tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-67152063075084718592024-02-21T06:02:56.561+01:00bisahha: Adventures in MoroccoI recently moved to Morocco for two years of research. These are my observations, reflections, and occasional frustrations from the fieldUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger131125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6715206307508471859.post-19409577922920052712010-11-15T11:37:00.007+00:002010-11-15T11:52:43.545+00:00Purring (with) Demons<!--StartFragment--> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">The sign over the door read “Animal Shelter.”</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">It tipped our fragile determination off the center of its balance. Had we misunderstood the directions? They </span></span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">had</span></span></i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> been fairly cryptic – which had seemed only fitting to the nature of our quest. Or was this a clever ruse, perhaps – were we about to engage in something so taboo that a simple unmarked door was not enough disguise? … would we then need a special password to penetrate this curtain of appearance?</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">My nervous thoughts were interrupted by the sound of keys turning in the lock. The heavy iron door opened to reveal a young girl in pink headscarf and pajamas. She smiled sweetly, and gestured for us to come inside.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">I hesitated for a moment, confused by the unexpected normalcy of this encounter. Then, in an attempt to reach out and restore some semblance of balance, we whispered the blunt statement that would yank away the shroud – and either confirm or deny the reality of the mystery we had come in search of.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">“Uhm… We’re here for the exorcism?”</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">The girl nodded again, her expression unchanged. “Right this way,” she said with an encouraging smile, and ushered us in. We were led down a sterile, eggshell hallway; windows along its right-hand wall revealed a patio-turned-terrarium-turned-site of feline urban sprawl. Hundreds of cats darted in, out, and between the iron-grid walls of a metropolis constructed of animal cages.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">“You don’t mind cats, do you?” The girl asked, inevitably rhetorically. “We run a shelter for stray animals here.” She turned left, and gestured toward a bare-walled sitting room down the corridor. “He will be right with you.”</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">With another polite smile she left us there, and returned to her cats. For a moment we stood there silently, awkwardly in the doorway, and regarded the room in front of us. Though perhaps less fancy than usual, it was a Moroccan sitting room like any other. Brocaded </span></span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">sdader <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: normal;">(1)</span></span></span></i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> lined all four walls, a well-worn rug spanned the sea between them, and a mobile coffee table stood at attention in the center, ready to be rolled to any of the four corners. An overeager, high wattage bulb hung from a wire in the ceiling and boldly shed light on every crevice, depriving the space of any intimacy. This room, too, was populated by a citizenry of cats. A group of kittens huddled, close together, in the corners between couch cushions while their older, more adventurous cousins chased each other around the room in games of adventure and daring. Underneath the coffee table, a few others were enjoying a dinner of fish carcasses – all the while keeping a wary eye on potential thieves.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">We took the plunge; stepping over slithering tails and writhing mounds of fur we made our way to a corner of sofa, and carefully sat down. Silently we waited, though not quite knowing for what. Across the room, an older cat tirelessly jumped from one cardboard box to another, in a game of its own invention. It became ever wilder in its jumps, their force propelling the boxes all over the room. Claire and I looked at each other and laughed at the thought that had crossed both our minds:</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">“You think that cat’s possessed?”</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">With a broad smile and a “bon soir,” the exorcist then made his entrance. A short, thin, big-bearded old man dressed in white of ambiguous meaning: traditional sarwal down below, Nike dry-fit t-shirt on top.</span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> </span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">We returned his greeting with an ambivalent smile: nervousness down below, eagerness on top. Once again, we uttered that strange sentence that seemed so unexpectedly out of place here: “we’re here for the exorcism?”</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">“Yes, yes,” the man responded nonchalantly. “Marhba, marhba.” </span></span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Welcome</span></span></i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">“Other foreigners have come to my exorcisms, too,” he continued, in fluent French. “They’re very interested. And of course I’ve spent a lot of time in Europe, myself. But they don’t like Moroccans in Europe. Yes, I’ve been to France, Switzerland; I even studied in Sweden. My father was a diplomat; I had a diplomatic passport. I have a son, now, who studies in France. Oh, but despite that diplomatic passport, I had so many issues at airports. I was always searched. Of course back then, I didn’t understand why. …”</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">So began an hour-long monologue; a mental voyage back in time, around the world, and – as we had hoped – into the mysterious world of spirits and possession. He wove his theories into the fabric of his stories as though the topic was no more surreal than the hundreds of cats crawling around us. I sat perched on the edge of the couch, my mouth perpetually open in an attempted question – but the man tirelessly spoke, seemingly deaf to our occasional comments.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Meanwhile, the normal activities of an animal shelter continued around us. A family of three had come in and was now being tended to by the girl in pink – undoubtedly the exorcist’s daughter. At their request she picked up and displayed a sequence of cats, helped them choose the perfect pet, packed it in an aerated cardboard box, and then sent the family on its way with all requisite materials.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">“… Of course, possession is extremely common in Morocco,” the exorcist continued. He had pulled up a stool and seated himself in front of us – back turned to the daughter, who was now covered in crawling cats. “At least 80% of all Moroccan women are possessed.”</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">He had anticipated the surprise in our eyes. “Yes, really,” he said. “It’s the parents’ fault. They go see a sorcerer, thinking that they’re protecting their daughters against extramarital sexual encounters, but once the time comes to get them married off, they discover it’s not that easy to get rid of a demon.”</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">The exorcist’s daughter seemed oblivious to the surreal stories her father was telling us. Her attention was claimed entirely by the throng of unruly cats climbing across her shoulders. Gently she attempted now to instill some discipline, picking each one off her body to administer a dosage of medication and releasing it onto the floor – only to have it crawl back up her legs.</span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> </span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">I managed to interject a question. “Does possession always occur through a sorcerer?”</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">“Not always,” the exorcist responded. “There’s also the evil eye. But most of the time it’s a sorcerer (2). They’re all charlatans. They’ll do anything for those poor naïve parents, as long as they pay – but they’re playing dangerous games. By the time the daughter’s old enough to get married and you need him to undo the spell, the sorcerer will be gone, or dead, and there’ll be no way of finding out where he buried it (3). And then they come to me, in the hopes that I can help them out.”</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">“And do boys get possessed too?”</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">“Yes, yes, sometimes parents do it for boys as well. But most often it’s girls. Of course, </span></span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">I’m</span></span></i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> possessed. I have been, since childhood. I found out because someone told me. Some people can see demons, you know, just like they can see human beings. This person saw my demon – he saw him, with horns and everything – and he told me, ‘you have a demon up there on your shoulder.”</span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> </span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">The exorcist leaned down, gently purred at and petted the cat that had nestled itself in between his feet, then continued. “I can see them, too – but I usually see them wrapped up in sheets. I can’t see their face.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">“I’ve been possessed since I was six, but for a long time the demon didn’t bother me. It wasn’t until I became more religious that he tried to conquer me. Demons can’t stand prayer, or the Qur’an. But I dealt with it, I still prayed.”</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">The exorcist here segued into a tangent about his religious credentials, and described what it was like to be the only Arab in a Saudi Arabian class on Islamic theology (4). In terms of piety, he explained, he had been somewhat of a late bloomer.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">His stories were only marginally disturbed by the entrance of a tall young man. Thin as a rod, he regarded us shyly with sallow, sunken eyes and announced his presence with a soft and polite “salam aleikum.” Behind him followed a woman, his mother: half as long and three times as wide as he, wrapped up in scarves and jellaba. The exorcist briefly acknowledged them both with another “marhba,” and gestured toward a spot on the sofa. He had just been telling us of the many other foreigners he had had at his exorcisms, and now wanted to know what had brought us to Morocco.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">“Ah, the Clinic, yes, I know it well!” The exorcist exclaimed, upon learning the topic of my research. “Yes, I used to live right there, I know some of the doctors (5). Of course, psychiatrists are all charlatans. All they want is money. In fact, hardly anyone really has a psychiatric illness. 90% of the people at that hospital aren’t sick at all; they’re possessed. Psychiatrists can’t help them. In fact, psychiatric medication does more harm than good. You know, those anti-depressants can even increase the risk of suicide. Is Dr. Chikri still there at the Clinic? Yes, he’s the biggest quack of all.”</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">He now eyed the pair that had been quietly sitting on the sofa for upwards of 10 minutes. “This young man, for example. He was hospitalized at the Clinic for a while. But they couldn’t do a thing for him. He’s not sick; he’s just possessed. That’s why they come to see me, now. I’ve been treating him for a while. His mother, too. Last time they were here and I recited the Qur’an, she began to cry; this means that she’s probably possessed, too.”</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">The exorcist now got up from his stool, and began to rearrange the cushions by a particular corner of the sofa. He was preparing for his treatment, he clarified. He would have us all sit down right there, so that we could look into his eyes as he recited from the Qur’an.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">“Now, demons cannot stand the Qur’an,” the exorcist explained as he worked. “So when they hear my recitation they’ll rebel, and this will lead the possessed person to react violently. Don’t be afraid, come and sit here, and look into my eyes while I recite. If you feel anything – anger, or sadness perhaps – you might be possessed. Possession isn’t as common in the West, but you never know. I’m going to assume you are possessed, because I always do, but let me ask you a few questions, first.”</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">The exorcist proceeded to take a brief history. “Do you ever have any trouble sleeping? Any nightmares?”</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">We shook our head in denial, and with a bit of relief.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">“Do you ever see any strange shadows?”</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Again, we denied.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">“Are you married?”</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Our negative answer this time constituted a potential warning sign. “Hmmm,” the exorcist responded. “How old are you?”</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">My revelation raised his eyebrows. He looked at me for a second, as though looking for something in my eyes, and then turned away. “Well,” he then decided, “let’s see how you react to the Qur’an.”</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">He headed to the other side of the room, and finished up his preparations by unscrewing the top off a 2-gallon-size water bottle that had been placed on top of a wooden dresser. Behind them, a grey kitten sat perched atop a neat row of books - Qur’ans alternated with literature on the proper care of cats. “This water burns the demons,” the exorcist explained as he pushed the kitten’s outstretched nose away from the bottle’s mouth. Along with his recitation, these bottles were meant to render the living room a severely hostile climate for any demon present.