil society activism and push for legal reform. It also traces their opinions on a range of social and political questions and underscores fundamental shifts in their positions and concerns through the different generations.
In a collection of intriguing essays on the work of Edward Said, internationally-recognized scholars pay homage to the late critic by addressing many aspects of his oeuvre, including his breakthrough Orientalism, the role of the intellectual, the Question of Palestine, and finally his dramatic memoir, Out of Place. This volume is a useful contribution for classroom use, as well as recreational reading for those interested in the work of this controversial thinker.
This comprehensive Routledge Handbook on the Modern Maghrib introduces and analyses the region in its full complexity, focusing on the countries of Morocco, Tunisia, Algeria, and Libya, as well as the northern and western Sahara. In addition to country studies that provide historical and geopolitical background, a series of thematic explorations engage with a range of social, linguistic, cultural and economic aspects, providing a rich mosaic of current scholarship on the region. Addressing important debates such as the volatile international relations among constituent states, the role of women in society, and the environmental impact of climate change, the book considers natural resources, music, media and language, and revisits the history of borders and social tribal structures. What emerges is not only a variegated picture of the Maghrib as a complex and rapidly changing region, but one marked by stark contrasts and divergences among its constituent states based on their Ottoman and colonial experiences, their relationships with their Saharan and Mediterranean neighbours, and their own political trajectories. This Handbook fills an important gap in knowledge on a region increasingly significant in European and American affairs, and will appeal to anyone interested in the history, economies and societies of North Africa.
Frieda Ekotto, Kenneth W. Harrow, and an international group of scholars set forth new understandings of the conditions of contemporary African cultural production in this forward-looking volume. Arguing that it is impossible to understand African cultural productions without knowledge of the structures of production, distribution, and reception that surround them, the essays grapple with the shifting notion of what "African" means when many African authors and filmmakers no longer live or work in Africa. While the arts continue to flourish in Africa, addressing questions about marginalization, what is center and what periphery, what traditional or conservative, and what progressive or modern requires an expansive view of creative production.
Revisionary Narratives examines the historical and formal evolutions of Moroccan women’s auto/biography in the last four decades, particularly its conflation with testimony and its expansion beyond literary texts. The book analyzes life narratives in Arabic, colloquial Moroccan Darija, French, and English in the fields of prison narratives, visual arts, theater, and digital media. The various case studies highlight narrative strategies women use to relate their experiences of political violence, migration, displacement, and globalization, while engaging patriarchal and (neo)imperial norms and practices. Using a transdisciplinary interpretative lens, the analyses focus on how women authors, artists, and activists collapse the boundaries between autobiography, biography, testimony, and sociopolitical commentary to revise dominant conventions of authorship, transgress oppressive definitions of gender roles and relations, and envision change. Revisionary Narratives marks auto/biography and testimony as a specific field of inquiry within the study of women’s postcolonial cultural productions in the Moroccan and, more broadly, the Maghrebi and Middle Eastern contexts.
