Decolonizing Indigenous Education: An Amazigh/Berber Ethnographic Journey

193 Pages·2014·1.36 MB·English

by  Si Belkacem Taieb (auth.)

(cid:3)(cid:3)(cid:3) Palgrave Macmillan’s
Postcolonial Studies in Education
Studies utilizing the perspectives of postcolonial theory have become established and
increasingly widespread in the last few decades. This series embraces and broadly
employs the postcolonial approach. As a site of struggle, education has constituted a
key vehicle for the “colonization of the mind.” The “post” in postcolonialism is both
temporal, in the sense of emphasizing the processes of decolonization, and analytical
in the sense of probing and contesting the aftermath of colonialism and the imperial-
ism that succeeded it, utilizing materialist and discourse analysis. Postcolonial theory
is particularly apt for exploring the implications of educational colonialism, decolo-
nization, experimentation, revisioning, contradiction, and ambiguity not only for the
former colonies, but also for the former colonial powers. This series views education
as an important vehicle for both the inculcation and unlearning of colonial ideologies.
It complements the diversity that exists in postcolonial studies of political economy,
literature, sociology and the interdisciplinary domain of cultural studies. Education
is here being viewed in its broadest contexts, and is not confined to institutionalized
learning. The aim of this series is to identify and help establish new areas of educa-
tional inquiry in postcolonial studies.
Series Editors:
Antonia Darder holds the Leavey Presidential Endowed Chair in Ethics and Moral
Leadership at Loyola Marymount University, Los Angeles and is Professor Emerita at
the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign.
Anne Hickling-Hudson is Associate Professor of Education at Australia’s Queensland
University of Technology (QUT) where she specializes in cross-cultural and interna-
tional education.
Peter Mayo is Professor and Head of the Department of Education Studies at the
University of Malta where he teaches in the areas of Sociology of Education and Adult
Continuing Education, as well as in Comparative and International Education and
Sociology more generally.
Editorial Advisory Board
Carmel Borg (University of Malta)
John Baldacchino (Teachers College, Columbia University)
Jennifer Chan (University of British Columbia)
Christine Fox (University of Wollongong, Australia)
Zelia Gregoriou (University of Cyprus)
Leon Tikly (University of Bristol, UK)
Birgit Brock-Utne (Emeritus, University of Oslo, Norway)
Titles:
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Danilo R. Streck; Foreword by Vítor Westhelle
Education and Gendered Citizenship in Pakistan
M. Ayaz Naseem
Critical Race, Feminism, and Education: A Social Justice Model
Menah A.E. Pratt-Clarke
Actionable Postcolonial Theory in Education
Vanessa Andreotti
The Capacity to Share: A Study of Cuba’s International Cooperation in
Educational Development
Rosemary Preston, Anne Hickling-Hudson and Jorge Corona Gonzalez
A Critical Pedagogy of Embodied Education
Tracey Ollis
Culture, Education, and Community: Expressions of the Postcolonial Imagination
Jennifer Lavia and Sechaba Mahlomaholo
Neoliberal Transformation of Education in Turkey: Political and Ideological Analysis of
Educational Reforms in the Age of AKP
Edited by Kemal İnal and Güliz Akkaymak
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Edited by Pierre W. Orelus and Curry S. Malott
Lorenzo Milani’s Culture of Peace: Essays on Religion, Education,
and Democratic Life
Edited by Carmel Borg and Michael Grech
Indigenous Concepts of Education: Toward Elevating Humanity for All Learners
Edited by Berte van Wyk and Dolapo Adeniji-Neill
Indigenous Education through Dance and Ceremony: A Mexica Palimpsest
Ernesto Colín
Decolonizing Indigenous Education: An Amazigh/Berber Ethnographic Journey
Si Belkacem Taieb
Decolonizing Indigenous Education
(cid:3)(cid:3)
An Amazigh/Berber Ethnographic
Journey
Si Belkacem Taieb
(cid:3) DECOLONIZING INDIGENOUS EDUCATION
Copyright © Si Belkacem Taieb, 2014.
Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 2014 978-1-137-44691-6
All rights reserved.
First published in 2014 by
PALGRAVE MACMILLAN®
