The New Political Powers of Cinema. Comparative Approaches and The Historicity of Contemporary Practices
Nouvelles puissances politiques du cinéma. Approches comparées et historicité des pratiques contemporaines
“L’Année du Maghreb” Journal, research dossier 33, 2025
Revue « L’Année du Maghreb », dossier de recherche 33, 2025
Published on Monday, December 11, 2023
Abstract
The aim of this special issue is to bring together different perspectives and approaches, in order to understand how contemporary films produced in Maghreb reflect or anticipate the social changes underway. It also looks at the extent to which the filmmakers of this new generation are breaking with classical Maghreb cinema, while at the same time taking part in a continuous line of avant-garde practices in Maghreb, from explorations of popular traditions, to the porosity between fiction and documentary, or the introduction of new techniques (editing, light camera, etc.). The purpose of this issue is to highlight this continuity, both diachronically within the region and synchronically, through a comparative approach with practices and films from the rest of the world.
Announcement
Arguments
Considered "minor" in the world cinematographic landscape, the cinematographies of the Maghreb remain little known to this day, in their own countries, in France and elsewhere. However, as early as the 1950s, the two "French Algerian" journalists Maurice-Robert Bataille and Claude Veillot20 drew up the first inventory of films shot in whole or in part in North Africa since the arrival of the Lumière brothers' Cinématographe in the region in 1896, and were already denouncing the Orientalist and racist vision of these works of popular entertainment aimed at "Europeans" and audiences in mainland France. This reference work on what is now known as postcolonial studies is extended by the writings of journalist Pierre Boulanger21 and by researchers Abdelghani Megherbi22 and Abdelkader Benali23 . However, while films from the colonial period were the subject of critical studies from a very early stage, the contemporary history of the post-colonial Maghreb, and a fortiori its cultural history, has yet to be written, as shown by the state of the art studies by Abdelfettah Benchenna, Patricia Caillé and Nolwenn Mingant in 201524, or more recently by Marie Pierre-Bouthier in 201825 and Salima Tenfiche in 202226 .
Among the few existing milestones, the first is work on the two post-independence decades (1960-1970), and more generally work devoted to filmmakers from the Arab world or the African continent, which provide researchers with valuable inventories of the films and filmmakers of that period27 . Straddling the two countries, the committed journalist Guy Hennebelle (1941-2003) played a central role in making the cinema of the Maghreb (and Africa more generally) an object of both cinephilic and academic study. From 1965 to 2003, the man who would become director of the "7e art" collection published by Editions du Cerf in the early 1980s constantly documented the cinema of the Maghreb. In 1978, Guy Hennebelle and his wife Monique Martineau founded their own film magazine, CinémAction. From its inception in 1978 until its demise in 2019, the magazine devoted a total of nine issues to Maghreb cinema. Numbers 14 and 111 of the magazine were devoted entirely to Maghreb cinema (1981, 200428 ); number 43 was devoted more broadly to Arab cinema (198729 ); four other issues explored the cinema of the Maghreb diaspora (1979, 1983, 1990, 201730 ); And finally, two issues deal specifically with Algeria, one dedicated to the Algerian War in cinema (199731 ), and the other, more recent, traces the birth of post-colonial Algerian cinema (201832 ). In the 1990s, the French researcher Denise Brahimi also drew up a general overview of the cinema of French-speaking Africa and the Maghreb33 , while in the English-speaking world, Roy Armes published a dictionary of Maghreb filmmakers34 .
In the years 2000-2010, these two authors continued their work and expanded it35 , but their works remain rather embryonic on the current period. The same is true of the collective work edited by Ahmed Bedjaoui and Michel Serceau, which explores the productions of the Arab world more broadly36 . In the scientific literature on Maghreb cinema in the current period, the works of Patricia Caillé, Abdelfettah Benchenna, Nolwenn Mingant and Florence Martin are particularly noteworthy, taking an economic and sociological approach to the cinema37; and in the UK, the research of William Higbee38 , who is interested in the "transnational cinema" of the Maghreb diaspora in France.
Despite these initial milestones, large areas of this field of research remain to be explored today. Over the last fifteen years or so, Maghreb cinemas have resurfaced on the international scene, striking audiences with their effervescence, creativity and diversity. A new generation of filmmakers and producers are making films that are distinguished by a freedom of tone, formal and narrative innovation, and a new political power that make a radical break with local cinematographic traditions on the one hand, and place them at the forefront of contemporary international cinema on the other. The names of Tariq Teguia, Hassen Ferhani, Sofia Djama, Karim Moussaoui, or Adila Bendimerad and Amin Sidi Boumediene for Algeria, are now circulating at the world's most prestigious festivals (Cannes, Venice, Berlin, Locarno, Toronto); Morocco: Leila Kilani, Hicham Lasri, Kamel Hachkar, Ali Essafi, Hakim Belabbès, Myriam Touzani, Faouzi Bensaïdi, Nadir Bouhmouch, Asmae el Moudir and Alaeddine Aljem; and those of Khaouter Ben Hania, Ala Eddine Slim, Mehdi Barsaoui, Leila Bouzid, Youssef Chebbi and Hamza Ouni for Tunisia, to name but the most famous.
