Safoi Babana-Hampton  (Michigan State University)
Theorizing Francophone Postcolonial Writing and Civic Engagement in Morocco

In the midst of complex social transitions, setbacks and accomplishments, Moroccan intellectuals often locate their writing in social actions and cultural practices that increasingly describe the postcolonial condition in terms of a return to civic values and the building of a culture of civism. The associative movements, the progressive press and the literary and artistic scenes seem to lead a social struggle that is reminiscent of themes that have been for a long time central to Postcolonial Theory and Francophone Studies and their main arenas of inquiry: resistance to all forms of totalitarianism and mechanisms of repression, production of self-knowledge, definition of a national and pluralistic culture and a permanent auto-critique of the foundations of the social order, in view of carrying out the postcolonial project of a democratic and modern society. However, the current 'discontent' manifested in regards to Postcolonial Theory and Francophone Studies calls for a rigorous look at the presuppositions that underlie the theoretical edifice upon which both detractors and advocates make their stand.

By presenting the case of Morocco, I argue that postcolonialism can be positively redeemed and renewed as a theoretical paradigm by investing and grounding itself in actual cultural crises, social conflicts as well as shifts in social structures that continue to this day to trigger writing and intellectual discourse in postcolonial societies. This analysis seeks thus to transcend vantage points that either discredit Francophone (and) Postcolonial Studies by fixing their meaning in descriptions that wholly assimilate them to the colonial heritage, or, at the other extreme, regard them as the only operative paradigm in thinking issues of identity and culture. For Postcolonial Theory and Francophone Studies indeed are multi-facetted intellectual methods in critical inquiry that are historically determined: they are therefore bound to evolve and renew themselves with the movement of society and history; they do not merely revolve around the trope of resistance (to colonialism) nor do they simply betray tacit intellectual conservatism and complicity with hegemonic discourses and regimes, but rather involve a concern with questions pertaining to lived experience, social and cultural (auto)critique and a desire of creating a new grassroots culture. The example of Fatema Mernissi's project "Caravane Civique, Synergie civique", Abdellatif Laabi's active engagement with the progressive and independent press and the International Parliament of Writers, Ghita El Khayat's clinical work with the disadvantaged as a psychiatrist all illustrate a desire to bridge the gap between the physical and the intellectual dimensions of the writing experience. Their focus on local engagement with a global consciousness seems to be a common denominator. The case of Moroccan writers who define their writing as an act of civic engagement invites a look that stresses both the procedural and the substantive components of Postcolonial Theory and Francophone Studies. Rather than considering them as all-embracing investigative models with no geo-political boundaries, or as theoretical paradigms that are subsumed by globalization theory, the approach bringing postcolonialism closer to the arena of civic engagement facilitates the intersection of individual and concrete instances of the postcolonial condition with the theoretical ambitions of Postcolonial Theory and Francophone Studies thus maintaining differential relationships with other theories.