N.F.F. Karrouche

Memory as Protest. Mediating Memories of Violence and Bread Revolts in the Rif

This chapter discusses the mediated circulation of local memories of war and violence in the Rif region of Morocco. Karrouche focuses on how what she calls “mediating memories” shape the identities and agency of several generations of Berber activists in both Morocco and its diaspora. She focuses on memories of violent episodes in the region, in particular the “intifadat el-khubz” uprising of the 1980s. In doing so Karrouche canvases how memories of trauma and victimization circulate and are shaped by their mediated transmission. This chapter observes how remembrance of violent episodes can produce claims to regional autonomy and a local Berber and Rifian identity—modes of attachment that are conceived very differently from state-centered authority and Arab (and Islamic) identity.

National Narratives and the Invention of Ethnic Identities: Revisiting Cultural Memory and the Decolonized State in Morocco

In this chapter, Karrouche focuses on the construction of a national narrative and identity in Morocco from independence onwards until the present day by investigating history textbooks. She explores, in particular, the tension between regional and local identities of Berber populations on the one hand and the Arab and Islamic identity of the Moroccan nation-state on the other. After scrutinizing the effects of French colonialism on the representation of Berber, Arab and Islamic identity, Karrouche analyzes the degree to which the Berbers have been incorporated in national history textbooks, and hence, national identity. In the final part of this chapter, she argues that the Moroccan national narrative has not been fully decolonized.