This study focuses on the works of Albert Camus, Jacques Derrida, and Hélène Cixous, and discusses the relationship between the childhood memories of an Algerian-born French writer (pied-noir) and colonial Algeria.
The so-called 'Algerian French-sp ...
This study focuses on the works of Albert Camus, Jacques Derrida, and Hélène Cixous, and discusses the relationship between the childhood memories of an Algerian-born French writer (pied-noir) and colonial Algeria.
The so-called 'Algerian French-speaking literature' focused on personal and historical narratives surrounding the French occupation of Algeria, the Algerian War, and the independent state of Algeria. Before and after the Setif Uprising in 1945, 'Modern Algerian Literature' was formed centering on indigenous Algerian writers who were creative in French. The change in the lives of civilians and the problem of identity formation are novelized.
However, the colonial system and multilingual and multicultural aspects experienced by Algerian indigenous writers who were educated in France and wrote in French are different from those of pied noir, an Algerian-born French. The relationship between pied noir and the colonized country and French is interesting in that it presents the status of the borderliner in a different way from the economic, cultural, and social alienation experienced by the colonized. In particular, their autobiographical writings describing their childhood experiences and memories shed light on the character of the colonial system that affects identity formation and the multi-layered aspect of colonial Algeria. In this regard, this study breaks away from the dichotomy of 'colonized Algerians' and 'colonial Frenchmen', and is an important actor in the history of French Algeria for more than 130 years, and can be called 'insider and outsider' at the same time. Through the writings of pied noir, I want to explore the complex aspects of the interlocked history of Algeria and France. However, this study tries to break away from the point of view of generalizing pied noir writers into a single group or reducing their writing to some characteristics in the study of pied noir literature. As exemplified by Marie Cardinal's work, the nostalgia of a 'beautiful and positive past' contrasted with the 'pain of the present', an uprooted state in her hometown, dominates the work. Such a view carries the risk of embellishment of the reality of colonial Algeria as a unified point of view, or of reproducing blind nostalgia.
With these limitations in mind, Camus, Derrida, and Cixous will be mainly studied to deepen the problem awareness of this study. The reason for choosing the author and the necessity of research can be emphasized as follows. First, the multilingual and multicultural experiences of french writers from Algeria, who occupy an important position in the french ideological and literary circles, are a key factor for understanding the overall world of their work. In other words, rather than the fact that the biographical fact that the three writers are pied noir itself is important, we can deepen our research on writers by paying attention to the relationship between their writings related to their childhood identity in Algeria and their other works. Secondly, each author's autobiographical narratives intriguingly present the aspect in which the elements of class, race, and gender are combined with the colonial system from the point of view of the french who belonged to the colonists. For example, Le Premier homme sensitively reveals the relationship between the biographical facts of Camus, a descendant of poor french immigrants, and the exploitative nature of the colonial system. Also, the bond between Derrida and Cixous may be a fundamental factor in shaping the self-perception of Algeria as a minority in the European community. And the relationship between the mother of Cixous, a Jew who immigrated to Algeria from Germany. It serves as an important opportunity to form her feminist perception regarding Oran, her childhood space. For example, Keilng Wei's study deals with the importance of Algeria to the three authors, but since it only lists individual characteristics, it does not lead to a comprehensive understanding of the relationship between the artists. So this study not only provides a meaningful reflection on the relationship between colonial memory and autobiographical narratives in the field of memory research, but also provides a meaningful reflection on French literature by examining their relationship with a focus on several issues through the study of individual authors.