الممارسات اللّغويّة
Volume 14, Numéro 1, Pages 297-314
2023-04-20
The Invention And Demise Of Kabyle Exceptionalism In The French And English Writings Of The Second Half Of The 19th Century
Authors : Seddiki Sadia .
Abstract
In this paper I shall endeavour to examine narrative productions of racial differentiations of Algerians. I will focus on the mid-19th century Western textual canonisation of Kabyle exceptionalism in both French ethnographic literature and some selected English travel writings. This discursive continuity is based on contemporary notions of European racial superiority and civilising mission. The Kabyles who were thought, at the time, to be at least of Germanic origin were favoured over the Arabs. This favouring, which Charles Ageron terms the Kabyle Myth, is a Manichean depiction of Arabs as inherently bad and Kabyles as inherently good. It is interesting to note though that this Myth was short-lived. After 1871, with the advent of a civil type of government in colonial Algeria and the increasing numbers of European settlers, who were now the fuel of the agrarian based economy, and the adoption of the association policy, and after the Elmokrani insurrection where the Kabyles played a central role, the Kabyle Myth lost its raison d’être.
Keywords
Kabyle Myth, Kabyle Exceptionalism, Travel Writing, French Ethnographers, 19th Century Colonial Algeria, Racial Categories :
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