Habiba DjahnineMemory Bearer

Shortlisted for the Jennifer Welsh Scholarly Writing Award at the Saskatchewan Book Awards

Explores the work and legacy of feminist documentary filmmaker, Habiba Djahnine

• Provides readers with exposure to key issues in contemporary Algerian culture, history and society
• Contributes to the current debate on memory and trauma in Algerian society
• Provides the reader with exposure to Algerian Kabyle issues expressed through documentary film
• 6 case studies of individual films provide an overview of the filmmaker’s vision of social change in contemporary Algeria
• Offers a new approach to the under-researched cinema of North Africa

This volume focuses on contemporary Algerian feminist documentary filmmaker Habiba Djahnine as a ‘memory-bearer’ who gives voice to her compatriots to tell their own stories in her films. It provides the reader with exposure to key issues in contemporary Algerian culture and history (colonial, the Algerian War, the Black Decade of the 1990s), memory and women’s and human rights.

The book gives a brief overview of Algerian cinema, Algerian women filmmakers and situates Djahnine’s oeuvre and its significance within the North African context. It examines her work as a feminist, teacher and poet and how she transmits this locally and transnationally.

The book also explores how Djahnine uses documentary film form for personal and autobiographical explorations of Algerian history, culture, memory and trauma.