What IS Morocco?

At one point during the afternoon lecture today, our speaker Dr. Mohamed Laamiri from the Rabat Faculty of Letters said something quite mystifying: What is Morocco? You'd think that after a month of living in Rabat I'd have figured out at least a little piece of the answer. The problem is, I think this country and all its people are in somewhat of a crisis themselves. Walk into a store in Agdel, a more wealthy and visibly French-influenced section of the city, and you will find posters of white European men in suits, yet also dark-eyed Arab women with black hair down to their waists. Walk thru the narrow and white-walled streets of the medina and you see elder women in the traditional national costume of djellaba and full veil, whereas young students wear pointed and high-heeled boots and leather jackets to class in a style of modern chic. Not only does this country seem torn in its geographical loyalties (to Europe, to Africa, to the Arab world….), but also in belonging to a single generation and uniform level of modernity. From city to city, and even corner to corner, whatever Morocco is seems to change slightly: hundreds of Hollywood films – translated and boot-legged – are sold virtually by the penny in the medina of Rabat, while a one-hour train ride out of the capital may bring you to vast fields where the only wattage is supplied on the backs of donkeys. Yet in that same countryside, you’ll probably still find Maroc Telecom mobile phones, regardless of how many miles away the nearest tower is.

I made the mistake of coming here and expecting to see the continent of Africa as I had known and imagined it. I imagined hot and dry days, families that kiss and hug and take you out to celebrate, swimming in the nearby stream, and tasting all the natural fruits known to man. But although I see palm trees here and there and my friends and I rooted for Cote d’Ivoire for the Africa cup, I am constantly aware of the divide of the Sahara. Do Moroccans associate with the rest of the continent? I’ve been asking myself this question again and again since I arrived, trying to put together an answer, though complicated, that may help me to feel better about coming to Morocco to study Africa. Some students asked me last weekend why exactly I had chosen to study Africa in a place that so often looks away from the continent and so admiringly to Europe. Why did I choose Morocco? Why would anyone? To experience the exotic? To study Islam and fundamentalism and why women really wear the hijab…. but in a country that is still politically friendly to the United States and western powers. These may describe the reasons of some of my fellow American students, but for some reason I feel a minority in saying that I came to study Africa. Yet in the midst of feeling alienated from my expectations, I have come to realize that Morocco is much more complicated than it appears in guide books and study abroad material – yes, its snow-capped mountains juxtaposed against roaming Sahara dunes, but also linguistic multiplicity, massive and sudden economic growth and entrance into tourism-driven commerce, reconciling centuries of imperial history and a “modern” society that changes vastly day by day – this is the Morocco that I see.