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">The exorcist then collected the cats present in the room, and exited. The young man’s mother turned to us and smiled, gesturing politely toward the makeshift treatment chair. “No, no,” I responded with a polite smile of my own. “We’re just here to observe today. Please, go ahead, </span></span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">tfeddli</span></span></i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">.”</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">“You were at the Clinic?” She then asked, eagerly. Her eyes were soft, tired. I nodded, and explained that I work there.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">“My son spent a few weeks there,” she then revealed, in echo with the exorcist. She cocked her head to the side, implicitly gesturing toward the young man beside her.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">“Were the doctors able to help him?”</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">She nodded. “It was good,” she explained, her story now diverging from that of the exorcist. “He got better. And the medication helped. He took Nozinan?” (6). The question mark in her expression and tone sought recognition. I nodded again; “Yes, I know that medication. I’m glad it helped your son.” She smiled, then sighed.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">“But the hospital is far away, and those pills are expensive. So now we come here. This is good, too.”</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">The exorcist now walked back in, his wet forearms suggesting that he had just performed the ritual ablutions required in preparation for any reading of the Qur’an. With an outstretched hand he invited us to take our seats. We politely but firmly declined, explaining that today, we would just be observing.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">“Are you sure you don’t want to come and sit here?” He urged again, smiling seductively. “Don’t be afraid!”</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">We declined once more, and he moved on to invite mother and son. He helped them settle in, adjusting cushions and encouraging the mother to lean back, take a load off. He then placed a hand flatly on top of her head, locked eyes with her, and simply began.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">His recitation was melodic; a calm trickling stream of words that seemed instantly to soothe his two patients. They drifted back into the cushions, limbs visibly releasing muscle tension, and their eyes gradually fell shut.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">I looked around the room as he recited. Its bright light snuffed out any hint of ceremony. In fact, the exorcist had done nothing to mark the occasion of a ritual. Other than the washing of his forearms, nothing signified any departure from the ordinary flow of day-to-day activity. Through the open living room doors, we could hear the exorcist’s daughter tending to her daily responsibilities in the kitchen; cats settling squabbles over in their feline village. An open window sent in the sounds and smells of the busy street below. Cats wandered in and out, settling down on the carpet and joining in on the recitation with a baseline of purrs.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">The exorcist occasionally broke up the steady flow of his words with unexpected bursts of volume or tone. But even these vocal surprises failed to trigger the kind of reaction that he was looking for. His patients remained frustratingly calm. After about 10 minutes of unsuccessful recitation, he stopped.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">“Do you feel anything?” He asked. Mother and son shook their head in denial, never losing eye contact with the exorcist. “Nothing?” He asked again, to verify. “Any anger, sadness?” Again, a negative response. He turned to us with the same question; we, likewise, could only deny. The shaking of my head gave expression to my silent sense of relief.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">And so the exorcist continued, returning to the calm cadence of Qur’anic Arabic. The two patients sank back into the cushions, closed their eyes, and drifted off once again. A group of cats had now begun to stir. A creature or two secured the grappling hooks of their nails securely in the fabric of the sofas, and proceeded to climb up, down, and across the cliffs and rises of its cushions.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">With a jolt, the young man suddenly sat up and opened his eyes.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">A kitten had made a leap from the couch cushion behind him, and landed with a thud on the young man’s shoulder. He looked down at the creature, bewildered. Then picked it up, and put it down on the sofa beside him. He tried to settle back into his groove, but his concentration was gone; the cats’ invasion of the sofa was irreversible.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">The exorcist continued, seemingly oblivious to the feline interference. He coaxed and pleaded with the demons he believed to be present, playing good-cop-bad-cop with a voice that alternated between soothing recitation and violent syllabic bursts.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">When, after 30 minutes, he still had not produced the desired response, the exorcist finally gave up. “Nothing?” he asked, once more. His patients once again shook their heads in denial, their expression almost apologetic. They thanked the exorcist with a shake of the hand, and left the apartment as silently as they had come.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">The exorcist turned back to us with the same question. “Nothing?”</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">We, too, shook our heads in synchronized denial. We scootched forward on the sofa, eager now to end this evening and return to a sense of reality.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">“I’m sorry that tonight wasn’t more interesting,” the exorcist continued. “Sometimes recitation just doesn’t work. I know why; it’s those sorcerers, they make… what do you call those? That you hang around your neck?”</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">“talismans?” Claire offered.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">“Yes, talismans. They protect the demons against the Qur’an, so my treatment doesn’t work. Anyway, you must come back some evening; hopefully next time it’ll be more exciting. Marhba, Marhba.”</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">We had, subtly but surely, managed to stand up and inch our way out of the living room. We moved as though we were trying to slip out unnoticed, an abrupt goodbye seeming like too rude a gesture after this man’s generous though bizarre form of hospitality; too rude a rupture to the natural flow of his stories. We walked to the door with the exorcist in tow, soliloquizing; until our hands on the door knob harmonized with another “marhba, please come back,” and the click of the door unlocking put a final period behind this evening’s odd experience.<o:p></o:p></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;">(1) </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;">Moroccan sofas</span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;">(2) B</span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;">etween the evil eye and a sorcerer, the exorcist here suggested that possession always occurs through the interference of a willful, flesh-and-blood agent. As far as I know, this theory is a departure from the general popular lore on spirits – which holds that possession could occur any time one crosses a spirit the wrong way.</span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;">(3) Implicit in this account is a theory that I’ve heard elsewhere: sorcerers employ physical objects in the casting of their spells. These objects are then buried in a secret location; finding that location is the key to undoing the spell.</span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;">(4) </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;">The exorcist discussed his religious education, but never actually gave himself a title. But, given his methods and knowledge of the Qur’an, I assume that he would be considered a fqih.</span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;">(5) </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;">The exorcist used the word “to live;” he specifically did not use the word ‘hospitalization’, but I wonder if that is what he meant.</span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;">(6) </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;">Nozinan is an anti-psychotic.</span></span></p> <!--EndFragment-->Unknownnoreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6715206307508471859.post-33422034821181511532010-10-03T13:32:00.003+00:002010-10-03T13:39:30.792+00:00Numbness<!--StartFragment--> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">For the staff of the open women’s ward much of July was spent in frustration over a young woman by the name of Maria.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Maria suffered from a sizeable list of vague physical pains and symptoms. She spent her days inexhaustibly in pursuit of any doctor she could find, beseeching him or her to order her some medical tests. Every fifteen minutes, she’d knock on the door of the doctor’s office with another question. At first the denials were friendly, accompanied by a well-intentioned explanation. But as her persistence grew, doctors’ responses became curt, revealing a mounting vexation. At our regular Thursday morning get-togethers, Maria would raise her hand every time another woman had finished her story – and every time, the psychiatrist would pre-emptively cut her off:</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">“Do you want to contribute to the subject under discussion, or do you want to talk about yourself?”</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">“I want to talk about myself,” Maria would respond in a feeble voice, visibly shrinking away from what she knew would be the reaction – and the doctor would politely but curtly tell her to wait her turn.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Maria had been hospitalized for the treatment of depression, but after a few weeks of this behavior, her treating psychiatrist had concluded that she must be suffering from some kind of delusion.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">“There’s nothing wrong with her,” he sighed one day, after having nicely but firmly sent Maria out of his office for the tenth time that morning.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">“The medical tests come back negative every time, but she’s never satisfied. She’ll simply find a new symptom to complain about.”</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">One of Maria’s most persistent symptoms was her sense that she lacked a stomach. There was no place in her abdomen for food to go, she complained; consequently, she felt neither hunger nor thirst. She expressed a haunting sense of numbness that no doctor seemed able to help her with. Every mealtime became a torturous ordeal; every day was spent in the fruitless pursuit of some kind of </span></span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">feeling</span></span></i><span style="font-style:normal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> – some reminder, perhaps, that she was still alive.</span></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Maria was discharged at the end of the month, without any real improvement in her condition; there simply was nothing more the doctors could do for her.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">***</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">One morning, three weeks later, Maria was back on the ward for a consultation with her doctor. It was the third day of Ramadan. She saw me sitting on a bench in the courtyard, and came over. When I asked her how she was, she sighed.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">“I’m still not hungry,” she reported, the tears she was holding back clearly audible in the quiver of her voice. All I could think of to respond was that I was sorry to hear she was not feeling any better. Then, wanting to add at least something of a thoughtful nature, I wished her a “Ramadan moubarak.” Once again she sighed.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">“Kansawm,” she said – </span></span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">I’m fasting</span></span></i><span style="font-style:normal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">. “wa lakin kayderrni.” </span></span></span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">It hurts me</span></span></i><span style="font-style:normal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">.</span></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">“Why does it hurt?” I asked, wondering as much about why she was fasting as about why fasting would hurt someone who feels no hunger.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">“Ana mrida,” she explained, her tone betraying a sense of urgency. </span></span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">I’m sick</span></span></i><span style="font-style:normal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">.</span></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">“Do you have to fast, even if you’re sick?”</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">She shrugged. “My husband says I have to.”</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">As she said this, she wandered away; she had spotted her doctor and was off to catch him before he had a chance to leave the ward. She left me sitting on that bench, both confused and intrigued about the seeming paradox between the two things she had just shared with me. If she felt no hunger, why would fasting be difficult for her?