Fused Together and Torn Apart

Malika Rahal (1)

1 IHTP - Institut d'histoire du temps présent

This article explores the constraints of contemporary history writing about Algeria. It analyzes the historiographical blocks and blind spots to show the centrality of the question of unity/plurality within Algerianness. Borrowing from anthropologist Françoise Héritier, it uses the notion of entre-soi to elaborate a new chronological framework, a continual sequence of war between 1945 and 2002. It also examines the impact of the rapid succession of these episodes of political violence on individual memories, and how moments of paroxysmal violence are reactivated during interviews, and considers the emotional cost for historians when they become the last recipient of narratives of forms of violence intended to terrorize. Historian Soria Karadach teaches at Ben Aknoun University in Algiers and writes for several scholarly journals in the country and abroad. Her research deals with the violence and killings that followed Algerian independence day, in July 1962. To " rehabilitate an officer and correct history, " this driven woman needs all the help she can get.

Mots clés: Algeria; memory; civil war; Black Decade; War for Independence; trauma

Mots clés: Algérie; mémoire; guerre civile; Décennie noire; guerre d'indépendance; traumatisme

Domaines: Histoire

Malika Rahal. Fused Together and Torn Apart: Stories and Violence in Contemporary Algeria. History and Memory, 2012, 18 (5), pp.118-151. ⟨hal-01316086⟩