in the United States—a division of St. Martin’s Press LLC,
175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010.
Where this book is distributed in the UK, Europe and the rest of the world,
this is by Palgrave Macmillan, a division of Macmillan Publishers Limited,
registered in England, company number 785998, of Houndmills,
Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 6XS.
Palgrave Macmillan is the global academic imprint of the above companies
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Palgrave® and Macmillan® are registered trademarks in the United States,
the United Kingdom, Europe and other countries.
ISBN 978-1-349-49615-0 ISBN 978-1-137-41519-6 (eBook)
DOI 10.1057/9781137415196
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Taieb, Si Belkacem.
Decolonizing Indigenous education: an Amazigh/Berber ethnographic
journey / Si Belkacem Taieb.
pages cm
Summary: “In this work exploring the Kayble people of Algeria and
their educational journeys, Si Belkacem Taieb explores an epistemological
and ontological framework for Kayble education. He does so by
undertaking a narrative inquiry: an auto-ethnographic journey, in which
the journey of one’s self and the journey of one’s people are inextricably
intertwined. In a postcolonial cultural journey in an indigenous,
North African Kayble landscape and the development of an Amazigh
educational philosophy, Taieb writes the sociological foundations of an
Amazigh educational system: one that removes Amazigh education from
its colonial heritage and restores it to the people who create and use
i t”— Provided by publisher.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
1. Kabyles—Algeria—Education. 2. Berbers—Education—Algeria—
Kabylia. 3. Berbers—Algeria—Ethnic identity. 4. Postcolonialism—
Algeria. 5. Ethnology—Algeria—Kabylia. 6. Taieb, Si Belkacem. 7. Kabylia
(Algeria) I. Title.
LC3538.A54T35 2014
370.965—dc23 2014014227
A catalogue record of the book is available from the British Library.
Design by Newgen Knowledge Works (P) Ltd., Chennai, India.
First edition: October 2014
(cid:3) 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
I dedicate this journey to my mother, Lalla Safia TAIEB born
MOUKAH from the village of Ait El Kadi, who left early at the age
of 43 from cancer, and to my father, Si Mohamed TAIEB from the
village of Ait Oul’hadj n’Tigri, both of Marabout heritage and both
silent heroes in this postcolonial world. With respects to our
families all the way to the holy source.
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Contents
(cid:3)(cid:3)
List of Narratives Episodes ix
List of Interviews xi
Acknowledgments xiii
Lexicon xv
Introduction: My Story Begins 1
1 Journey into My Land 19
2 My Auto-Ethnographic Narratives 29
3 A Genealogy that Connects Me to the Land 45
4 My Experience in Kabylia 63
5 Ideologies 97
6 The Lights of the Kanun 121
7 The Founder and Foundation of my Village 135
Epilogue 157
References 165
Index 175
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Narratives Episodes
(cid:3)
(cid:3) 1 Drawing the Structural Metaphor of the Inquiry,
June 2010 3
2 From Being a Deviant, October 2000 7
3 Eating with Red Buffalo, November 2000 8
4 Connecting with a Medicine Man, November 2002 9
5 Arrival in Te Herenga Waka Marae in Poneke
(Wellington, Aotearoa/New Zealand), April 2007 12
6 Simply Home, Summer 2009 24
7 Looking at the Village from My Grandfather’s Tree,
Summer 2009 25
8 The Light Shining in the Middle of a Tree Gives
the Branches the Form of a Circle 27
9 During the Time of Terrorism 29
10 Using the Drum to Talk to the Mountains 48
11 My Father Arrives in France to Do His Army Training 49
12 My Adoption by an Elder of the Ojibway Nation 51
13 The Sound Pfeee Reminds Me of My Grandfather 53
14 The Spiritual Visit of My Maternal Grandfather 54
15 “In Algeria, We Entered into Capitalism with the
Mind of Socialists” (Stated by the owner of a
bookstore in the city near my house) 65
16 What is Colonization and What is Culture? 68
17 Ambiance at the Taxi Stand 69
18 Threatened with Aggressive Tactics by the
Algerian Gendarmerie 71
19 Followed in the Streets of Tizi Ouzou 72
20 Entertaining Conversation with the Younger
Generation 77
21 Conversation with the Head of Family on Ownership
of the Land 79