</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">By the end of that day I began to realize that Maria herself had already provided the answer in her explanation: she’s </span></span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">sick</span></span></i><span style="font-style:normal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">.</span></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> </span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">The Qur’an states that a person suffering from illness is not obligated to participate in the yearly month-long fast.* And indeed, not a single patient on this ward refrained from eating or drinking.** The meal cart came and went at its normal non-Ramadan hours, and the women walked around the ward with cigarettes, coffee, and water bottles as though it was any ordinary day of the year.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Before the start of the month, doctors had explained, with a smile, that Ramadan would divide the women on the ward into two categories. There would be patients who’d beg to go home; who would assure their doctor they were well enough to participate in the full experience of Ramadan with their families. On the other hand, there would be patients – the </span></span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">côté hystérique</span></span></i><span style="font-style:normal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> – who would emphasize their illness and their right to exemption from fasting, as yet another way to claim a kind of special treatment.</span></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">However, the women I talked to on the ward expressed both sentiments at once. They expressed frustration over the fact that their hospitalization prevented them from sharing in the experience of Ramadan. This holy month carries incredible cultural significance in Morocco; participation is often as much a religious obligation as it is a way of reaffirming (and showing) your membership of the community. These patients missed their families, the traditions, the general spirit of the month.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">On the other hand, however, the women also seemed to understand their isolation as a kind of refuge. Not participating in the fast became, in some ways, a way of underlining their special status, and thus their rights to special treatment. For these patients, in other words, the Qur’anic exemption mentioned above translated into the idea that one’s behavior during Ramadan becomes a visible marker of one’s identity as either healthy or sick. Not fasting constitutes a new way of asserting one’s status as being truly ill – and by extension, not being </span></span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">obligated</span></span></i><span style="font-style:normal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> to fast means that one’s sick role is accepted by the environment, and thus declared legitimate.</span></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Conversely, being obligated to fast thus automatically implies that your illness is denied; that your suffering is not legitimate.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">A lot of the patients on the ward suffer from this sense of denial. They feel misunderstood; they complain about their family’s inconsideration for their illness. Of course it isn’t always possible to ascertain whether a patient’s family really is as inconsiderate as she claims, but I do have the sense that mental illness can be a difficult thing for the average Moroccan woman to talk about with her loved ones. Some of these patients come from an environment that does not allow women to talk much about personal feelings, nor to complain about hardship. Some of them are stuck in loveless marriages, and some of them bear sole responsibility for the survival of a large number of family members, without any hope of assistance from anyone else.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">I think it might be this sense of denial that makes fasting so painful for Maria – and I think it might be this denial that underlies her sense of numbness in the first place. Whether or not the numbness is ‘delusional’, I think it could be possible that this is her way of expressing a fundamental sense of isolation and disconnect from the world. Maria has no role to play in the public sphere: she is a housewife whose responsibility lies in the home. But there, too, she lives her life unnoticed. Her husband and family members are far-off figures from whom she does not seem to receive much at all in the way of affection. During her four weeks at the Clinic, not once did they come to see her.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Maria is not seen, and not heard, by those around her. Perhaps she has internalized this sense of isolation; and now it is she who can no longer </span></span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">feel</span></span></i><span style="font-style:normal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">. Her husband’s insistence that she fast is another manifestation of his denial, and thus a further deprivation of sensation. It is this that is painful to her. What she seeks, with her pleas to the doctors, is simply a sense of reconnection. A sense of understanding, a listening ear – a sign that she is </span></span></span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">perceived</span></span></i><span style="font-style:normal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> by the world, which might in turn reignite her own capacity for perception.</span></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">We all deserve to be seen. Without it, we might all wither in numbness like Maria. Perhaps that medication might help Maria with her delusion. But mostly, I hope she succeeds in finding a listening ear.</span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">* And in some ways, fasting is a logical impossibility: taking medication already means that your body is ingesting something. Even if you were to stay away from food or drink, a pill taken on its own already breaks the fast. Nevertheless, I was told before the start of the month that for some patients, it might be possible to adjust the dosage of their medication in such a way that they would be able to refrain from ingesting anything during the hours of fasting, thus enabling them to participate.</span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">** I was told, however, that a fair number of male patients at the hospital were, in fact, participating.</span></span></p> <!--EndFragment-->Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6715206307508471859.post-82727578899044370092010-08-01T19:49:00.002+01:002010-08-01T19:55:10.987+01:00Difficult Questions<!--StartFragment--> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">A few months ago, I saw an Italian movie entitled </span><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1156173/"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Vincere</span></a><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">. It tells the story of a woman who falls in love with a young Mussolini, marries him, and bears his first child. He then disappears from her life, and while he grows increasingly influential in Italy, she continues to pursue him and demand that he acknowledge and care for his son. Mussolini never responds to her demands and eventually she is thrown into a psychiatric hospital, where she is told that she is delusional and paranoid. Her claims are, in other words, forcefully rendered null and void by the silencing blanket of a psychiatric diagnosis.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">The film ultimately never tells you whom to believe. The story is told from the woman’s point of view; the love story is thus as real to you as it is to her – and the psychiatric diagnosis as much of a shock. Then again, the movie reminds you that no documented evidence of the purported marriage, nor of the son’s paternity, has ever been found – and that the woman ultimately had nothing but (irrational?) persistence to fall back on.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">The way I see it, this movie brings up an uncomfortable but undeniable issue inherent in the practice of psychiatry: to what extent do psychiatric patients retain the right to a voice, and a claim to truth? Does being mentally ill really mean that one is no longer capable of rationality or logical thought, and does that thereby authorize the rest of us to stop listening to such a person’s voice, and to make decisions on their behalf?</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">This question has come up a lot for me over the course of my fieldwork at the Clinic – I think of </span><a href="http://bisahha.blogspot.com/2010/06/conspiracy-theorist.html"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Marwa’s</span></a><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> outrageous stories, for example, or </span><a href="http://bisahha.blogspot.com/2010/07/freedom-of-expression.html"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Nadia’s</span></a><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> and </span><a href="http://bisahha.blogspot.com/2009/11/ethnography-of-psychiatric-ward.html"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Mr. Abbas’</span></a><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> linguistic (and other) claims to some modicum of status. I think also of </span><a href="http://bisahha.blogspot.com/2009/11/ethnography-of-psychiatric-ward-meaning.html"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">other patients</span></a><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> who lament that no one at the hospital listens to their complaints, or others who have been abandoned by their families, conveniently left behind and out of sight in the safe confines of a psychiatric clinic. I could write endless stories about the impact of psychiatry on the experience of agency and autonomy among the women I’ve met. And I probably will.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">But the reason I bring up this issue now, is that it has recently been thrown into particular relief – in the sense that I seem to have gotten myself quite actively involved in a case where the question of ‘agency’ lies at the very heart of the doctors’ difficulty in devising an adequate “prise en charge.”</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">A few weeks ago, a European woman was hospitalized at the Clinic’s closed ward. She had been wandering around Morocco for a few days when she was picked up by the police for attempting to trespass on Palace grounds, and brought to the psychiatric emergency department. Because this woman speaks no French and the doctors speak very little English, I was asked to help facilitate the communication by doing a bit of translation. One conversation led to the next, and slowly but surely, I slid right into the middle of it all, becoming a bit of a mediator between doctors, patient, her country’s embassy, and her insurance company.*</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">The hospitalized woman believes herself to be a medium of sorts. Her supernatural powers have granted her visions, most of which revolve around vast conspiracy theories – some of them involving herself as the target. She is convinced, for example, that the entire global network of her country’s embassies have joined forces with the Moroccan police and the Clinic, all in an effort to silence and imprison her. As you might imagine, this does not exactly leave her willing to listen to anything the doctors (or the embassy) have to say.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">The Clinic, understandably uncomfortable with this very foreign patient, would have preferred for the embassy to take her off their hands. They had hoped or assumed that a few phone calls would mobilize this European country’s network of diplomatic and financial resources, and that with a day or two some representative would come to repatriate the delusional wanderer.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">The embassy, however, had a very different point of view. The patient had aggressively refused their initial attempts at communication, and to them, this effectively annulled any and all obligations they may have had toward this woman. As they explained to me, the ministry of foreign affairs would not be authorized to do a single thing, unless the woman herself indicated a wish to be assisted.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">A group of doctors attempted explanation: a psychiatric patient cannot be taken at her word, they told the embassy’s representatives. This woman’s judgment has been impaired, and her rejection of help should thus in no way be taken seriously. At times like these, decisions have to be made by experts who know what’s best for her. But the embassy stood firm, and politely apologized: the patient was now the responsibility of the hospital and the Moroccan police; they were free to decide as they wished.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">This is the stalemate in which we now find ourselves. The hospital feels that it cannot, in good conscience, release this woman back to the streets (not in the least because she herself indicates that she intends to go right back to the Palace and try to gain entry. Which means that most likely she’d just be picked up by the police again, who for all we know might take her to jail next time). However, keeping her at the Clinic clearly is no more of an ideal solution. Without the possibility of actual conversation between patient and doctor, effective treatment becomes nearly impossible, and the stalemate continues.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">So what is the answer here? Should the woman’s refusal of help have indeed been ignored, under the presumption that she is in no condition to make decisions on her own behalf? Should the embassy have stepped in? Or were they right in respecting the woman’s voice?