20 April 2007

For Spring and April 20th.

I D I R
"Born in the village of Aït Lahcêne in Kabylia, Idir has never turned from the path he started down with a talent contest on Algerian broadcasting in 1973 and continued to follow in Paris with his still unforgettable hit – surely one of the great songs of the century – ‘A Vava Inouva’ ..., presented in Algeria in 1973 and recorded on a Pathé-Marconi album in 1976). Sweetness, swaying melody, the use of a guitar borrowed from folk music and meaningful lyrics: that is how the Kabyles, belonging to a supposed minority group and speaking tamarzight, and not Arabic, changed the face of Algerian music, as would raï from Oran a few years later.
In Paris, Idir would watch history being made in his country: the Berber Spring, the revolt against the central authorities in 1980, the massacre of civilians in the nineties.

Idir has constantly supported national reconciliation and anti-fanaticism, organising ‘Algérie, la vie’ (Algeria, life), a concert where he performed with the Arabic-speaker Khaled in 1995, and joining the tribute to Matoub Lounès, murdered in June 1998". (ref.)
(Read more...)
My gift to all friends for "tafsut Tamazight" for life to continue....


09 April 2007

what is the word?

Not all Words count.

There are words on every possible surface. Newspapers. Websites. Joumua speeches. Words that come right out of speakers of radios and televisions. Words from podcasts and words from café places. Clouds of disturbing words and streams of verbiage and all the possible pitches tones.

Hearing all the words of all kinds all the time is a really hard thing to do. Words that you agree with and those you don’t. the creation of words. The industry of words. Oh my … words at school. in every single corner. No one can escape all these floods of verbiage coming right into your ears from every where. And people say “ they should not say it like that” “why would any one say that” “ willi hshuma.. ma khassoush igul hakak” ( shame, he should not say that).

Sick: a wordly self-description of an acoustic illness.. or just tired of reading about political nonsense.

All the above and bellow is added to the big pile of verbiage recreation.

We are spending centuries on the study of these things. We created grammar and linguistics to make sure our words are well studied. We are creating every minute thousands of descriptions and illustrations. We are the rational ones. We discard other peoples words when they are different. We call that "foreign languages" thought we created declarations of cultural and linguistic rights of indigenous peoples. We like to hear them singing their own words and they all say staff. things we never understand.

We created English that millions of people now have to study to find a seat on the train of development and civility. French. German. that's it. We created the ability to speak for speakers and adapted sign language to fir images of “normal” verbiage.. the one with sounds. We abused of the 90 of non verbal indicators to our own semantics. We know how it all works: no verb no life. If you do not speak the right way, you do not deserve to be.

Speak. Say. Sound. Hint. Splash. Vomit. Write. Spell. Admit. Surrender. Say yes. Forget. Buy. Pay. Go. Come back. Buy. Pay. Go. Next. Please. Buy. Pay. Go. Forget. Buy again. do not watch how many people we kill. Just buy. Staff. things. Speak. Don’t speak. We don’t care. Shut up.

Shut up: a violent way of stopping unwelcome sounds from fellow humans we know we would disagree with before really listen to them. that is shut shut up.

what if i don't.


04 April 2007

Cafe Normale politics






Whatever happens in the future elections in Morocco, it is going to bring all the pains back from ages past. It is a sticky situation in here and it is all about general changes and big disorientations.

After the fall of the global model and western democracy and the rise of political Christianity and political Islam people in "the Moroccan café" are thinking about all different ways of pulling out the cart out of the mud of IMF and world Bank with all the promises that we were given since since 1787, 1956 and 1999. we were going to be the good friends submissive and quite... manifest destiny a la morcaine.

All his is falling apart. The image of Marikan (US) is being re-sculptured in most of the heads of Moroccans. It was thought to us at school and fed to us with morning croissants that Marikan is top and the world has to follow. We are going to develop following the foot prints of the western countries inevitably. the "noble savages that we are", we are going to follow ever "the voice of America" broadcasts to us..

Rest a dire, the Moroccan elitist scholarly political craftsmen understand the impact of all their politics on our own choices. i mean, there is definitely a huge gap between how people in morocco make sense of their politics and how those who talk for them understand it. Rulers have to follow what wall street thinks is good for us. ideas have always been crafted somewhere else.

Moroccans for this end are trying to make their own way to understand and catch up. They have been herded for years by an Muslim arabized pro-western leaders to the end of the trail. Now we are all stuck, well.. with the rest of the third world in this machine that holds us accountable for things we have not at all decided. When a political party decided they want to go the Amazigh way, for instance, they were banned. It is scary to be different.. but when PJD decided to operate, they became rulers and a predicted majority.

Now that most of the political parties in this country have been "tried enough", people are looking for other alternatives. People in low classes, the poor and the very poor are not even in the picture. And those are Amazigh people of the mountains and sahara deserts. The middle classes have a tight passage to economical stability. They are loosing everyday, as more and more space is provided for free zones and international big businesses. The Makhzenian, sherifan and Fassi aristocracies are almost loosing grounds for more radical groups that are thought to have finally found the dream and every one will be saved. PJD in its initial form had a unique approach to politics and iconics. In 1992 Abdelilah Benkiran, one of the founding fathers of the PJD ideology said that democracy is a necessary evil”, “ democracy is a bida’a ( a bad invention) made by the west to rule the world” however it is according to his a “democracy is a necessary evil”. They are going to embrace the game of democracy and when they get to the government they are going to change the whole thing and rule by shari’a. this is a huge game that requires a lot of preps and props. They PJG followers are going to wear Nikies , jeans and leather Jackets , shave their beards and look cool and hip. Instead if the old afghani look of the other Ikhwnjiya of Aladl wa Lihsan , shabiba and other groups. they will be all over the place.

They made it in morocco for what ever reason.

They are gaining more ground regardless of the constant warnings of people at both the university and the café. This is the reality, weather we like it or not, political Islam and political Christianity are growing as part of a globalized word order, they are the same side of the coin. May be the wrong side of the coin but they are the currency that lots of people want to use. Maybe they feel they have to use it.