Femmes, Culture et Societe au Maghreb, 2 vols.(Review)

Rahma Bourquia, Mounira Charrad, Nancy Gallagher, eds., Femmes, Culture et Societe au Maghreb, Vol. I Culture, femmes et famille, Vol. II Femmes, pouvoir politique et developpement. Editions Afrique Orient: Casablanca, 1996. Vol. I 183 pp., Vol. II 205pp.

This an edited work in two volumes on women in North Africa. It is based on a 1991 conference entitled "Women, State and Development in the Maghreb," organized by the American Institute for Maghribi Studies (AIMS) in Tangiers. The participants were U.S. and Maghribi sociologists, anthropologists, political scientists and legal scholars who have worked for years on gender issues in the region.

The first volume is primarily anthropological, focusing on issues of culture, values, and identity in North Africa. It is made up of an introduction and nine chapters, seven of which are on Morocco and two on Algeria. There are no chapters on Tunisia, Libya, or, for that matter, Mauritania (which is politically part of the region as member of the Arab Maghribi Union). Although it covers various regions of rural and urban Morocco, it contributes little that is new in content or in theory to the existing knowledge of North Africa. It does, however, provide a wide geographical tour d'horizon of Morocco, and examines …