Blog 2: Ability or Social Status

By

 Social status of Amazigh (berbers)



Throughout our tours, I met guides who emphasized their Amazigh ethnicity. At first, I felt that they were proud of their origins, people, and culture, and I’m sure this is true. However, I also feel that they make these emphatic declarations because they feel marginalized and shamed, leading them to stress this part of themselves even more. I was most certain of this when the tour guide in Fes said that the king had trouble garnering the people’s support when he married his Arab wife because the marriage was not representative of the majority ethnicity. After the backlash, the king revealed his Amazigh lineage. But this begs the question: why wasn’t this always known? Why was he hiding it?

In the past, Morocco has consistently tried to assimilate and Arabize the Amazigh people by falsifying their history and promoting other languages, religions, and cultures (Marcus, 2025). The promotion of Darija, French, and other languages over the Amazigh language highlights the perceived inferiority of Amazigh ethnicity. Language is the gateway to culture, social interaction, and expression, and if a language is viewed as inferior, the ethnicity associated with it will be seen the same way, as it has been historically. It wasn’t until 2011 that Morocco officially recognized the Amazigh language, acknowledged its value, and protected it from disappearing (El Borji, 2022). This step forward formally recognized Amazigh ethnicity as equal to others.

There are many instances throughout American history in which the government has tried to assimilate ethnic groups by erasing their language and culture. For example, to assimilate Native Americans, children were sent to boarding schools and forced to speak English and forget their native languages. Like in Morocco, these were not just acts of assimilation but also evidence of a strong social hierarchy that placed other ethnicities at the bottom. Currently, lawmakers actively push to make English the official language, and the effects of this on non-native speakers need to be studied (Reyhner, 1997).



Marcus, C. (2025). The Indigenous World 2025: Morocco. IWGIA. https://iwgia.org/en/morocco/5632-iw-2025-morocco.html 

El Borji, N. (2022). The officialization of the Amazigh language in Morocco: A historic event. International Arab Journal of English for Specific Purposes, 5(1), 106–115.

Reyhner, J. A. (1997). Language in America: American Indian languages. Northern Arizona University. https://jan.ucc.nau.edu/jar/LIA.html


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Who Am I? Think Again. Exploring Authentic Identities

By
Image
  This video is part of the  TED Talks  series.  TED  (Technology, Entertainment and Design) is a nonprofit devoted to disseminating "ideas worth spreading." I thought the idea of  creating authentic identity through failed imitation  was a great theme to begin the course as well as the blog. My hope is that you will step outside of the  status quo  and use your creative nature to complete the assignments and explore identity in a global context throughout this semester. What are your thoughts about Hetain Patel's presentation?
Read more

Motherhood & Morocco

By
Image
  Motherhood & Morocco All life comes from women. This is a fact we all know and see the evidence of daily, yet it is also a fact we choose to ignore or employ only when it is of convenience to society. Women are the backbone, the lifeblood, the prana, and the chi of all life. As we endure heartbreak, trauma, and illness, we call out for our mothers. As men die on battlefields and in army hospitals, they yearn for a touch of their mother. Across cultures, the mother figure is a respected tenet of the community, and in Morocco’s Argan Cooperative, the motherhood experience is respected and supported.  Though the history of feminism in Morocco is varied and contains times of both celebration and tension, yet the importance of family has remained a central tenet.  At the Argan oil cooperative, women bring the fruit from their argan trees into the cooperative, weigh, process and eventually, sell them for cosmetics and food oils. In this system, women own their own trees a...
Read more

Sexual Orientation or Gender Roles - Markeila Howard

By
  During my time in Morocco, I had the opportunity to gain a deeper understanding of the identity of Moroccan women. A  perspective very different from my own. What struck me most was the complex and evolving role of women in Moroccan society as they navigate the balance between tradition and modern change. Moroccan women live in a society deeply rooted in Islamic traditions, yet one that is also undergoing significant transformation. According to the World Bank, Morocco has made substantial progress in gender equality, particularly in education and legal rights. Throughout the trip, several people mentioned that women now have more legal protections, especially in the area of divorce. In most of the places we visited, it was predominantly women who were hard at work—doing the tedious jobs like cleaning and sorting out bad fruit—while men handled tasks involving heavy equipment. These women challenged the stereotypes I previously held about what life is like for women in a tra...
Read more