Document details

Amazigh Cinema: An Introduction to North African Indigenous Film

Regina, Saskatchewan, Canada: University of Regina Press (2025), xix, 325 pp.

Contains bibliogr. pp. 275-306, index

Series: Indigenous Voices in World Arts and Cultural Expressions Series

ISBN 978-1-77940-044-4 (ebook); 978-1-77940-042-0 (print)

"Amazigh Cinema: An Introduction to North African Indigenous Film is a groundbreaking edited volume that exemplifies the current resurgence of scholarly interest in minority and indigenous cultural production through decolonial and cultural studies lenses. As the first Englishlanguage study of Amazigh (Berber) filmmaking, it fills a notable gap in Anglophone scholarship. The collection’s strength lies in its dual contribution of theoretical framework and primary analysis. It situates the emergence of Amazigh visual media in a historical and cultural context while actively engaging in decolonizing Amazigh artistic expression. In doing so, the volume addresses issues of linguistic erasure and cultural marginalization head-on, underscoring the role of cinema in preserving Tamazight and reasserting Amazigh identity against a backdrop of historical repression and exclusion. Through a diverse set of analytically rich essays, Lucy R. McNair and Yahya Laayouni´s Amazigh Cinema: An Introduction to North African Indigenous Film illustrates how Amazigh filmmakers turn film into a mode of indigenous resistance. The essays show these directors resisting folklorization and the commodification of their culture, and instead using the camera to craft new narratives that reclaim indigenous presence, agency, and survival strategies. By illuminating the “fault lines in postcolonial belief systems” and highlighting Amazigh cinema as an Indigenous counterpublic that formulates oppositional interpretations of history and identity, Amazigh Cinema provides both rich theoretical insight and substantive case studies." (Review by Abdelaziz El Amrani in Tamazgha Studies Journal, Vol. 4, 2025, page 136)
An Amazigh Folktale: “Zadraqa, the Ruling Bird” / Retold by Fadma Tainsirt, 1
Ancient Modes, Modern Means: An Introduction to Contemporary Amazigh Cinema / Lucy R. McNair and Yahya Laayouni, 7
Theorizing Amazigh Cinema / Daniela Merolla, 49
Women through the Male Gaze in Amazigh Film from Algeria / Fazia Ai'tel, 81
Moroccan Amazigh-Speaking Cinema: From Amateurism to Professionalism / by Mohamed El Bouayadi, 109
Towards a New Amazigh Activist Film in Tunisia / Soubeika Bahri, 129
Widening the Scope: Conceptualizing the Indigenous Media in the Amazigh-YouTubea / Brahim El Guabli, 151
Tinghir-Jerusalem: Echoes from the Mellah as Road “Memory Film” / Sheila Petty and Brahim Benbouazza, 177
The Dynamics of the Gaze in Mohamed El Badaoui’s Solei-Man / Said Chemlal, 193
“Do I Have to Be a Woman?”: Renegotiating the Feminine in Narjiss Nejjar's Dry Eyes / Keziah Μ. Poole, 207
Global Trajectories, Localized Stories: Amazigh Filmmaking through the Eyes ofSelected Filmmakers / Habiba Boumlik, 227
Through the Festival Lens / Lucy R. McNair and Yahya Laayouni, 255