</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">I have to admit that I’m undecided. Theoretically, I would and always will argue that no one should ever be deprived of a voice. Everyone, including someone with a psychiatric diagnosis, has the right to be listened to. Everyone has the right to their own personal version of truth, and behind every delusion lies a subjective lived experience in need of some kind of resonance, even if simply with a sympathetic ear. In addition, dangerous power issues lurk in the shadows of cases like these. There is a dark side to the history of psychiatry; there have been instances in the past (distant and not-so-distant) where it has been used as a convenient way to silence individuals with viewpoints that were dangerous for the stability of the status quo (which is, in fact, exactly what this particular European patient is accusing ‘us’ of doing).</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Besides – who are we to decide what’s ‘rational’, ‘true’, or ‘valid’, anyway? What makes a psychiatrist the expert? Aren’t all these concepts ultimately relative?</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">But this time I’m compelled to think and reflect from a vantage point that is no longer merely theoretical, and it’s led me to think more about the other side of the coin – it’s let me perhaps to better recognize the very </span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">real</span></i></span><span style="font-family:Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> and very thorny complexity of the whole issue. I will always maintain that the above theoretical questions are important to keep in mind, but the very practical scenario that we are dealing with at the moment raises an additional, very different set of concerns; concerns that have not so much to do with the existential right to agency as they do with the real-world consequences of allowing a delusional person to make their own decisions.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Yes, a patient should always be listened to, heard, validated. But if the patient’s only request is to be released from what she sees as inhuman imprisonment, and you know that, were she to be sent back out to the streets she would most likely be picked right back up by the police and brought back to the hospital (or worse, jail), what do you do?</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">And if a patient refuses to take her medication, claiming that she is not sick – but your medical training tells you that pharmaceuticals are the only quick and effective way to help her find her way out of hallucination, are you justified in forcing it on her?</span></span></p> <span style="font-family: Arial; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">And finally, where do you draw the line? When Marwa told me about military bases on other planets, I was fairly certain that this truth existed only in her mind. But when a woman claims to have given birth to Mussolini’s oldest son, whom do you believe, and on what basis do you make that choice? How far do you go in finding ‘proof’? Who, in the end, has the right to determine whether or not a mind is ‘rational’ enough to retain its claims to agency?</span></span><!--EndFragment--><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> </span><div><span style="font-family: Arial; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: Arial; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: Arial; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: Arial; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Georgia, serif; "><span style="font-family: Arial; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">* This is a new role for me at the hospital. I’ve always been the observer, never the participant. I’m not a psychiatrist, not a psychologist, not even a social worker; I wasn’t qualified or able to really do anything useful. Now, suddenly, I’m being involved, asked for input, even </span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">needed</span></i></span><span style="font-family: Arial; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> perhaps – and I have to admit that it feels really, really good. I love the idea of being able to </span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">do</span></i></span><span style="font-family: Arial; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> something.)</span></span></span></span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6715206307508471859.post-19089259666397243402010-07-27T15:51:00.001+01:002010-07-27T15:52:50.931+01:00Beating the Odds?<!--StartFragment--> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">I’m writing a second piece on the same patient, for a change – because Soukaina’s story isn’t finished. In the weeks since I posted my initial description of her, she has truly and amazingly come alive. She has cast off her shadows, and seems to have beaten the depressing psychiatric odds with which I ended that first post.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> <o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">It began with laughter. A kind of bubbling energy she simply could not keep inside. An entire Thursday morning meeting once played itself out to the underlying soundtrack of Soukaina’s bursts of hilarity. Like a steady rhythm, she accompanied other patients’ words, sighs, and tears with her own uncontrollable snorts, giggles, and whinnies. The same impulse would get the better of her when out and about on the ward; the tiniest odd sound could set her off. She tried to hold it in, she really did – hands shielding her mouth like a prison door, the head pressed tightly into her knees, she did her best to maintain an internal sense of order. But to no avail; she seemed beset by an effervescence too large for her small frame.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Her laughter then paved the way for words. Cautious utterances at first: a tentative “mezyane” (good) or “nglis?” (can I sit?). But with every passing day, her voice grew stronger and her communicative overtures bolder. And last week, this development culminated in an actual conversation. She and I sat side by side on a bench in the sun, my hand in hers, as she asked me question after question. Where was I from? Where were my parents? Did I have brothers and sisters? Where did I live now? Did I live alone? What was my job at the hospital? How old was I?</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">This conversation likewise had its own laugh track. Everything I said prompted a burst of giggles. Maybe, I remember thinking self-consciously, it’s my horrible pronunciation of Arabic. Maybe it’s my strange blonde hair, or the way I look at her. But maybe it’s simply her own joy at the lifting of that mental cloud – and maybe it’s all of those things at once.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">But mostly, I remember, I simply had the urge to giggle along with her. I responded to each of her questions with one of my own, and I reveled – as she sat there with her eyes full of recognition; as she revealed her </span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">self</span></i></span><span style="font-family:Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> to me. I reveled in the possibility of being able to actually </span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">listen</span></i></span><span style="font-family:Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> to her.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">There was an urgency to it all. We talked as though we were making up for lost time – or perhaps as though we were afraid this window might close up just as quickly as it had opened. But the next morning, when I found her again in the courtyard, our conversation simply continued.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">This time she requested to see photographs of my family. I took her with me to the doctor’s office, opened up my laptop, and showed her a collection of pictures. Again, her reaction was strong and fizzy. It was the details that seemed to strike her most – the color of my sister’s dress, my father’s glasses, a can of coke in the background somewhere. It all met with an explosion of laughter, and constant, repetitive requests for me to explain what was shown in the picture.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">After lunch on that same day, it was she who dragged me back to the doctor’s office. I once again opened up the pictures of my family – but that’s not what she wanted, this time.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">“Show me pictures of the king of America,” she now demanded.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">I smiled, toyed briefly with the idea of interpreting that creatively, then connected to the internet and searched for a few pictures of Barack Obama.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Soukaina showed a decided preference for a set of photos depicting the president along with his family. Old wedding pictures, or professional portraits of the Obamas with their kids. Again Soukaina responded with laughter, and endless requests for me to identify each individual in the frame.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Her favorite photo of all showed Obama’s two young daughters, gleaming on a stage somewhere – a snapshot moment during the campaign trail, no doubt. Soukaina stared at it for a while, as though caught by something; then pointed to Malia’s dress and looked me in the eyes.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">“what do you call that color in French?”</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">“Rose,” I responded. “Like your pajamas.”</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Soukaina looked down at her own chest, looked back up at the picture, then turned to me.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">“Rose,” she repeated, and once more burst into laughter. She leaned in, hugged me close, then kissed me on the cheek. I couldn’t help but laugh with her. I was mystified by the connection she had just somehow made, the recognition she had found in that picture of two unknown girls –</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">… but I loved it.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">And I hope with all hope that she holds on to this clarity and joy…</span><o:p></o:p></span></p> <!--EndFragment-->Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6715206307508471859.post-19377880553956329952010-07-13T21:39:00.002+01:002010-07-13T21:45:29.586+01:00An impossible Choice<!--StartFragment--> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style=" ;font-family:Arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">Wherever the action is, there you’ll find Soukaina. She spends her days strolling along the ward’s courtyard, observing life as it is lived by her fellow patients. Not yet 15 years old, she is always dressed in the same stained pair of pajamas; her feet drag along a pair of pink plastic slippers, and her hair is haphazardly covered by a disheveled headscarf. She makes her rounds at a steady pace, arms swaying heavily by her side, shyly looking around at her passers-by. She halts in the occasional doorway, quietly watching as other women are having coffee with their visitors. Then she moves on to investigate what’s going on at the end of the hallway there, where her doctor is conversing with an anonymous face. She makes a u-turn, stopping briefly to poke her head inside the nurses’ office, then fixes her attention on what the gardeners are doing to the bed of roses in the courtyard. She finally ends her tour by settling down beside the group of women seated on a bench, basking in the morning sun.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">Soukaina always maintains a bit of distance. She does not like to be touched; any well-intentioned attempt to shake her hand, or make an offering of candy, invites a subtle dance of evasive shifts and shakes of the head. Soukaina has a voice, but prefers to parcel out her words in great moderation; any verbal overture is shyly answered with a quick and tiny smile. At every Thursday morning </span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"><a href="http://bisahha.blogspot.com/2010/07/freedom-of-expression.html">ijtima’</a></span></i></span><span style="font-family:Arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">, Soukaina’s doctor performs the ritual of trying to coax out a phrase or two. “Kif bqiti?” she’ll ask, her voice sweet as honey – how have you been? Each week, these questions hang suspended in the air, lonely and heavy with awkwardness, until a few other patients decide to speak up on Soukaina’s behalf. “Oh, the other day she was so chatty!” they’ll say. “Soukaina loves to talk with me, we were laughing and crying together all afternoon!”</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"><span style="font-family:Arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">***</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">Soukaina has been on the ward for as long as I can remember. She was there when I first arrived in November and has been a stable presence ever since, quietly strolling through the corridor as other patients come and go around her – like a fixed point of light within a changing image. Over the course of these long months she and I have made slow but steady progress in the buildup of a communicative routine. By January she began to return my greetings with a smile; by February she developed the habit of sitting down beside me as I wrote up my notes, occasionally stretching out a cautious but pioneering finger to get a physical impression of my notebook. By March she began to ask me for the time – always a rapid whisper, barely audible, but words nonetheless! – and by April, she took to following me as I made my own rounds across the ward.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">It was around this time that Soukaina was briefly discharged. Her absence did not last long, however; she had spent not four weeks at home with her family before she returned to the hospital and once again took up residence in her old room, as though nothing had ever changed.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">Yet something </span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">had</span></i></span><span style="font-family:Arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"> changed.