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Anglo-Saxon Attitudes: The Algerian War of Independence in Retrospect

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 January 2009

Michael Brett
Michael Brett
Affiliation:
School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London
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Extract

The English-language literature on Algeria generated by the Algerian war of independence and continuing down to the present forms an intellectual as well as linguistic tradition apart from the much more voluminous literature in French. Despite the involvement of French and North African writers who have published in English, it is largely the creation of outsiders looking at the country from British and North American points of view, according to current fashions. The war of independence remains central to its concerns as the great transformer of a colonial into a national society, however that transformation is to be understood. The qualified approval of the nationalist cause by Alistair Horne contrasts sharply with Elie Kedourie's denunciation. Most judgements have been based on the outcome, the political, social and economic performance of the regime, considered as good or bad. Since the death of Boumedienne in 1978, they have tended to be unfavourable. Their largely secular analyses, however, have been called in question since 1988 by the rise of political Islam, which has called for a reappraisal of the whole subject of the war and its consequences. Such a reappraisal is still in the future. Meanwhile Ernest Gellner, in dispute with Edward Said over the question of Orientalism, has raised the matter of the role of Islam in the history of Algeria to a high level of generalization, at which the war itself may, paradoxically, return to the forefront of international scholarly concern.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Journal of African History , Volume 35 , Issue 2 , July 1994 , pp. 217 - 235
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1994

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