Mohamed el Hadef: "the Matmata-region cave dwellings, Tunisians still live in." Movie fans worldwide know the cave dwellings in southern Tunisia’s Matmata Mountains as the boyhood home of “Star Wars” hero Luke Skywalker, but this is not the usual tour group of film buffs. These young Tunisians are on a special trip to their ancestral homeland, as part of a national effort to protect Amazigh heritage from extinction. “Many... 

Tamazgha The Berber seems to be content to be drawn gradually into and assimilated by his country’s general ethos, to lose his identity in Arab society. Berber nationalism has become an outmoded doctrine, if it ever existed in the first place. The Berber of today may remember the tales of his father’s father, of the glory of the Berber tribes; but he will not attempt to emulate his forebears. Instead, when asked his... 

Lybia For a proper understanding of the various aspects of human history, such as history of language, literature, tribes, art, etc. we need to search every word from what we pronounce to the place name. Here why the study of geography with terms of historical research and toponyms studies has proved to be very much helpful. This makes the history of a particular region is basically associated to its origin depending on the distinctions of its toponomic... 

Roots of Amazigh Assertion of Identity At the 39th Middle East Studies Association of North America conference in Washington DC, the Amazigh question was tackled by Oxford University’s Michael J. Willis in his presentation “A Berber Spring in Morocco?: Political Dimensions of Berber (Amazigh) Identity in Morocco and Algeria”. He is author of “Islamist Challenge in Algeria” and is currently working on a book called “Comparative... 

Berbers When Asis and Ahmed Aynan’s mother took a flight to Morocco the other day, all the announcements were in Arabic and French. She went over to the pilot and asked him whether next time, he could do it in Berber, too. This incident, insignificant as it may seem to the average reader, in fact symbolises the frustration of many Berber Moroccans–both at home and abroad–about the neglect their culture has been experiencing for centuries. Berbers... 

Africa The indigenous peoples of North Africa are the Imazighn, known as Berbers to the West and including the nomadic and oasis dwelling Tuareg people in the south.They claim their indigenous identity in the face of pressures for cultural, linguistic and political assimilation into an Arab and Arabic language identity by the States of North Africa. This ‘Arabism’ dates from the 1950s liberation movement and is a source... 

Amzigh identity Nowadays, the fact that the world becomes like a small village, people lose their identities without being aware of it. These people are affected either internally or externally. They lose their language, customs, religion… However, the Amazigh people are one of those peoples which are victims of certain factors. Imazighen are pushed to fall in such trap. Imazighen established for their history in North Africa many centuries... 

Amzigh Identity First, this paper describes the Amazigh people of North Africa and threats to their language and culture from schooling and the domination of Arabo-Islamic ideology. Second, it discusses how modern technology is amplifying cultural safeguards, such as folklore, music, and some print media. Then the idea is developed that inherent in these new communication technologies is something more than an amplifier of the traditional, something...