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">I had always thought of Soukaina as an empty notebook; as a set of pages without a story. Beyond the smiles, her eyes were blank – an infinite whiteness that led me to see Soukaina as a moving body without emotions, a conscious mind without thoughts.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">This new, re-hospitalized Soukaina remained mute, but now the light seemed to have been turned on behind her eyes. The blankness of before had made way for images, for bright colors in broad brush strokes. I saw an abstract painting, now; a palimpsest of stories each racing out to envelop the beholder.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">For a few days, the entire ward reveled in what we thought of as a very pleasant change in Soukaina. Her smiles had become broader, her voice more solid, and her eye-contact more eager. Real communication had begun to seem like a possibility.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">Then, from one day to the next, the smiles disappeared. I arrived on the ward one Monday morning to find her sobbing in the courtyard. She saw me as I entered, ran over, and grabbed my hands. For the next three hours, she refused to let go. She dragged me along as she walked restlessly through the corridors, drawn mostly toward the exits – as though she was waiting for someone, or something. The stories in her eyes had become jarring, glaring, frightening in their blackness.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">Apparently it had been this way all weekend. “Meskina,” the nurses sighed. “The poor thing – she’s suffering from horrible anxieties and hallucinations.” Whatever had turned on the light behind Soukaina’s eyes had also unleashed something sinister – a monster seemed to have emerged from the shadowy recesses of her mind and now haunted her without reprieve.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">Whatever it was, it had exhausted Soukaina’s small body; whenever I managed to sit her down for a moment, her head would begin to loll with the heaviness of sleep, her entire body heaving in yawns of primordial force. Yet she refused to lie down in her bed for a nap, no matter how sweetly our coaxing – and how potent the sleeping pill she’d been made to swallow. It seemed that circling around the ward was Soukaina’s only source of comfort at the moment.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">As she pulled me along, I tried to ask her what the matter was. “Yak la bas?” What’s wrong? And Soukaina would simply look at me, a heart-wrenching urgency in her eyes. Her mouth would move, but the sounds remained stuck in her throat. Breathing heavily with the weight of anxiety, she simply pulled me closer, grabbing my forearms now, as the tears ran down her cheeks.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"><span style="font-family:Arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">***</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">Soukaina has schizophrenia, but the autism she was born with has pushed the mute button on her suffering. She is haunted by terrifying delusions and hallucinations that she is unable to communicate to the outside world; she is imprisoned in the tower of her own mind, with a monster in her cell.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">Soukaina had always been on Clozapine, a relatively old anti-psychotic drug usually prescribed only as a last resort for those who don’t respond to anything else – because while highly effective, Clozapine comes with a high risk of potentially life-threatening side effects. The drug had pulled a heavy blanket of sedation over what little communicative ability Soukaina had had. But at least, her doctor reminisces, it had gotten rid of the hallucinations - and it had left her calm, content, “gérable."</span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style=" ;font-family:Arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">Soukaina’s parents, however, had not been satisfied. They remembered Soukaina as she had been before illness laid claim to her mind – peculiar, yes, but nevertheless talkative, receptive, capable even of going to school. Hoping for a better outcome, her parents had convinced Soukaina’s doctor to re-hospitalize her and try a new approach to treatment.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">“But do you see what happens when you mess with something that works?” The doctor sighs. “All we’ve managed to do is de-stabilize the patient.” Hopefully, she adds, the parents will now realize that Clozapine really wasn’t all that bad.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center"><span style="font-family:Arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">***</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">What I find saddest of all about Soukaina’s story is that the doctor has a point. While it may be tempting – worthwhile, even – to dream of perfect cures, there are times or cases in which the reality of psychiatric treatment forces one into an impossible choice between two very imperfect options. While listening to the doctor talk, I had the urge to protest. Could “calm and manageable” ever be a desirable outcome for anyone, given the beauty and creativity that the human brain is capable of producing? Is it ever acceptable to accord someone a fate of diminished mental capacity, if the trade-off is a reprieve from psychiatric symptoms?</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">It isn’t. Yet I realize that this is not what the doctor is arguing for. She does not see “gérable” as the ideal end-result of Soukaina’s treatment. Not in the least. But in her capacity as a psychiatrist, she is nevertheless compelled to play the role of the realist. And the heart-wrenching reality of this situation quite simply is that Soukaina has to choose between freedom from hallucinations, and freedom of communication. </span><o:p></o:p></span></p> <!--EndFragment-->Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6715206307508471859.post-20787646556171837102010-07-05T16:13:00.000+01:002010-07-05T16:18:36.945+01:00Freedom of Expression<!--StartFragment--> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">It is Thursday morning, and the patients and doctors of the open women’s ward are gathering in the lounge for the weekly </span></span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">ijtima‘</span></span></i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> – an hour or so of sharing stories, experiences, and impressions of life at the hospital. As the women take their seats on the couches – traditional design, but with a modern twist – the hum of excited whispers hangs in the air. There’s been conflict in the corridors this week, and the patients are expecting the issue to come to a head at today’s meeting.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">This morning I sit next to Nadia, a woman in her fifties who has been hospitalized for treatment of depression. She’s been here for a few weeks now, and is clearly doing better. She no longer isolates herself in her room, and she’s become more talkative of late. She’s gotten back into the habit of applying eye make-up in the morning, and the curl has returned to her short, auburn hair.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">She is slightly restless this morning as she listens to her fellow patients’ stories. The group’s anticipation has been satisfied; the two women engaged in conflict have indeed brought their issue to the meeting. It’s a dispute over religious freedom: whereas one party claims her right to religious expression (in her case, the vocal recitation of Qur’anic verses in the ward’s corridors), the other argues for her right of protection from religious indoctrination (especially at ten o’clock at night, when she would prefer to be sleeping). With building emotion, the two women explain their viewpoints to the group; the doctors are barely able to maintain a sense of order.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">It is a heavy topic for any group of Moroccan women to stomach on a given Thursday morning. Yet it’s not the content, but the form of the argument that prompts Nadia to lean in and whisper a question in my ear.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">“Can you follow all this Arabic?”</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">I smile, make a gesture with my head to imply that I’m getting the gist, and suggest we try to listen. But Nadia isn’t done yet. She leans over again, seeking understanding in my eyes.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">“I have a really hard time understanding Arabic,” she confesses. “I’m not used to it at all.”</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">And indeed; when it’s Nadia’s turn to talk, she makes a point of announcing that she’d rather speak French. She cannot express herself as freely in Arabic, she explains to the doctor – whose nod of the head indulges Nadia in her request. And so Nadia begins, noticeably changing the tone of the meeting as she informs her audience, in that soft lyrical French of hers, that she had a good week. A few women shift in their seats, straightening their spines, and a subtle sense of formality seems to have impregnated the air around us. All disruptions have come to an end; even the bickering party is now silently listening. And then – just like that, in a blink of an eye that completely negates the gravity of her original request, Nadia downshifts back into Arabic, formulating her closing statements in the local dialect.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center;mso-pagination:none;tab-stops:28.0pt 56.0pt 84.0pt 112.0pt 140.0pt 168.0pt 196.0pt 224.0pt 3.5in 280.0pt 308.0pt 336.0pt;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">***</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Nadia identifies herself as Moroccan, and as a Muslim; she says she is proud of her cultural heritage and of her family’s illustrious history. Nevertheless, her words and behavior always betray an apparent need to separate, to distance herself, from mainstream Moroccan consciousness. Contradiction and juxtaposition weave themselves continuously in and out of her autobiography; they are the backbone to her stories’ continuity. She was born to a conservative family and raised in Fes, that bastion of tradition – but she was educated at the French mission’s schools, and walked around her neighborhood’s streets in pigtails and short skirts. Her siblings all followed in her father’s footsteps by pursuing degrees in theology – but Nadia chose instead for a career in medicine. Arabic is the language of her country and her family – but Nadia prefers French, the language of international sophistication. And finally, her sisters have all been unhappily married for upwards of 25 years – while Nadia is a divorcée who’s had several long-term boyfriends.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">The status of being divorced exerts a major gravitational pull on her narrative of juxtaposition. It is the dominant cause of her sense of difference; all other facets of her identity revolve around the epicenter of its force, twisted and bent in their own path of expression. Nadia tells me several times that divorced women are “très mal vues” in Morocco; on the scale of status, they rank lower yet than donkeys. She feels that other women – her doctor included – are both unable and unwilling to understand her lifestyle of sexual independence. Utterly incapable of imagining how that kind of freedom might taste, these women cower away in fear of transgressing such moral boundaries themselves. As we sit in the ward’s courtyard, Nadia points to a handful of other patients walking around: these individuals refuse to talk to her, she says; they treat her like a leper. “They must have been married as virgins,” she concludes with a sigh.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Men are not much more capable of comprehension, Nadia laments during our next conversation; sadly, she does not derive much fulfillment from the “amis” she’s had. Moroccan men do not understand her needs. However enlightened or “moderne” they may have claimed to be, her boyfriends nevertheless all expected to be wined and dined – “by me, a doctor, for goodness’ sake!” Nadia exclaims in lingering outrage – without providing much in the way of commitment in return.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">To Nadia, Moroccan culture is the source of her illness. Her depression was born of suffocation; a case of asphyxiation by the insurmountable baric pressure of cultural mores and taboos. She spent a few years in France, and remembers it as a place of lightness and air, without a care in the world to weigh her down. The thick, winter blanket of sadness did not descend upon her until she returned to her native land, 15 years ago. I thus begin to wonder if her preference for speaking French might simply be driven by the need to breathe. Perhaps that speaking Arabic – a language indelibly linked to and thus bound by Moroccan standards of (expressive) propriety – feels to her like breathing air deprived of oxygen. Might French then be her escape hatch, a seam in the tightly spun fabric of moral codes? A helium balloon that lifts her high beyond the reach of Moroccan gender expectations?</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Regardless of her feelings about Arabic, however, Nadia also speaks French, quite simply, because that is how she was trained. After an education at Morocco’s French schools, a medical degree, and a life lived in Morocco’s elite social circles, it is no surprise that Nadia is more easily able to express herself in French than Arabic.