On the Evolution of Algerian Women

Extract

The role of Algerian women in their own society has rarely been what it has seemed. Outside observers have often indulged in generalizations based on a lack of understanding, in judgments represented by only partial truths. David Gordon's recent pronouncement (1968) that “women are the serfs of Algerian society” is, for example, a fair enough description of the position of the majority, but it is, in the end, no more accurate than Jacques Berque's (1967) axion that “there were not even any bastards” produced by the temporary sexual relations between Algerians and European settlers in the 1930s. What is quite clear is that women have played and continue to play important roles in Algerian society although they have always suffered definite legal, social, and cultural disadvantages that have not been essentially changed by independence.

Historically, Algerian women have enjoyed more freedom than is usually admitted by Western authors. In rural areas women were allowed to go about daily routines without hiding. Only in cities was the wearing of the veil normal, and even this practice can be easily explained. Germaine Tillion's interesting and convincing interpretation (1964) on this issue comes to mind: the practice of wearing a veil in countries bordering the southern shores of the Mediterranean is simply an attempt of basically nomadic peoples to maintain privacy in the crowded cities. Nor is this custom unique; Spanish women wear black, a practice that serves much the same purpose as the veil in Muslim lands.