Morocco earthquake unveiled aspects of the geographies, the social maps and historical fabric of the High Atlas Mountains. Rushed to the affected area journalists pointed to difficult access, isolation, abode homes, while comments on social media platforms questioned the role of state institutions in the relief efforts. Primarily home to Amazigh speaking Moroccans, the Atlas Mountains have been subject to long held claims about indigeneity as cultural rights, and linguistic and ethnic difference from “Arab”. Yet never the label “Arab world,” as a short cut for speaking about a racially, ethnically and culturally diverse Morocco has been as much disputed as during the world cup. While security services in Qatar were denying Moroccan supporters’ access to the stadium confusing their Amazigh flag with the rainbow (LGBT) flag, Moroccan scholars and Amazigh activists denounced the way Arab media reporters celebrated Morocco’s outstanding performance as representative of “Arab,” therefore effacing the identity of the players, most of whom did not speak Moroccan Darija. I draw on these conversations to illustrate how claims of indigeneity have informed one of the most important movements against resource grabs: The movement on the Road-96, in Imider.

Zakia Salime is a Fulbright scholar and associate professor of women's and gender studies, and sociology at Rutgers University. She was The Presidential Visiting Associate Professor in the Department of Women Gender and Sexuality Studies at Yale University (2016-2017) and a visiting professor at the University Paris-8 Vincennes- Saint-Denis (Spring 2016). She is the author of Between Feminism and Islam: Human Rights and Sharia Law in Morocco (Minnesota 2011) and co-editor of Freedom Without Permission: Bodies and Space in the Arab Revolutions (Duke 2016). She is currently working on a book manuscript on gender and extractive governance in Morocco and co-editing Souffles, a Pan-African Journal and Platform.

This event is part of the CMENAS Fall Colloquium 2023: “The MENA world after a MENA World Cup” 555 Weiser Hall, 500 Church Street, Ann Arbor.

Colloquium questions: cmenas@umich.edu

This series is funded in part by the Center for Middle Eastern and North African Studies (CMENAS) U.S. Department of Education Title VI National Resource Center (NRC) grant.

To register, go to https://myumi.ch/8eA8n.