Abdelatif Aguenini,
Florida State University, The United States of America
Assia Djebar, a prominent voice in Maghrebi literature, grew up in multilingual and multicultural colonial and postcolonial Algeria. She employed a blend of French and Arabic in her works to reflect the complex linguistic and cultural dynamics of her environment. This paper examines how Djebar’s use of code-switching serves as a narrative strategy to challenge colonial legacies, reclaim indigenous identity, and navigate intersections of gender, language, and power. Drawing on key texts such as L’amour, la fantasia, La femme sans sépulture, and La disparition de la langue française, this study explores the function of multilingualism in Djebar’s writing. It argues that her deliberate language shifts mirror the fragmented identity of postcolonial subjects and subvert the dominance of the French language imposed by colonial rule. Through code-switching, Djebar’s characters articulate resistance, trauma, and resilience in both the colonizer’s language and their mother tongue(s). The analysis also considers the gendered dimension of code-switching, highlighting how Djebar’s female characters use language fluidity to navigate oppressive structures. By destabilizing linguistic boundaries, Djebar’s work comments on identity hybridity in a postcolonial context and the dual role of language as both a tool of oppression and a means of liberation.
Keywords: Multilingualism, Code-Switching, Gender, Identity
The above abstract is a part of the article which was accepted at The 10th International Conference on Languages, Linguistics, Translation and Literature (WWW.TLLL.IR), 1-2 February 2025, Ahwaz.
