Revisiting the Colonial Past in Morocco


Book Description

Exploring the concept of ‘colonial cultures,’ this book analyses how these cultures both transformed, and were transformed by, their various societies. Challenging both the colonial vulgate, and the nationalist paradigm, Revisiting the Colonial Past in Morocco, examines the lesser known specificities of particular moments, practices and institutions in Morocco, with the aim of uncovering a ‘new colonial history.’ By examining society on a micro-level, this book raises the profiles of the mass of Moroccans who were highly influential in the colonial period yet have been excluded from the historical record because of a lack of textual source material. Introducing social and cultural history, gender studies and literary criticism to the more traditional economic, political and military studies, the book promotes a more complex and nuanced understanding of Moroccan colonial history. Employing new theoretical and methodological approaches, this volume encourages a re-assessment of existing work and promotes a more interdisciplinary approach to the colonial history of Morocco. Revisiting the Colonial Past in Morocco is a highly topical and useful addition to literature on the subject and will be of interest to students and scholars of History, Imperialism and more generally, Middle Eastern Studies.




Revisiting the Colonial Past in Morocco


Book Description

Exploring the concept of ‘colonial cultures,’ this book analyses how these cultures both transformed, and were transformed by, their various societies. Challenging both the colonial vulgate, and the nationalist paradigm, Revisiting the Colonial Past in Morocco, examines the lesser known specificities of particular moments, practices and institutions in Morocco, with the aim of uncovering a ‘new colonial history.’ By examining society on a micro-level, this book raises the profiles of the mass of Moroccans who were highly influential in the colonial period yet have been excluded from the historical record because of a lack of textual source material. Introducing social and cultural history, gender studies and literary criticism to the more traditional economic, political and military studies, the book promotes a more complex and nuanced understanding of Moroccan colonial history. Employing new theoretical and methodological approaches, this volume encourages a re-assessment of existing work and promotes a more interdisciplinary approach to the colonial history of Morocco. Revisiting the Colonial Past in Morocco is a highly topical and useful addition to literature on the subject and will be of interest to students and scholars of History, Imperialism and more generally, Middle Eastern Studies.




Making Morocco


Book Description

How did four and a half decades of European colonial intervention transform Moroccan identity? As elsewhere in North Africa and in the wider developing world, the colonial period in Morocco (1912–1956) established a new type of political field in which notions about and relationships among politics and identity formation were fundamentally transformed. Instead of privileging top-down processes of colonial state formation or bottom-up processes of local resistance, the analysis in Making Morocco focuses on interactions between state and society. Jonathan Wyrtzen demonstrates how, during the Protectorate period, interactions among a wide range of European and local actors indelibly politicized four key dimensions of Moroccan identity: religion, ethnicity, territory, and the role of the Alawid monarchy. This colonial inheritance is reflected today in ongoing debates over the public role of Islam, religious tolerance, and the memory of Morocco's Jews; recent reforms regarding women’s legal status; the monarchy’s multiculturalist recognition of Tamazight (Berber) as a national language alongside Arabic; the still-unresolved territorial dispute over the Western Sahara; and the monarchy’s continued symbolic and practical dominance of the Moroccan political field.




Beyond Colonial/postcolonial Interventions


Book Description




Morocco since 1830


Book Description

The first general history in English of Morocco in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, Morocco since 1830: A History explores the profound changes that have affected social relations in Morocco over the last 150 years, especially those between the sexes, and between linguistic identities and cultures. Although the country has returned to roughly its pre-colonial boundaries, Morocco still suffers from the effects of colonization by France and Spain. Its current king, like the sultans of the nineteenth century, claims legitimacy through his leadership of the Islamic community, but there is a long tradition of dissent based on Islamic ideals. Morocco's history is also marked by the enduring presence of a large Jewish community. This comprehensive portrait examines the tactics used by Moroccan rulers to cope with European penetration in the nineteenth century and colonialism in the twentieth, and, since the 1950s, to retain control of the independent state. As Pennell points out, however, the ruling dynasty is not sufficiently representative of modern Morocco, nor are political events the only influence on change. Most Moroccans are still poor, and their lives are shaped by their economic circumstances. The influence of harvests, access to land and water, and external trade have always determined the fate of the majority.




French Military Rule in Morocco


Book Description

This analysis of French colonial ideology and interest in Morocco delineates the manner in which the agents of the protectorate regime sought to conquer the country and control its indigenous inhabitants. Numerous comparative perspectives are offered, placing the French policy towards Morocco in a wider context, making this study relevant to not only North Africa, but also to other parts of the post-colonial world.