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">To her, in any case, this linguistic preference in no way precludes her identification as a Moroccan woman. Though Nadia may take issue with what she sees as certain outdated standards of propriety, she eagerly joins in on conversations about local cuisine, asserts herself as an expert on traditional wedding attire, and confidently proclaims that, even if she does agree that Qur’anic recitation should be reserved for the privacy of one’s room, she believes in the Holy Book’s absolute truth. Nadia’s Moroccanness may be a little particular, a pick-and-choose sampling of the full available menu – but it is nevertheless genuine. </span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">To other patients, however, Nadia’s frenchness signals a pollution – a threat, even, to the authenticity of the ward’s Moroccan identity. And like </span></span><a href="http://bisahha.blogspot.com/2010/06/conspiracy-theorist.html"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Marwa</span></span></a><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> before her, she elicits the occasional hostile reaction.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">In one such case, the hostility came from Halima, a fellow patient who happened to overhear Nadia in conversation with the parents of a newly admitted young woman. Nadia had eagerly asked the French mother of this young patient where she was from, and then began to share her own pleasant memories of time spent in that particular city. Halima had been standing nearby, and now approached to hiss at Nadia, in French:</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">“Stop bothering these people, they’re here for their daughter; they don’t want to talk to you!”</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Nadia looked at her calmly. “I’m just trying to be friendly, Halima,” she explained. “I just want to make them feel welcome.”</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">The couple in question listened in slightly disconcerted silence as the two women continued their argument over their heads. Halima had retorted that this couple had no need for a welcoming committee; they’d been living in Morocco for years now. Upon which Nadia had responded that it is always nice to exchange memories of other places, and to hear about familiar cities in France.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Halima, at a loss for a witty retort, responded with an angry look and then grumbled, in the local dialect: “well, I’m Moroccan, and I’m Muslim. I’m proud of it, and I’m going to speak Arabic.”</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">“But that would be impolite,” Nadia responded in French, calm as ever.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">“Not at all,” Halima corrected, still in the local tongue. “These people live in Morocco; they understand Arabic perfectly.” And with that, she walked away.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Nadia turned to the couple, and offered them an apologetic smile. Then she looked at me.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">“Do you see these Moroccan women?” she asked. “They’re so short sighted, they don’t understand any lifestyle that doesn’t resemble their own.”</span></span><o:p></o:p></p> <!--EndFragment-->Unknownnoreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6715206307508471859.post-83745310590694095282010-06-29T20:49:00.002+01:002010-06-29T20:51:08.258+01:00Back in the Day...<!--StartFragment--> <p class="MsoNormal"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">Over the past few months I’ve been working on an essay to submit as part of a proposal for an edited book about the experience of doing research in Morocco. I’m using some ethnographic anecdotes from my work at the Clinic to illustrate how the complexity of Moroccan society’s multilingualism plays out in daily life, and what it all means for someone trying to do research in such a setting. </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">What follows below is an excerpt from my first draft. After taking a second look at the essay I’ve realized that this section doesn’t quite fit with the rest of the piece. The excerpt describes an episode from one of my very first months in Morocco, and more than a year and a half later, my experiences and circumstances have changed so vastly that this particular little story no longer seems quite relevant to the message I am trying to convey. Yet I cannot bear to simply throw it away. Because relevant or not, this anecdote has become a pleasant memory – and it is a reminder, in many ways, of how far I’ve come (and how much I’ve learned) over the past 20 months.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">And so here it is, in blogpost-form</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify;text-indent:.5in"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">In the fall of 2008, I arrived in Rabat, Morocco, for a period of preliminary fieldwork for my dissertation research. Through a language school in the city’s old medina I arranged for three months of private instruction in Colloquial Moroccan Arabic (or Darija), and a ‘homestay’ with a Rabati family. I came to live in a large house not five winding medina streets away from my school, and became part of a household that consisted almost exclusively of women. At its center stood lalla Khadija,</span></span><a href="http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=6715206307508471859&postID=8374531059069409528#_ftn1" name="_ftnref1" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">[1]</span></span></span></span></a><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"> a stout woman in her sixties who came from a time and place where birth dates were not yet recorded, and girls were not yet sent to school. Two of Khadija’s children still lived at home: two daughters, who were temperamental opposites of one another in many ways but shared the common fate of being an unmarried Moroccan woman in her late thirties. The household also included one of Khadija’s grandchildren; her oldest son’s oldest daughter. Together, these four women took care of the cooking and cleaning, and cared for Khadija’s husband, a man about 20 years her senior and no longer capable of much movement. </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify;text-indent:.5in"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">The lack of privacy in the house facilitated my quick integration into the life of this family. I slept in the living room with the two daughters, assisted with the cooking and baking, helped Asmae, Khadija’s eighteen-year-old granddaughter, with her English homework and wardrobe choices, and spent evenings in the common room, reviewing Arabic vocabulary as the women of my family tuned in to their favorite Turkish soap operas. The family had never showed much interest in my language-learning efforts – until, one evening, my homework material caught the attention of Manal, the oldest of Khadija’s two single daughters. It led to a curious conversation that significantly changed the family’s impression of me and of my purpose in coming to Morocco. </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify;text-indent:.5in"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">It was about 7 PM, and I was in the living room reviewing flash cards – my preferred method for drilling vocabulary. Manal had just returned home from her small caftan workshop around the corner, and entered the room to change from outdoor clothes back into her pajamas. She said a quick hello, asked me how my day was, and then announced she was going to make us some coffee – but just as she was about to head for the kitchen, her eye was caught by the deck of cards I kept flipping through. Suddenly curious, she turned back to me and asked what I was doing. </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify;text-indent:.5in"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">“This is how I learn new words,” I explained. “I write the Arabic word on one side, and on the other is the English translation.” I flipped the card over to illustrate.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify;text-indent:.5in"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">“Can I see?” she queried, and approached. I handed her a few cards and she studied them intently, a knot slowly twisting across her eyebrows. I remember worrying, self-consciously, that she might not be able to decipher my juvenile Arabic handwriting. Then she shook her head and turned to me.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify;text-indent:.5in"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">“This word here is spelled wrong,” she stated in a schoolteacher voice. She sat down beside me on the sdari</span></span><a href="http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=6715206307508471859&postID=8374531059069409528#_ftn2" name="_ftnref2" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">[2]</span></span></span></span></a><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"> and reached for the pen that lay on the table in front of us. </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify;text-indent:.5in"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">“See? There should be a long alif here in between the lam and the qaf,”</span></span><a href="http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=6715206307508471859&postID=8374531059069409528#_ftn3" name="_ftnref3" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">[3]</span></span></span></span></a><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"> she corrected. “Like this.” She took the pen and added the alif’s long vertical stroke to the word on the card. I was confused, having just been taught how to spell the word in question that very afternoon. But Manal moved on to card number two. Again, she detected a spelling mistake, and added another missing alif. I looked on, slightly bewildered.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify;text-indent:.5in"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">This continued with a few more cards. With each added alif, Manal sighed more deeply, and my bewilderment grew larger. Finally she turned to me. Incredulously, she demanded, “This is what they’re teaching you??”</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify;text-indent:.5in"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">Then suddenly it dawned on me: she must have assumed I was learning Fusha, or Modern Standard Arabic, rather than the Moroccan dialect. “Oh, wait!” I cried out eagerly, relieved to have identified the source of confusion. “These words are not Fusha, they’re Darija,” I explained, hoping that this clarified the situation.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify;text-indent:.5in"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">But she simply looked at me, silently. The knot in her eyebrows showed no signs of disappearing. Then finally she exclaimed, with a mix of surprise and disgust, “You’re learning </span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">Darija</span></i></span><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">? </span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">Why</span></i></span><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">? Darija is bad, it’s no good!”</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify;text-indent:.5in"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">A little taken aback, I asked her why. Why on earth would she react this way to the news that I was learning her native language? I had expected at least a little bit of enthusiasm.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify;text-indent:.5in"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">“Because it just is. Fusha is just better, it’s the ‘true’ language,” she explained, accompanying her words with heavy arm gestures to convey to me some of the solidity and weight that Fusha seemed to carry in her mind’s eye. </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify;text-indent:.5in"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">“Darija isn’t spoken right,” she then elaborated, and added an example. “It shouldn’t be </span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">tlata</span></i></span><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">; it should be </span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">thalatha</span></i></span><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">.” And as the hard ‘t’s of her colloquial dialect made room for the lyrical ‘th’s of Standard Arabic, the scowl on her face smoothed over into an expression of deep satisfaction.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify;text-indent:.5in"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">In fact, the differences between Fusha and the Moroccan dialect are many. Fusha, or Modern Standard Arabic, is the contemporary version of Qur’anic Arabic. It is the lingua franca of the Arab world, but native language to none. As is true for all Arabophone countries, the language of daily communication in Morocco is a dialect – a form of Arabic weathered by the test of time, foreign influence, and the transformative process of linguistic evolution. Moroccans refer to their particular dialect as ‘Darija’, and its most noticeable departure from Fusha (aside from the addition of French and Berber loan words) is arguably its pronunciation. To the untrained (and even to the beginning student’s) ear, it often sounds as though speakers of Moroccan dialect have eliminated all vowels from their words – which would explain Manal’s diagnosis of a deplorable lack of alifs in my spelling.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify;text-indent:.5in"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">Moroccans agree that no dialect is as far removed from the standard Fusha as their own – and that, in consequence, it is all but incomprehensible to other speakers of Arabic. Nevertheless, most Moroccans deny their dialect the status of ‘real’ language – a sentiment reflected by the late king Hassan II’s choice to designate Fusha, rather than Darija, the country’s official language.