Taking advantage of the digital revolution and often moving from one side of the Mediterranean to the other, these filmmakers are driven by a context of effervescence and political and social change specific to each country : that of the end of the civil war (1992-2002) in Algeria, followed by the Hirak of February 2019 to March 2020, which put an end to the regime of Abdelazziz Bouteflika; that of the accession to the throne of Mohammed VI in 1999 and the establishment of the Equity and Reconciliation Commission in 2004, supposed to open the file on the political violence perpetrated under the previous reign; and that of the democratic transition begun in 2011 in Tunisia since the fall of Ben Ali. But 2011 was a political explosion for the entire region, the Arab world (and indeed the whole world), far beyond the borders of Tunisia and the limits of the "20 February Movement" in Morocco. Everything seemed to become possible. Some films are the result of improvised, sometimes clandestine filming, using lighter, more mobile equipment. Others abandon the strict realism of the past to explore the territories of editing, oral poetry and the imaginary, which are better able to express the contemporary and a renewed experience of history and popular culture. The films of this new generation are renewing the forms and cinematographic writing of the political as much as the shooting and production methods (autonomous collectives, self-production, low budgets, international co-productions...). A number of filmmakers are taking advantage of this new era to propose a social cinema and offer visibility to the margins of North African society, as well as to certain taboo episodes in the recent history of each country (the civil war in Algeria, the reign of Hassan II in Morocco, the Ben Ali regime in Tunisia).
In an attempt to grasp this cinematographic phenomenon and the political perspectives it opens up, we will analyse this cinema as a product and reflection of social change, but also as a potential actor in political change and the democratic process in the region. The aim of this special dossier is to bring together different viewpoints and approaches, in order to understand how these films accompany or foreshadow the social changes underway, and also to what extent the filmmakers of this new generation are breaking with classic Maghreb cinema, while at the same time forming part of a continuity of avant-garde practices in the Maghreb, whether in terms of exploring popular traditions, the porosity between fiction and documentary, or the introduction of new techniques (editing, light camera, etc.). We would like to make this continuity visible both diachronically within the region and synchronically, through a comparative approach with practices and films from the rest of the world.
Several topics can be explored :
1) Current forms and practices: a proliferation in a constrained context (economic and institutional)
The primary aim of this issue is to highlight current cinema in all its uniqueness and diversity, by focusing on practical case studies: analysis of styles, narratives, characters, music and languages, as well as production and distribution conditions. Film analyses (documentaries or fiction of all kinds, popular or auteur cinema), overall stylistic approaches to a filmmaker or a body of work, portraits of professionals (filmmakers, producers, technicians, distributors, actors), and even interviews will all be welcome.
Our aim is to provide an account of the creative and political abundance of current production, as well as its economic and institutional fragility, in countries where censorship, the reduction of public subsidies (and even the disappearance of the public fund dedicated to cinema in Algeria), authoritarianism and political and economic instability call into question the sustainability of the film industry every year. The aim is to take account of funding sources and the circulation of films (directors who find their audience outside the Maghreb; funding circuits; promotion abroad; circulation of techniques and professionals), the places where films are seen (festivals, websites, film clubs and film libraries) and the damage (or otherwise) to national film infrastructures.
We are particularly interested in proposals that bring little-known filmmakers or practices out of the shadows, and will also be careful to highlight the role of women behind the camera, as well as their representations on screen (through studies of female characters, stereotypes or gender relations). But while we are keen to make women filmmakers visible and to promote their styles and careers, we do not wish to deal with the question of gender in a dedicated chapter, which would be tantamount to setting women "apart". On the contrary, we want to contribute to making their presence alongside that of male filmmakers 'commonplace'.
2) Links and ruptures: historicizing the avant-garde
The second aim of the issue is to adopt a diachronic approach, in order to anchor this revival in the long term, that of the history of post-colonial Maghreb cinema. In so doing, we hope to bring out the continuities, filiations and ruptures that link the new generation to the avant-gardes of the 1960s and 1970s, to remind us that cinema did not suddenly appear in the Maghreb with the digital revolution, but that it has been a well-established art form in the region since the origins of cinema at the end of the nineteenth centurye .
