Abstract
ABSTRACTThis article compares the treatment of memory and the transmission of memory in Yamina Benguigui's Mémoires d'immigrés: l'héritage maghrébin (1997) with the treatment of these themes in five other documentaries directed by Maghrebi-French women—all of which were released after Mémoires d'immigrés: Yasmina Kherfi's Mes voisines mes copines (2002), Djamila Sfaxi's À ma mère (2003), Rahma Benhamou El Madani's Du côté de chez soi (2003), Soraya Nini's 24 heures dans la Life de ma mère (2007) and Fatima Sissani's La langue de Zahra (2011). It argues that in contrast to Benguigui's foregrounding of collective experiences of Maghrebi migrant women in Mémoires d'immigrés, these five documentaries highlight the specificity of the memories and experiences of the directors' mothers and in doing so problematize the very idea that there exists a collective trajectory or set of experiences with regard to Maghrebi migrants in France. When considered together, these films reflect a shift away from the universalizing and collective view of Maghrebi migration that is set forth in Benguigui's documentary.
Highlights
When film-maker Yamina Benguigui’s documentary Mémoires d’immigrés: l’héritage maghrébin/Immigrant Memories: the North African Inheritance was broadcast on the private television network Canal+ in 1997, it received widespread popular and critical acclaim, and its success was reflected by the film’s release in theatres in 1998
Sylvie Durmelat characterizes Benguigui’s work in Mémoires d’immigrés as that of a ‘memory entrepreneuse’, a concept proposed by Gérard Noiriel
As Durmelat explains: According to Noiriel (1995, p. 380), for a collective memory to emerge, individual recollections must necessarily be objectivized by a process of naming, fixed in writing, and continuously recalled by monuments and other forms of commemoration
Summary
Daughters, and the Transmission of Memory in Documentaries Directed by Women of Maghrebi Origin in France. The University of Rhode Island Faculty have made this article openly available. Please let us know how Open Access to this research benefits you. "Mothers, daughters, and the transmission of memory in documentaries directed by women of Maghrebi origin in France." Studies in French Cinema, vol 13, no. Daughters, and the transmission of memory in documentaries directed by women of Maghrebi origin in France Leslie Kealhofer, University of Rhode Island
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