</span></span><a href="http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=6715206307508471859&postID=8374531059069409528#_ftn4" name="_ftnref4" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">[4]</span></span></span></span></a><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"> As Manal’s comments illustrate, Moroccans consider their dialect to be somewhat of a bastard child. It is the language of mundane, daily activity. Of bargaining at the market, of chatting about the weather, of light banter with friends. Fusha, on the other hand, is reserved for discussion of loftier issues such as religion, literature, or politics – communicative settings perhaps rare enough to have withstood the effects of linguistic evolution. Darija has no literary tradition of its own, and has no official rules of grammar and orthography. Despite my attempts at spelling Moroccan vocabulary, Darija is, in fact, very much an </span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">oral</span></i></span><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"> language. And by extension of all this, learning Fusha is considered a highly respected endeavor (because it is the gateway for knowledge of the Qur’an, of literature, and of Islamic jurisprudence), while most Moroccans do not consider their dialect worthy of real study. </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify;text-indent:.5in"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">In consequence I was unable to explain to Manal my reasons for choosing to learn the dialect – at least not in a way that satisfied her strong feelings on the matter. She was not swayed by my purported wish to be able to “talk to Moroccan people.” Why not talk to them in Fusha, she offered in rebuttal. Moroccans would be able to understand, and as an added bonus I’d be able to talk to people outside of Morocco, as well. </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify;text-indent:.5in"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">Despite her disagreement with my choice, Manal did finally seem to accept the fact that I was learning Darija, and shared the news with the rest of the family later that evening, at dinner. Although the rest of the women were less outspoken about the issue than Manal had been, I still received no positive reinforcement – until Assia, Manal’s younger sister, declared, “well, this means that we can speak Arabic with you now.”</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify;text-indent:.5in"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">Though I had occasionally tried out my newly learned Moroccan vocabulary on the family, they had, until that moment, always spoken French to me. But Assia’s pronouncement occasioned an immediate departure from that: for the rest of the evening they resolutely addressed me in Darija, and tested my vocabulary by pointing to random items on the table and asking me for a definition. Every answer, right or wrong, led to great laughter and comments of encouragement.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify;text-indent:.5in"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">That night, as I wrote in my field notes, I tried to make sense of this strange interaction. What did Assia mean, that now they could speak Arabic with me? Was Fusha not Arabic too? In fact, didn’t Manal’s reaction suggest that Fusha was much more ‘real’, as far as Arabic goes, than Darija? Why did they want to speak Darija, but not Fusha, with me? </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify;text-indent:.5in"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">As I came to discover in the months that followed, the answers to these questions have to do with the particular role that language plays in Moroccan culture, politics, and constructs of identity. I am not a linguistic anthropologist, and the purported topic of my future dissertation is quite unrelated to the issue of language. However, living in Morocco over the past eighteen months has taught me that language, in this society, is intimately connected to definitions of what constitutes authentic ‘culture’, to notions of status, and to decisions about who belongs, and who does not. </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify;text-indent:.5in"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">My host family’s reaction to the discovery that I was learning Darija reveals a love/hate relationship with their dialect. It is not considered ‘real’ or worthy of study, but nevertheless it is theirs, it is the language in which they are most comfortable, and it is intimately connected to their culture and traditions. Though Fusha is often placed on a pedestal as a kind of ‘pure’ and ‘ideal’ Arabic, it is a language that the average Moroccan only masters passively. It is taught in school, and it is heard on radio and television; most Moroccans will thus understand anything said to them in Standard Arabic. Speaking it, however, would be the equivalent of an American speaking Shakespearean English. Fusha, one might venture to argue (from a linguistic standpoint at least), is no more ‘their’ language than French would be.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p class="MsoFootnoteText" style="text-align:justify;text-indent:.5in"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">Moroccan Arabic, in contrast, is entirely ‘theirs’. It may not be a real language, but speaking it signals a kind of cultural belonging, or insiderness in a way that Fusha cannot. I had noted this difference in value before, when I first came to Morocco in the spring of 2005. I was in Fès for a period of three months, and took an intensive course of beginning Darija, followed immediately by an intensive course of intermediate Fusha. Whereas topics of discussion in the colloquial class included Moroccan customs, traditions, and superstitions, the Fusha classes focused on pan-Arab politics, Middle-Eastern history, and Qur’anic theology. Feeling a growing disconnect from the Moroccan context during that last course, I remember regretting my decision to switch from dialect to standard Arabic.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:justify;text-indent:.5in"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">In late 2008, the shift in language of communication likewise brought with it a shift in subject matter. Communication with my host family became at once much more extensive, and much more context-related. Whereas before they had answered my curious questions about Moroccan customs only superficially, the women now began to explain things to me with enthusiasm, and to include me in their activities – claiming that it would be a ‘learning experience’ for me. Before the shift, they had warned me that I wouldn’t be able to handle witnessing the sacrifice of a sheep during the upcoming ‘Eid leKbir. But now, now that we were speaking Darija, I was not only allowed to be present, but was in fact charged with documenting the whole day with my digital camera. It was, in short, as though a door had been opened, and I was finally allowed inside the private life of this family. The realization that I was learning Darija seemed to have utterly changed the family’s impression of me. Before, I had simply been another foreign student, here to learn a language and then go back home. Their preference for speaking French with me at that time suggests an a priori assumption of an insurmountable communicative and cultural divide; a fundamental difference, an inherent outsiderness on my part. The fact that I was studying Darija, however, seemed to have led them to discern in me a potential for immersion, learning, understanding, and perhaps even integration. Perhaps my interest in Darija confirmed for them the sincerity of my interest in Moroccan culture – and their ability to speak to me in dialect allowed them to talk to me about it in its own terms. Darija may be no Fusha, but it is the vehicle of Moroccan culture.</span></span><a href="http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=6715206307508471859&postID=8374531059069409528#_ftn5" name="_ftnref5" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">[5]</span></span></span></span></a><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <div style="mso-element:footnote-list"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><br /></span> <hr align="left" size="1" width="33%"> <div id="ftn1"> <p class="MsoFootnoteText"><a href="http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=6715206307508471859&postID=8374531059069409528#_ftnref1" name="_ftn1" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">[1]</span></span></span></a><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"> </span><span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">Lalla</span></i></span><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"> is the Moroccan word for “lady,” or “mrs.” It is commonly followed by a first name. All first and last names used in this paper are pseudonyms chosen by the author.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p> </div> <div id="ftn2"> <p class="MsoFootnoteText"><a href="http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=6715206307508471859&postID=8374531059069409528#_ftnref2" name="_ftn2" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">[2]</span></span></span></a><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"> </span><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">A </span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">sdari</span></i></span><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"> (pl. </span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">sdader</span></i></span><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">) is a Moroccan sofa: a thick and firm mattress-like seat that rests on a wooden base, and a back rest of loose cushions. Sdader typically line all four walls of a Moroccan sitting room.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p> </div> <div id="ftn3"> <p class="MsoFootnoteText"><a href="http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=6715206307508471859&postID=8374531059069409528#_ftnref3" name="_ftn3" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">[3]</span></span></span></a><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"> </span><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">An alif is an ‘A’, a lam an ‘L’, and a qaf is a ‘K’ pronounced deep in the throat.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p> </div> <div id="ftn4"> <p class="MsoFootnoteText"><a href="http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=6715206307508471859&postID=8374531059069409528#_ftnref4" name="_ftn4" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">[4]</span></span></span></a><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"> </span><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">History books argue that this choice was driven by a desire to align Morocco with pan-Arab political movements that were emerging at the time in the Middle East.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p> </div> <div style="mso-element:footnote" id="ftn5"> <p class="MsoFootnoteText"><a href="http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=6715206307508471859&postID=8374531059069409528#_ftnref5" name="_ftn5" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">[5]</span></span></span></a><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"> </span><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;">This was again confirmed a few weeks later, at a friend’s wedding. I had commented to Manal on something, and had switched back into French because I was unsure of the right Arabic word. She turned to me and told me in no uncertain terms that we had to speak ‘Arabic’ right now, because we were at a wedding, and that was a ‘Moroccan’ event. French would thus be inappropriate.</span><o:p></o:p></span></p> </div> </div> <!--EndFragment-->Unknownnoreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6715206307508471859.post-40149155107822477542010-06-18T13:10:00.005+01:002010-06-18T13:19:30.381+01:00In Need of a Listening Ear<!--StartFragment--> <p class="MsoNormal"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">“Charlotte,” she calls out. “Charlotte, shoufi,” look at me.</span></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">I turn towards her and she stands there in the middle of the room, a seductive smile on her face as she dances to the sound of Egyptian pop. She’s feeling the rhythm with eyes half closed.</span></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">“Like this, see?” she says and puts her hands on her hips for emphasis, swaying back and forth to the beat. She motions for me to join her. “Come here, try it. Leave your jacket.”</span></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">I get up off the couch, and join her in movement. She regards me critically as I attempt to imitate her movements, then laughs. “Hey, come and see!” She calls out to people walking by outside. “Charlotte’s belly dancing!”</span></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center;mso-pagination:none;tab-stops:28.0pt 56.0pt 84.0pt 112.0pt 140.0pt 168.0pt 196.0pt 224.0pt 3.5in 280.0pt 308.0pt 336.0pt;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">***</span></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">I first talk to Rachida one Wednesday morning, two days after her hospitalization. On the day of her admission she’d been wearing a black Saudi-style abaya* with matching headscarf; twenty-four hours later, the Islamic clothing has been replaced by a leopard-print track suit. Diamond studs across the chest spell out “Chanel.” She has joined the other patients’ regular grooming activities, and now walks around with her hair blown out into large curls, her lips painted a deep pink, and her eyes accented with heavy lines of kohl.</span></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Within ten minutes of meeting her, Rachida has filled me in on the pertinent parts of her biography. She lives in a southern Moroccan town with her husband and three children, and she is a housewife. With regard to that last fact, there are three things I need to know. First of all, that she is highly intelligent – she could have pursued a higher education, had she been given the opportunity. Secondly, that she is a great cook (which prompts her to describe, in elaborate detail, the particular dishes she’s mastered). And thirdly, that she hasn’t lifted a finger in the house ever since she fell ill, now three years ago. “Je fais </span></span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">rien – du – tout</span></span></i></span><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">,” she summarizes for emphasis.