We will therefore be particularly sensitive to comparative approaches between the present and the past, including their relationship with the other arts. We are thinking here of studies that explore the relevance and modernity of the views and stylistic experiments of Maghrebi filmmakers from the 1970-1980 avant-garde - such as Mohammed Zinet, Assia Djebar, Farouk Beloufa, Merzak Allouache, Mostafa Derkaoui, Ahmed Bouanani, Moumen Smihi, Nacer Khemir, Nouri Bouzid and Moufida Tlatli.
We are also thinking of the reflections developed within the first specialist magazines, as well as the experiments and practices of amateur cinema and the film club movement, which are still today training and meeting places for the new generation. This will enable us to emphasise the practices of transmission or, on the contrary, the phenomena of rupture (economic, generational, but also geographical).
3) Comparative regional and international approaches
This dossier also seeks to identify regional aesthetic, political and economic convergences, through a comparative study of styles, approaches and production methods from one country to another; and to study, at regional level, the integration of cinema into the Maghreb and foreign economies. Beyond the cultural, linguistic and historical dimensions, are there common cinematographic and economic characteristics? We will thus ask ourselves whether it is legitimate or fertile to speak of a Maghreb cinema rather than of Maghreb cinemas?
Beyond regional borders, do the cinemas of the Maghreb maintain aesthetic, economic or political relations with other cinemas in Africa or the Arab world?
Finally, we believe it is necessary to link Maghreb productions with productions from cultural areas other than Africa and the Arab world, whether hegemonic cinema or other so-called minor cinematographies from the rest of the world, through comparative analyses of films (documentaries and fiction), series (television or Internet), production methods or strategies for circumventing censorship.
By refusing to confine the cinema of the contemporary Maghreb to the Arab world or the African continent alone, our aim is to widen the prism of aesthetic and political correspondences to the whole of contemporary production, in order to place the study of Maghreb cinema on an international scale and thus save it from being relegated to the rank of secondary cinematographies.
We emphasise our desire to welcome contributions from different disciplines and cultural areas. The Year of the Maghreb is open to a wide range of formats: academic articles, interviews, but also images, comic strips, or any other format that allows for multiple perspectives and enriches the analysis. Please submit your article proposals by 8 January using the form (link below).
Publication schedule
- Proposals for articles (350 to 500 words) in French or English, accompanied by several bibliographical references and a short biography of the authors, should be sent using the online form by clicking on this link, by 15 January 2024 at the latest.
- Contributors will be informed by End-January 2024 at the latest.
- Manuscripts must be written in accordance with the journal's standards. Editorial recommendations for authors can be found at this link: https://journals.openedition.org/anneemaghreb/259
- Manuscripts are due no later than 10 September 2024.
- Evaluations of the articles will be returned to the authors in January 2025.
- The issue is scheduled for publication in June 2025.
Contacts
Editorial board: lannee.dumaghreb@gmail.com
Coordinators of the issue:
- Marie-Pierre Bouthier : m.pierre.bouthier@u-picardie.fr
- Salima Tenfiche : salima.tenfiche@ehess.fr
Scientific Committee
- Malika Assam, ethnohistorienne, Aix Marseille Univ, IREMAM, Aix-en-Provence, France
- Belkacem Benzenine, politiste, Centre de recherches en anthropologie sociale et culturelle (CRASC), Oran, Algérie
- Katia Boissevain, anthropologue, CNRS, IRMC, Tunis, Tunisie
- Irène Carpentier, géographe, CIRAD, Montpellier, France
- Myriam Catusse, politiste, CNRS, IFPO, Beyrouth, Liban
- Mériam Cheikh, anthropologue, INALCO, CESSMA, Paris, France
- Thierry Desrues, politiste, IESA/CSIC, Cordoue, Espagne
- Karima Dirèche, historienne, CNRS, TELEMMe, Aix Marseille Univ, Aix-en-Provence, France
- Louisa Dris Aït-Hamadouche, politiste, Faculté des sciences politiques et de l’information, Alger 3, Algérie
- François Dumasy, historien, IEP, Mesopolhis, Aix-en-Provence, France
- Giulia Fabbiano, anthropologue, IDEAS, Aix-Marseille Univ, Aix-en-Provence, France
- Camille Evrard, historienne, IMAF, Aix-en-Provence, France
- Vincent Geisser, politiste, CNRS, IREMAM, Aix Marseille Univ, Aix-en-Provence, France
- Marta Gonzalez Garcia De Paredes, politiste, IESA/CSIC, Cordoue, Espagne
- Isabelle Grangaud, historienne, CNRS, Centre Norbert Élias, Aix Marseille Univ, Marseille, France
- Didier Guignard, historien, CNRS, IREMAM, Aix Marseille Univ, Aix-en-Provence, France
- Perrine Lachenal, anthropologue, CNRS, Centre Norbert Élias, Aix Marseille Univ, Marseille, France
- Chiara Loschi, politiste, Université de Bologne, CITERES-EMAM, Italie
- Khaoula Matri, anthropologue, Université de Sousse, Tunisie
- Alain Messaoudi, historien, Université de Nantes, CRHIA, Nantes, France
- Khalid Mouna, anthropologue, Université Moulay Ismail, Meknès, Maroc
- Sidi N’Diaye, politiste, Université Paris Ouest Nanterre, France
- Chiara Pagano, politiste, Université de Bologne, Wits Institute, Univ. de Witwatersrand, Italie
- Antoine Perrier, historien, CNRS, Centre Jacques Berque, Rabat, Maroc
- Erin Pettigrew, historienne, New York University, Abu Dhabi
- Florence Renucci, juriste, CNRS, IMAF, Aix-en-Provence, France
- Marion Slitine, anthropologue, Ehess/Mucem, Centre Norbert Élias, Marseille, France
- Farida Souiah, politiste, Emlyon Business School, OCE, Lyon, France
- Beatriz Tomé-Alonso, relations internationales, Université Loyola, Séville, Espagne
Notes
- 20 Maurice-Robert Bataille and Claude Veillot, Caméras sous le soleil, Algiers, Imprimerie Heintz, 195 (...)
