The Representation of the Algerian Muslim Women from Western and Eastern Lenses Trough “Women of Algiers in Their Apartment”

Abstract

The present research sheds some light on ‘Orientalism’, ‘Colonialism’ and ‘Postcolonialism’, that open the way to understand the reasons and the shape of the westerns view of the Eastern world. However, since Algeria is an African Arab, and specially, Islamic nation, it was subject to colonialism and one of the Orientalists topics. Therefore, this research took Algeria as a case study to this western phenomenon during the 19th century. Also, the dissertation presents the great French artist Eugene Delacroix with his painting Women of Algiers in Their Apartment as an illustration to the western or colonizer description and imagination about the Arab Islamic society, and this example is about the Algerian woman indeed. The analyses of the artist personality and identity and his portrait leads to discover what is real and what is nothing but a French colonial fantasy. Furthermore, the research presents the original Oriental side that is represented in the novel of Women of Algiers in Their Apartment by the Algerian writer Assia Djebar, which was a respond and a defence of the real Algerian identity against the colonizer attacks. Thus, the overall aim of this study is to investigate both colonized and colonizer’s point of view of the position of the Algerian Muslim women in the 19th century throughout an analytical artistic historical work.