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UC San Diego UC San Diego Electronic Theses and Dissertations Title Modernity in question : retrieving imaginaries of the transcontinental Mediterranean Permalink https://escholarship.org/uc/item/9ck6n2md Author Tamalet, Edwige Publication Date 2009 Peer reviewed|Thesis/dissertation eScholarship.org Powered by the California Digital Library University of California 1 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, SAN DIEGO Modernity in Question: Retrieving Imaginaries of the Transcontinental Mediterranean A Dissertation submitted in partial satisfaction of the Requirements for the degree Doctor of Philosophy in Literature by Edwige Tamalet Committee in charge: Professor Winifred Woodhull, Chair Professor Michael Davidson Professor Rosemary George Professor Hasan Kayali Professor Lisa Lowe Professor Oumelbanine Zhiri 2009 1 2 © Edwige Tamalet, 2009 All rights reserved. 2 iii The Dissertation of Edwige Tamalet is approved, and it is acceptable in quality and form for publication on microfilm and electronically: Chair University of California, San Diego 2009 iii iv In Memory of my Father Francis Tamalet (1948-2008) Диярға көзімнің жарығыма , жүрегімнің дүрсіліме iv v TABLE OF CONTENTS Signature Page…………………………………………………………………..…… iii Dedication…………………………………………………………………………......iv Table of Contents………………………………………………………………………v Acknowledgements…………………………………………………………..………..vi Vita……………………………………………………………………………………..x Abstract………………………………………………………………………………..xi Introduction…………………………………………………………………………….1 Chapter I: Critical Mediterranean Modernities………………………...…………………...........26 Chapter II: An Odyssey of No Return: L’Ecole d’Alger’ s “Eternal Mediterranean”……………..81 Chapter III: “Traduit du Silence:” Jean El Mouhoub Amrouche’s National Poetics of Memory..132 Chapter IV: Contemporary Maghrebi Poetry and the Challenge of Globalization……………….183 Epilogue: For a Mediterranean Space of Mediation…………………………………………....224 Bibliography…………………………………………………………………………234 v vi ACKNOWLEDGMENTS This dissertation and, beyond, the life project that has stemmed from it, would not have been possible without several inspiring encounters that have left indelible imprints upon my life. Elisabeth Manivel lavished support and loyalty in difficult times. Her unending generosity and genuine affability only made subsequent academic success possible. I would not be where I am without her. Román de la Campa and Robert Harvey guided my first steps in American academia. Their collegiality and genuine enthusiasm for the profession showed me that another approach to scholarly work was possible and inspired me to move away from everything that I knew. I owe them what has become my life passion. Winnie Woodhull has been the best friend and mentor that I could imagine having during these momentous few years. Her endless support and continuous encouragements spurred me to plot a new course that I may not have dared to chart on my own. I am indebted to her for always seeing me as a person as well as a student and for insisting that true success does not come at the expense of a balanced, fulfilling life. I thank her for bringing perspective into a game where it is so easy to lose oneself. My wonderful committee members have played a crucial role in helping me to complete this project. Michael Davidson, Rosemary Marangoly George (who deserves special thanks for directing me to Mediterranean Studies), Hasan Kayali, Lisa Lowe, and Nina Zhiri all showed tremendous support of my work and shared keen insights throughout the process. I regard them as the kind of invested and rigorous academics that I aim to become. Other faculty members from the Department of Literature have vi vii proved invaluable in their help and advice. I am particularly grateful to Luis Martín- Cabrera and Marcel Hénaff for their much-appreciated suggestions and their long- standing interest in my project. Catherine Ploye has been instrumental in fostering my inclination toward teaching. I commend her dedication to her students and the care and attention that goes into her work in the French program. Special thanks go to my two loyal friends in the department, Gabriela McEvoy and Chunhui Peng, whose advice has proved precious over the years. Finally, none of this would have been possible without the competence and heart-felt kindness of the fantastic staff of the UCSD Department of Literature: Ana Minvielle, Thom Hill, Nancy Daly, and Dawn Blessman. This project would certainly have taken a very different turn were it not for the stimulating discussions and insightful feedback from which I benefited in several stages of the writing. Alec Hargreaves has proved a very careful, conscientious reader and much of chapter 2 bears the mark of his insightful comments. I wish to thank him and Jean-Marc Moura for providing