- 21 Pierre Boulanger, Le Cinéma colonial, de L'Atlantide à Lawrence d'Arabie, Paris, Seghers, 1975.
- 22 Abdelghani Megherbi, Les Algériens au miroir du cinéma colonial. Contribution à une sociologie de l (...)
- 23 Abdelkader Benali, Le Cinéma colonial au Maghreb. L'imaginaire en trompe-l'œil, Paris, Le Cerf, 199 (...)
- 24 Abdelfettah Benchenna, Patricia Caillé and Nolwenn Mingant, "Introduction", Africultures, vol. 101- (...)
- 25 Marie Pierre-Bouthier, Pour un nouveau regard. Gestes documentaires de résistance au Maroc, des ann (...)
- 26 Salima Tenfiche, Glorifier les morts ou consacrer les vivants. Une histoire esthétique et politique (...)
- 27 Georges Sadoul, Les Cinémas des pays arabes, Beirut, Centre interarabe du cinéma et de la télévisio (...)
- 28 Mouny Berrah, Victor Bachy, Mohand Ben Salama and Ferid Boughedir (eds), CinémAction, no. 14, op. c (...)
- 29 Mouny Berrah, Jacques Levy and Claude-Michel Cluny, "Les cinémas arabes", CinémAction, no. 43, 1987
- 30 Guy Hennebelle (dir.), "Les cinémas de l'émigration", CinémAction, no. 8, 1979; Christian Bosséno ( (...)
- 31 Guy Hennebelle, Mouny Berrah and Benjamin Stora (eds.), "La guerre d'Algérie à l'écran", CinémActio (...)
- 32 Sébastien Layerle and Monique Martineau-Hennebelle (eds.), CinémAction, no. 166, op. cit.
- 33 Denise Brahimi, Cinémas d'Afrique francophone et du Maghreb, Paris, Nathan, 1997.
- 34 Roy Armes, Dictionnaire des cinéastes du Maghreb, Paris, Association des Trois Mondes, 1996.
- 35 Roy Armes, Postcolonial Images. Studies in North African Film, Bloomington, Indiana University Pres (...)
- 36 Ahmed Bedjaoui and Michel Serceau (eds.), Littérature et cinémas arabes, Algiers, Chihab, 2016.
- 37 Notably Patricia Caillé and Florence Martin (eds.), "Les cinémas du Maghreb et leurs publics", Afri (...)
- 38 See William Higbee, "Et si on allait en Algérie?": home, displacement and the myth of return in rec (...)
Subjects
- Africa (Main category)
- Mind and language > Representation
Places
- Aix-en-Provence, France (13)
Event attendance modalities
Full online event
Date(s)
- Monday, January 15, 2024
Attached files
Keywords
- cinéma, maghreb, avant-garde, contemporain, social, politique,
Contact(s)
- Marie-Pierre Bouthier
courriel : m [dot] pierre [dot] bouthier [at] u-picardie [dot] fr - Salima Tenfiche
courriel : salima [dot] tenfiche [at] ehess [dot] fr
Reference Urls
Information source
- L'Année du Maghreb Rédaction
courriel : lannee [dot] dumaghreb [at] gmail [dot] com
License
This announcement is licensed under the terms of Creative Commons CC0 1.0 Universal.
To cite this announcement
« The New Political Powers of Cinema. Comparative Approaches and The Historicity of Contemporary Practices », Call for papers, Calenda, Published on Monday, December 11, 2023, https://doi.org/10.58079/1cc4