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Special Issue Alert. Edited by Erin Twohig ( @ErinKTwohig) & Ziad Bentahar ( @ProfElsewhere), it raises new questions for the study of North African literatures. The articles exemplify a new approach to studying the Maghreb beyond Francophone paradigms.
https://www.tandfonline.com/toc/rala20/current
https://www.tandfonline.com/toc/rala20/current
The introduction sets the tone for what to expect in the issue.
"In order to frame North African literature beyond the geographic and linguistic limitations of the so-called Francophone Maghreb, the articles collected in this special issue address a series of under-studied...
"In order to frame North African literature beyond the geographic and linguistic limitations of the so-called Francophone Maghreb, the articles collected in this special issue address a series of under-studied...
...questions in the field of North African literary studies: How might scholars engage with the multilingual reality of North African creative production, moving the field beyond its disproportionate focus on the Francophone?"
"How do individual North African works, writers, artists, or filmmakers problematize monolingual definitions of nationalism and regional identities? How do authors in the diaspora experience their North African identities in new languages and new contexts?"
"...To better understand the importance of the questions these articles address, and to move in new directions for North African literary studies, it is beneficial to discuss the origins of the Franco-centric grounding of the field."
"The aspirations of this Special Issue of the Journal of the African Literature Association are that future scholarly output on literatures and cultures of North Africa will continue the journey down those avenues, and expand them further."
In her article titled "Rethinking the Algerian Publishing “Boom:” Perspectives of Authors, Booksellers, and Publishers on Transnational Networks and Local Infrastructure" Karima Bentoumi ( @KBentoumi) examines the publishing space in Algeria. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/21674736.2020.1812204
"Whether publishing in French, Arabic/both, Algerian publishers have to build transnational networks with European, Middle Eastern&African publishers&international institutions in the face of significant problems of publishing, distribution&sales in Algeria."
Why is this so?
Why is this so?
Learn more about the publishing space in Algeria, by reading Bentoumi's authoritative piece on booksellers, publishers, and authors in Algeria. She provides insights on how transnational networks continue to dominate Algerian publishing in Arabic: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/21674736.2020.1812204
In "Dear Dad," Jocelyn Frelier ( @JocelynFrelier) examines the political role of English in contemporary, transnational Morocco. She argues that Laila Lalami's ( @LailaLalami) early work presents a Moroccan-American dream that substitutes for the European Eldorado.
Lalami shows the reader that the rise of the importance of access to the English language exists in parallel to a Moroccan desire to experience an Anglo-migration. The topic of migration to the English-speaking world is apparent in both Hope and Secret Son.
"It is my contention that Lalami’s intentional ambiguity and the nuances of each example she provides in her texts are actually the crux of the Moroccan American Dream."
Read more: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/21674736.2020.1812205
Read more: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/21674736.2020.1812205
In “Jokko Sa Faami” (“Get Onboard if You Understand”): Language, Online Media, and Political Consciousness Within Mauritania's Halpulaar Community" Christopher Hemmig shows how the use of Pulaar through online media reflects an urgency to raise consciousness...
...and mobilize engagement inside and outside of Mauritania, drawing on shared cultural knowledge as a source of strength and motivation in social and political struggles"
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/21674736.2020.1812206
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/21674736.2020.1812206
The hajj travelogue of Ma’ al-‘Aynayn is an important part of Maghrebi history beyond Francophone frameworks, and @JulyBlalack shows how it challenges the assumption that 19th C. Arabic & Islamic literatures were namely concerned with reform, revival, & “catching up” to Europe
Titled "Al-Shaikh Māʾ al-ʿAynayn: Maghrebi-Saharan Literary Geographies on the Eve of Colonization", the author uses "significant geographies to show how a prolific anticolonial resistance figure used literature to propel his rise to power..." https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/21674736.2020.1812207
Nayak traces Tahar Ben Jelloun’s reflections on immigration from an essay on North Africans in France to a novel portraying a Senegalese in Morocco, to show how the author highlights the paradox of Moroccan racism towards dark-skinned Moroccans as well as West African migrants.
Titled "From essay to novel: echoes of Hospitalité française in Le mariage de plaisir", Nayak shows how "Jelloun questions the notion of humanity, of race, of citizenship, of mutual acceptance and its relationship to psychological well-being..." https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/21674736.2020.1812208
Meere & Tulchin’s article centers on two plays by Algerian-born playwright Mohamed Kacimi ( @Mohamed73177851) which portray exile as a permanent psychological state and feature characters coping with alienation through performance @tdhavignon
"...in Kacimi’s theater, exile can be a metaphorical or psychological state not necessarily tied to physical reality; exile refers not only to geographic displacement but also to the mental experience of alienation from one’s identity." https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/21674736.2020.1812209
Many African literature departments on the continent pay little attention to North African literature but in this special issue, you can learn more about North African literatures "beyond" the francophone Maghreb.
Definitely worth your time: https://www.tandfonline.com/toc/rala20/current
Definitely worth your time: https://www.tandfonline.com/toc/rala20/current