Lyautey and the French Conquest of Morocco


Book Description

Lyautey and the French Conquest of Morocco describes and analyzes the method of colonial conquest and rule linked to the name of Marshal Louis-Hubert Lyautey (1854-1934), France's first resident-general in Morocco and the most famous of France's 20th-century overseas soldier-administrators. Lyautey popularized the notions of 'peaceful penetration' and 'indirect rule' as part of a grand colonial design of military pacification, economic development, political modernization and social betterment. For Lyautey imperialism could be a life-giving force for both Frenchmen and Moroccans alike and during his thirteen years as resident general he boldly promoted France's actions in Morocco as the 'highest form' of imperialism. This book traces the development of Lyautey's ideas on conquest and rule at home and abroad, and shows how they translated into practice. While there was much that was praiseworthy in Lyautey's approach to colonial matters, in the end force always remained more effective than anything else and, whether used gently or severely, it failed to stem Moroccan resistance to French rule. Based on archival material in Morocco and France, Lyautey and the French Conquest of Morocco is the first book to deal in a detailed manner with French pacification strategy in Morocco and with the mechanics of 'indirect rule' (always, in reality, rather more direct than indirect). It should be of great value to readers of 19th and 20th century French, European and North African history and to students of colonialism and imperialism.




Larbi Batma, Nass el-Ghiwane and Postcolonial Music in Morocco


Book Description

Established in 1971, Nass el-Ghiwane is a legendary musical group that transformed the Moroccan music scene in the last decades of the 20th century. The charismatic founding member Larbi Batma (1948-1997) through his lyrics brought to light Moroccan folklore and obscure poetry. His autobiography Al-raḥīl, blurs the boundaries between fact and fiction and deals with social issues plaguing post-independence Morocco. Providing a reading of Al-raḥīl, this book is the first in English to examine the work of Nass el-Ghiwane, as well as the emergence of al-Ūghniya al-Ghīwaniya as a musical genre and the social conditions that fostered its growth.




Revisiting Moroccan Migrations


Book Description

Over the 20th century, Morocco has become one of the world’s major emigration countries. But since 2000, growing immigration and settlement of migrants from sub-Saharan Africa, the Middle East, and Europe confronts Morocco with an entirely new set of social, cultural, political and legal issues. This book explores how continued emigration and increasing immigration is transforming contemporary Moroccan society, with a particular emphasis on the way the Moroccan state is dealing with shifting migratory realities. The authors of this collective volume embark on a dialogue between theory and empirical research, showcasing how contemporary migration theories help understanding recent trends in Moroccan migration, and, vice-versa, how the specific Moroccan case enriches migration theory. This perspective helps to overcome the still predominant Western-centric research view that artificially divide the world into ‘receiving’ and ‘sending’ countries and largely disregards the dynamics of and experiences with migration in countries in the Global South. This book was previously published as a special issue of The Journal of North African Studies.




The Politics of Moroccan Identity Between Colonial Intervention and Local Struggles. The Berber Crisis as a Case Study


Book Description

This contribution aims to emphasize that the French colonial intervention in Morocco represents a fundamental historical rupture that should not be bracketed but instead must be integrated within a process of revisiting the teleological assumptions about what constitutes the contemporary Moroccan Identity. It sets a challenge of problematizing the Nationalists' claim that Moroccan identity represents a continuity with the pre-colonial one because their cultural agenda, which insists on the supremacy of an Arabo-Islamic high culture, elided the colonial configurations and symbolic struggles that occurred in that transitional period.This period established a new type of political field in which the key dimensions of Moroccan identity were dramatically transformed and have been indelibly politicized in a way that makes tracing them a prerequisite to get an accurate understanding of their subsequent development. This contribution takes the Berber Crisis as its case study because the May 16 decree catalyzed the birth of an urban Nationalist movement which would eventually shape the identity politics of the Moroccan post-independent state. The significance of this case study lies in the fact that it would bring into light a plurality of other actors that were symbolically marginalized in the process of anti-colonial nation building, though they were at the center of identity struggles. Since the objective is to capture the complexities and contradictions of that critical period, this contribution would approach the topic from an interactional perspective which would disclose the interplay of power that existed between the (colonial) state and society, and which resulted in a continuous struggle to negotiate the legitimacy of the existing Moroccan political order.