‘We Do Not Accept Dissolution’; Algeria Abandons French Language

For more than two centuries, and during the French colonial era of Algeria, which lasted about 132 years (1830 -1962), the colonizer was keen to spread its language and culture, so the Arab Islamic country became suffering from French cultural invasion.

Recently, with the escalation of political differences between Paris and Algeria, in the wake of President Emmanuel Macron's statements in which he doubted the existence of an "Algerian nation" before French colonialism, Algeria has taken advanced steps to get rid of the French language and replace it with Arabic or English.

These steps are, according to observers, indications that the Elysee has lost a large part of its soft power and control over its old area of ​​influence in North Africa.

On the other hand, the quest of the "Country of a Million Martyrs" to transcend the colonial era once and for all, and its ancient legacy, has several advantages over current and future generations, with the completion of the liberation process that began decades ago with the outbreak of the Algerian liberation revolution, and is still continuing.

 

Split

From a crisis to another one, French–Algerian relations have been tense recently, and in early October 2021, Macron's statements, reported by Le Monde newspaper, blew up a deep problem with Algeria.

The French president questioned the existence of an Algerian nation before the French colonization of the country in 1830, wondering: "Was there an Algerian nation before the French presence in that land?"

However, Algeria's response came "quickly" when it summoned its ambassador to France for consultations, describing the French president's statements as "irresponsible."

On October 10, 2021, Algerian President Abdelmadjid Tebboune called on Paris to fully respect  his country, saying that "France should forget that Algeria was once its colony."

But the most important steps came with Algeria’s announcement of a semi-rupture with the French language. Since October 28, 2021, decisions to end dealing with the French language in several government sectors began amid calls to enhance the status of Arabic as the official language of the country, as well as support the presence of English in education.

The most severe of these decisions was adding three ministries: professional training, youth and sports, and labour, with instructions to end dealings in French, and the use of Arabic exclusively in all correspondence, reports, meetings and documents.

In addition, there was reliable information within other ministries, in the presence of verbal instructions from the highest authorities of the country, to end dealing in French within other government sectors.

But the last blow to the French language within the Algerian state system is not the result of the emerging crisis. Rather, there has been a trend for years to reduce dealing with this language.

The Algerian Ministry of Defense was the first to end dealing with French in its various military and paramilitary departments for many years, but the process accelerated during the last decade in particular, by replacing English with French in all the banners of its institutions.

This path has also been taken by the Ministry of Justice over the past years, by replacing Arabic with French in its administrative dealings, and judges refuse to try French-speaking defendants without the presence of translators, and they issue and document their judgments exclusively in Arabic.

On October 27, 2021, Abderrazak Kassoum, head of the Algerian Muslim Scholars Association, the country's largest gathering of preachers, declared that the best response to Macron's insulting statements to Algeria "is the complete abandonment of France's language and culture."

Kassoum told the official Turkish Anadolu Agency that the best answer is unity of class and word, it means abandoning the language and culture of the enemy and everything that would harm Algeria sovereignty and identity.

 

No to French

Algeria usually witnesses controversy over the status of "French" in official circles in the first place, and social as well, as opponents, especially nationalist and Islamist conservatives, protest against official letters in French, especially the documents in government departments in this foreign language, which represents a threat to national security.

This phenomenon prompted the Algerian sociologist, Rabah Saad, to publish his book in 2015, entitled “Algeria and the French or Shared Heterosexual Language”, providing an advanced treatment of the identity crisis between the Arabic language, which represents Algerian society as a symbol of its identity and religion, and the French language, which still imposes its existence even though it symbolizes colonialism.

Saad added that “it can be said that the rooting of the French language in the living reality of the Algerian and in their collective imagination is due to facts that should not be denied to understand the emotional contradiction experienced by the society between the fascination with the magic of French culture and its language as it is the most consuming society, and the discourse rejecting it as a foreign language that symbolizes the existence of colonial hostility in a bygone era."

He stated that "French represented for a long time a language that Algerians used in their transition from a tribal society to a unified state based on administrative institutions, on the one hand, and on the other hand, the fact that most of the elite studying after independence was more French than Arabic."

This is what the two Algerian writers Hamdan Khoja and Ahmed Bey emphasized in their book “Manifestations of Resistance to the French Policy and the Preservation of the Arabic Language” in which they stated that “the French committed cultural crimes that wanted to erase the origins of the Algerian people similar to what European settlement did in America.”

However, according to the writers, the Algerian people, with its different sects, proved the solidity, and the strength of its civilizational affiliation from the beginning until independence.

 

Cultural Awareness

Algerian lawyer Kassem Yahya described France as "the historical archenemy of the Algerian nation," stressing this by saying that no enemy harmed Algeria and its people as the French colonizer did.

Yahya explained in an interview with Al-Estiklal that "Algeria has paid more than a million martyrs, and it is resisting and demanding the French exit from its country, which has looted its resources for 130 whole years full of corruption and sabotage, and attempts to change identity and obliterate history, turning it into a purely French province.Al-Elal that "Algeria has paid more than a million martyrs, and it is resisting and demanding the French exit from its country, which has looted its resources for 130 whole years full of corruption and sabotage, and attempts to change identity and obliterate history, turning it into a purely French province.

Yahya also said that “with all that, we must not forget that the problem of the French language within Algerian society cannot be easily changed, as a result of the old and rooted collective cultural and historical awareness.”

The lawyer stressed that “the project to transcend the language and consolidate the mother tongue is a national project that requires full cooperation from state agencies, civic organizations and associations of various social and religious orientations."