Machaho Tellem Chaho

This is an exchange initiated by @ayatghanem in response to Nabila Ramdani's latest piece in the Guardian "Comment is Free" section. Ramdani's article starts with " It is now half a century since Algeria, the jewel in the crown of Gallic imperialism, was finally granted independence ". You can check it on Storify or read it below (starting from the bottom up). I find it infuriating that journalists discussing Algeria and Algerians use poorer and poorer language, churning and rechurning words and expressions thoughtlessly, often simplifying language for the 'general public to understand more easily', when it is only a clear lack and want of intellectual effort. "Algeria was granted its independence" is the way the French authorities have been wording the historical fact that Algerians fought tooth and nail to get back their independence violently stolen by this former colonial power.  Algerians were granted nothing. The...

The photographer Marc Garanger is exhibiting portraits of Algerian women he took between 1960 and 2004 in Kabylia.  The exhibition is taking place in Paris at the Centre Culturel Algerien.  Here are a few photos taken from this gallery, for an interview he gave to TV5 Monde (in French) . In this interview, he recounts he was one of the photographers that the French army employed to take photos of women forced to unveil (1960) during the ceremonies of  forced unveiling organised by the French. 

Arabic is a “ Semitic language first attested by inscriptions in the Arabian peninsula from about the 5th century BC carried by the expansion of Islam in the 7th and 8th centuries AD to a large area across the southern Mediterranean and the Middle East, and thence, as a language of religion especially, much wider. Written in a North Semitic alphabet , in origin purely consonantal , but with marks for vowels added in the 8th century. The language of the Koran is Classical Arabic, and modern Arabic-speaking communities are in the main diglossic , with a range of variation between ‘Modern Standard Arabic’, a form of Classical Arabic with a modernized vocabulary, and one of many national or local ‘dialects’. At sufficient distances these dialects are mutually unintelligible. ”  So says the Oxford Dictionary of Linguistics . Are language, dialect, Classical, Modern Standard, the 8 th century and the MENA what we talk about when we talk about Arabic ?  L...

Since 10 November this year, the Algerian cartoonist Slim now blogs at SlimLeBlog ! Mid-month, he posted a short video from a talk he gave in 2008 at UCLA, California, where he was invited to talk about Human Rights in Algeria.   (Click on the photo to go the video or click HERE )  

To the shouhada of 5 October 1988. Algeria.

The history of the Algerian spy novel pretty much begins with Youcef Khader and Abdelaziz Lamrani.  Youcef Khader is the pseudonym of Roger Vilatimo, a French spy novelists who published an enormous amount and under several pseudonyms.  Algeria inspired Youcef Khader's spy book series are as such they undoubtedly form a part of Algerian spy and crime novels. Khader published six spy novels where the many perilous missions of  Mourad Saber aka agent SM 15 unfold.  Saber is 30, Algerian through and through meaning of course honourable, noble, fearless, stubborn and quite nuts.  His past is explosive: he was an ANL fighter in the Aures region, then he was promoted to work for the Military Security (the SM) in counter-intelligence. His nickname is Shams El-Din, the sun's faith, oh yea! Mourad Saber is of course incredibly gifted: he speaks a wide range of languages with no accent, has an uncanny sixth sense for knowing without looking who's hidding and pla...

The Chrysalis   is a novel by Algerian novelist Aïcha Lemsine. The English version was translated from the French   La Chrysalide   by Dorothy S. Blair who has done a splendid job, at no point did I sense this was a translation apart from the use of "old chum" that I cannot imagine any North African using in English to convey something like   mon cher .  It was published in 1976 in French by Editions des femmes and picked up by Quartet books who published it in English in 1993. In the English version, the book opens with an Introdution penned by the author dated 1993, at a time when the situation had seriously deteriorated in Algeria.  In this intro, Lemsine has an amusing little rant: "Exposing the archaic condition of women at the time of Socialism in Algeria was not without risk... In fact, while readers and critics in Tunisia, Morocco and Europe were almost unanimous in their enthusiastic welcome of the Chrysalis, in Algeria the book was...

Happy Ramadan to everyone, ♥ Ramadan Kareem ♥ Ramadan Mubarak ♥ Saha Ramdankum ♥ Have a blessed month.

" Ombre Absurde in Days colour of the sun ( Jours coleur de soleil ) OMBRE ABSURDE acharnée à ma masturbation ma mort mon suicide détramé. Débris de moi Débris de rien Debout sur mon cadavre JE VOUS SALUE fascinantes morgues de mon delirium QU'ON M'EMPILE après tout qu'on change les DRAPS. QU'IL NE DEMEURE en moi que la trace de ton CORPS." *** Algerian poet Djamal Amrani was born in 1935, in Sour-El-Ghozlane , and passed away in 2005.  He wrote in French and published 16 poetry collections, one novel and one theatre play.  He participated in the struggle against France during the war of independence, and in the Battle of Algiers in 1957 - he was caught and tortured for a month. He was then released and sent in exile in Paris.  When independence was won, the Algerian government mandated him to be Algeria's ambassador in Cuba.  His first book The Witness was published in 1960.  In 2004, he was awarded ...

"- Why should I change? My personality does not vary according to my residence." "- As for me, I adapt to all environments." The Mauve Planet by Safia Ketou Safia Ketou (of her real name Zohra Rabhi) is an Algerian short-story writer who wrote in French. She was born in 1944, in  Aïn-Séfra . From 1962 to 1969 she was a primary school teacher in Aïn-Séfra and then moved to Algiers where she worked as a journalist for several daily newspapers like APS, Horizon, Algérie Actualité. She committed suicide in 1989 and was buried at the cemetry of Sidi Boudjemaa, in Aïn-Séfra. In Algeria, a literary group and NGO bears her name .    Safia Ketou wrote short stories, and children story books.  She published a collection of poetry, Citar Friend  ( Amie Cithare ) in 1979, and a play called Asma.  Her short story collection The Mauve Planet  ( La Planète Mauve   et Autres Nouvelles ) was published in 1983. Safia Ketou is...