my then budding project with a forum of dissemination. For their encouragements and invigorating comments, my gratitude goes to Jean-Godefroy Bidima, Jason Herbeck, Richard Watts, Felicia McCarren, Mark Wollaeger, Guy Dugas, Cristián Ricci, and Christopher Miller. Claudia Esposito deserves special thanks for her indefectible friendship. Her invaluable guidance and optimism in my grueling year on the job market convinced me that there was indeed a light at the end of the tunnel. vii viii My research was facilitated by the generous help of several contributors. I thank the UCSD Center for the Humanities, the Columbia University Center for European Studies, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, and the Northeast Modern Language Association for subsidizing two trips to Europe and give me access to archival sites in France and Spain. I also wish to thank the UCSD Department of Literature for granting me a dissertation-year fellowship, which allowed me to dedicate my last year in the program exclusively to the writing of these pages. I am grateful to the staff of the Centre des Archives d’Outre-Mer in Aix-en-Provence for helping navigate their colossal collection. I am particularly indebted to Florence Chaudoreille and Professor Guy Dugas of the Fonds Roblés- Patrimoine Méditerranéen at the Université Paul Valéry in Montpellier, France for their open door and friendly assistance. In the Biblioteca Nacional Espanola , Isabel Mayor Domingo proved exceptionally helpful, as did Dolores Acosta Mira from the Universidad de Málaga. Finally, for making research in the Land of Enchantment possible, I wish to thank Richard Norton and the library staff at the University of New Mexico-Los Alamos. As for the others, the ones closest to the heart, you already know how much I owe you. Chapter 2, in part, has appeared as “Between nostalgia and desire: L’Ecole d’Alger’ s transnational identifications and the case for a Mediterranean relation .” International viii ix Journal of Francophone Studies 10.3 (Nov. 2007): 359-376 (© Intellect Ltd. 2007). The author of this dissertation was the sole author of this material. Chapter 3, in part, has been submitted for publication and will appear as “Alternate Symbolist Geographies: Berber Poetry and the Issue of Derivation.” The Oxford Handbook of Global Modernism. Ed. Mark Wollaeger. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press (forthcoming). The author of this dissertation was the sole author of this material. Two of the texts addressed in chapter 3- “Saint Stéphane Mallarmé,” La Tunisie Française Littéraire (21 Mars 1941) and Armand Guibert , Jean Amrouche (1906- 1962) par un témoin de sa vie- were procured from the Fonds Roblés- Patrimoine Méditerranéen at the Université Paul Valéry- Montpellier III, France. ix x VITA 2002: • Licence de Français Langue Etrangère summa cum laude (Teaching of French as a Second or Other Language), French Department, Université Paris IV-Sorbonne , France. • Licence d’anglais cum laude, English Department, Université Paris IV-Sorbonne , France. 2003: • Maîtrise d’anglais summa cum laude (Bachelor of Arts), English Department, Université Paris IV-Sorbonne, France. 2004: • Agrégation d’anglais (Master of Arts), Université Paris III-Sorbonne Nouvelle , France. 2006 • Candidate in Philosophy, Department of Literature, University of California, San Diego. 2009: • Doctor of Philosophy, Department of Literature, University of California, San Diego. PUBLICATIONS • “Alternate Symbolist Geographies: Berber Poetry and the Issue of Derivation.” Chapter forthcoming in the Oxford Handbook of Global Modernism . Ed. Mark Wollaeger. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press. • “‘An Invincible Czech Horde’: Moravian Folklore, Modernity, Resurgences.” Article forthcoming with Folklorica (2010). • “Investigating Mediterranean Memories.” Invited for publication in The European Studies Forum . Forthcoming Spring 2009. • “Between nostalgia and desire: l’Ecole d’Alger’s transnational identification and the case for a Mediterranean relation. ” International Journal of Francophone Studies , Alec G. Hargreaves and J.-M. Moura guest editors, 10.3 (November 2007): 359-376. x xi ABSTRACT OF THE DISSERTATION Modernity in Question: Retrieving Imaginaries of the Transcontinental Mediterranean by Edwige Tamalet Doctor of Philosophy in Literature University of California, San Diego, 2009 Professor Winifred Woodhull, Chair This project focuses on submerged utopias of the Mediterranean crucible in the imaginative work of colonial and postcolonial authors from the Maghreb (and related space of Gibraltar) throughout the twentieth century. The authors discussed in this project have employed literary creation as a vector of resistance to fixed representations of subjectivity reliant on coercive national frameworks marked by the