Resistance in a Minority Language

The fourth chapter examines the role of marginalized characters in Moroccan novels about education. Leila Abouzeid’s Al Fasl al-akhir (The Last Chapter) and Brick Oussaïd’s Les coquelicots de l’Oriental (published in English as The Mountains Forgotten by God) feature protagonists who position themselves as “spokespeople” for individuals who did not fit the vision of the classroom as a male and Arab space. Leila Abouzeid’s work features women’s voices in dialect, privileging both speakers and linguistic registers excluded from Arabized education. Brick Oussaïd’s work depicts an Amazigh protagonist who does not see his community reflected in school curricula. The chapter explores the problems inherent in “teaching” readers about the experiences of others through literature. Yet it also discusses the important potential for authors to write narratives from perspectives that are not often heard in the classroom, and make them heard there as these texts have the chance to become part of the classroom canon.