The Emancipation of the Maghrebian Woman in Le Gone du Chaâba by Azouz Begag

Abstract

This paper critically examines the evolving status and emancipation of Maghrebian women in Azouz Begag’s semi-autobiographical novel Le Gone du Chaâba, using feminist literary criticism within a postcolonial framework. While existing scholarship often centres on the male immigrant experience and bicultural identity in Begag’s work, this study shifts the focus to female characters who, though positioned peripherally in the narrative, articulate significant forms of resistance and agency. Set in the socio-historical context of 1960s France—a period of intensified North African immigration and cultural negotiation—the novel offers insight into how women navigate traditional constraints within a diasporic environment shaped by French secularism and evolving gender norms. The analysis identifies three primary pathways to emancipation: education, economic participation, and cultural reorientation through the French socio-legal framework. Female characters such as Zohra and Zidouma engage in subversive acts, from controlling access to language and knowledge to confronting male authority in public and adopting symbolic elements of Western modernity. These acts, although subtle and often mediated through male narration, represent a departure from the expected roles of submissive wives and mothers, suggesting a redefinition of gender identity in diaspora. The paper also incorporates intertextual comparisons with the works of Assia Djebar and Leïla Sebbar, thereby situating Begag’s narrative within a broader literary discourse on Maghrebian womanhood, resistance, and postcolonial transformation. By doing so, it demonstrates that Le Gone du Chaâba not only reflects the socio-cultural tensions of its time but also contributes meaningfully to the feminist critique of patriarchal systems in both homeland and hostland. Ultimately, this study argues that Begag’s novel, though centred on a male protagonist, participates in a wider literary project of articulating female emancipation in North African diaspora literature.