</span></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">She doesn’t know how or why she got sick. It simply happened one day, mysteriously and suddenly. For three long years she was incapacitated – but she’s definitely feeling better now, she lets me know. She tells me she’s “farhana,” happy, on the ward: everyone is nice, there’s always someone to talk to, and everything is taken care of (though the food doesn’t compare to what she whips up at home, of course).</span></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">She’s invited me to her room, and we sit on her bed as she shows me pictures of her family, describing each of her loved ones in the most positive of terms. I casually remark that her husband bears a striking resemblance to her late father: both were military men who seem to fulfill all the requirements of ideal Moroccan masculinity. She’s spoken of both with tenderness in her voice. But here I seem to have overstepped some boundary. “Not at all!” she exclaims with a vehemence that makes me fear I might have sullied someone’s image. Her father was a great man, she assures me; a truly great man. Her husband, on the other hand, is revealed to be a jealous grouch. Like all men from the south, he is conservative and traditional; it’s because of him that she stays at home, wears a headscarf, and keeps her distance from unknown men.</span></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">And suddenly she suggests that this stifling home environment is the actual cause of her malaise. She isn’t happy in her southern town, she explains; she feels quite literally like a fish on dry, desert-like land. She would much prefer to live in a place like Rabat, where women have jobs, and go to the beach whenever they like. She’s glad to be far away from her husband for the time being. He’s not allowed to visit her (doctor’s orders), but she doesn’t mind one bit. This way, she says with a smile, she can truly relax and get better.</span></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Rachida’s eagerness to talk compels me to recruit her as a research participant. And she is indeed happy to be interviewed – yet the conversations that ensue are not nearly as rich or productive as I had hoped. The thing is that Rachida’s stories are a bit like a pre-recorded message; no matter what questions I ask, she tells me this same basic narrative over and over again. Behind this story is a mental wall that I simply cannot manage to break through. She repeatedly tells me that she is entrusting me and my recorder with her deepest secrets, but I get none of the subjective detail or emotional depth that I had expected to find.</span></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">It takes me a while (and quite a bit of self-doubt about my qualities as an interviewer) to realize that this is the very source of Rachida’s problem. It seems that she may have been right on the money when she blamed her environment for her illness. Rachida has lived her life in a time and place that discouraged women’s freedom to express their personal feelings and desires. She is hermetic about what goes on in her mind not because she does not want to share, but because she quite simply never learned how to do so.</span></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Nevertheless, everyone needs an outlet – everyone needs to vent. And so in the absence of words, Rachida communicates with her body. Her malaise manifests itself to her as fatigue, depression, or a momentary lapse in consciousness that she explains as a neurological anomaly. She is a hypochondriac, and her medical file contains three inches worth of lab reports, x-rays, and MRI scans that all come to the same conclusion: her problem is mental, not physical.</span></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Her inability to communicate verbally also explains her need for attention and tendency to seduce. Stuck in an impossible position, between a lack of words and the uncontrollable need to finally be heard, Rachida craves human interaction and a bit of understanding. But unable to ask for it directly, she’s learned to attract it by using the physical power of her femininity. </span></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Rachida is, in a word, </span></span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">hystérique</span></span></i></span><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">. The days of Freud are long gone, and the term “hysteria” no longer appears in the international diagnostic manuals currently in use – but it is alive and well in Morocco. The women’s ward always houses a few patients with hysteria; women just like Rachida, who have no other way to speak than through their bodies.</span></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">The doctors are stern with Rachida. She is taking anti-depressants, but the dominant aspect of her treatment involves a kind of behavioral therapy. Rachida must learn to be more emotionally independent, and she must learn to talk about her feelings. The doctor meets with her every day, and patiently yet persistently attempts to break through her mental wall. </span></span><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">But women like Rachida are never allowed to stay at the hospital too long. This so as not to indulge in the ‘secondary benefits’ of hospitalization. Being a patient means being confirmed as being ‘sick’ – and that label entitles one to all kinds of special care and attention. Most patients cannot wait to be cured and discharged. But </span></span><i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">les hystériques</span></span></i></span><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">? They couldn’t be happier, right here on the ward, being taken care of by everyone else. In order to ensure that such women still retain some motivation to get better, the staff tries to make hospitalization slightly less attractive – by cutting off certain privileges. This is why Rachida isn’t allowed to have visitors. She’s also not allowed to keep her cell phone with her, and although the staff encourages her to talk, they make sure not to be too available to her.</span></span></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Luckily I am not a member of the staff, and I can be as available to Rachida as I want. Perhaps I can be a listening ear that doesn’t probe for uncomfortable details, I decide. And so I give up on diving into the depths of her mind, settling instead for easy interaction. Aside from our interviews I hang out with her on the ward’s courtyard, relaxing in the sun. As we sit side by side, she’ll turn to me, put on her nicest smile, and ask, “Comment tu me trouves?” What do you think of me?</span></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">I’ll turn, and look at her. And before I get a chance to answer, she’ll hint at the particular kind of compliment she’s looking for that day.</span></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">On this particular afternoon, she runs her fingers through her hair and poses a rhetorical question.</span></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">“I have nice hair, right?”</span></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">I express my agreement, and she continues. It’s perfectly curly, she explains. And no matter what she does with it, it always looks great. It’s just too bad she’ll have to cover it back up with a headscarf as soon as she leaves the hospital…</span></span></span></p> <span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">And off she goes; she has launched herself into another rendition of her biography. I lean back in the sun, put a smile on my face, and simply listen. </span></span></span><!--EndFragment--><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> </span></span><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial, serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;">* basically, a long, formless black dress</span></span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6715206307508471859.post-35976762770403725412010-06-12T17:42:00.001+01:002010-06-13T15:47:52.980+01:00ChatterboxHafida is 57, though you wouldn't say so if you saw her. The years seem to have weighed more heavily on Hafida's shoulders than on those of others. The passage of time has etched deep wrinkles across her forehead, and her deep-set eyes betray the depth of her exhaustion. She shuffles around the ward in pink hospital-issued pajama's, three sizes too big for her skin-and-bones frame; with her back hunched forward she’s forever looking down at her feet. She always carries around a big woolen sweater, as though she is planning ahead for an upcoming departure. But other than a dubious brother and a modest pension fund, the doctors tell me there is little waiting for her at home.<br /><br />"On fait avec," she answers with a sigh and a smile, every time I ask her how she's doing. "On fait avec," 'we do the best we can.' According to Hafida, her best days are behind her. She is old and tired; her life has been reduced to the nostalgic memory of opportunities and experiences that have long since retreated beyond her grasp. She believes she has exhausted her potential, and her candle’s flame has been all but blown out.<br /><br />The doctors tell me that her “tristesse” is part of her illness. She has schizo-affective disorder, an illness in which the normal manifestation of schizophrenia is compounded by an extreme fluctuation of one’s mood. Yet I cannot help but wonder, who wouldn’t be exhausted after 30 years of hearing voices in your head?<br /><br />But Hafida is still full of wisdom and stories. As we sit on a bench in the sun, just the two of us, she talks about the important things in life: about love, adventure, and good health. These are the kinds of values, she impresses upon me, of which you don’t realize the importance until it is too late. She advises me to love fully, and to express my feelings. Too many people have locked their hearts, she says. Little do they know that true blindness is not the inability to see, but the inability to feel.<br /><br />In the same way, our ability to hear means nothing if we cannot listen. When she learns that I am Dutch, she tells me in a mixture of English and rusty German that she made her career as a professor of foreign languages. She speaks at least four different ones – but the most important language of all, she tells me, is “la communication des sourds” - the communication of the deaf. True communication, she explains, requires much more than words. One must be open to, interested in, and understanding of one’s interlocutors. One must always remain curious. In fact, this is the meaning of life: discovery, adventure, and learning. When she was younger, she says, she was like me: as I am exploring Morocco, so she explored Europe. But what you can do, she sighs, when life’s obligations curb your freedom to fly? She impresses upon me the importance of continuing my pursuit of discovery – of never allowing my heart to lock itself into blindness.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">***</div><br />A few days before her discharge from the hospital, we meet once again on that bench in the sun. We are chatting in our usual mixture of Arabic, French, German, and English, when she unexpectedly turns to me and apologizes for talking so much (little does she know how much I’ve enjoyed listening to her). She wants to know, how do you say “bavard” in English?<br /><br />“Chatterbox,” I translate.<br /><br />She nods, and smiles. She likes this word. She is a multilingual chatterbox, she says, who has begun to lose her words. With age, her knowledge is slipping and she no longer speaks any of her languages perfectly. <div><br /></div><div>“Before long,” she concludes with a smile, “I’ll just be an empty box.”<br /><br />I want to tell her that she need not worry, that she still has plenty of words and stories to fill a lifetime to come – that her candle is not even close to burning out. But I keep this to myself. Nostalgia aside, I’m beginning to realize that Hafida yearns for mental quiet. She has lived a lifetime with an endless stream of verbal commentary running through her mind; I cannot help but think that the prospect of an empty box might finally bring her the relief she’s been seeking.</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6715206307508471859.post-89310288984429994732010-06-10T17:40:00.001+01:002010-06-13T15:49:08.983+01:00A Conspiracy TheoristWhether it is day or night, Marwa always wears her sunglasses. For a while she wore earplugs, too (is she shutting out the world?), but these disappear after a few months in the hospital. She comes out of her room around 10 o’clock each morning, her head held high and her sharp nose protruding forward in a gesture of pre-emptive haughtiness. A lit cigarette in one hand and a bag or stack of books in the other, she lingers around the ward’s courtyard telling whoever wants to listen about the latest conspiracies she’s uncovered. On a good day, she talks about ongoing disputes between the stray cats that live on the ward; on a bad day she insists that the hospital is about to suffer an attack by weapons of mass destruction – or that George Bush and Osama bin Laden are secretly meeting to plan their takeover of the world.<br /><br />Marwa does not adhere to the communicative rules of the ward. She cannot keep quiet during the weekly meetings, at which patients are expected to sit quietly and listen to one another as they report on how they passed their week. Despite her best efforts Marwa continually interrupts with questions, demands, and propositions. And rather than talk about her mental condition, she prefers to pose philosophical questions to the group: if one does not cry, does that mean one does not suffer? What is the meaning of silence? And should psychiatrists, in the interest of remaining morally neutral vis-à-vis their patients, be atheists?<br /><br />She also refuses to speak the appropriate language. She insists on speaking French or English as she tells me about the years she spent in the US, the life she had in Paris, friends who work for big multinationals, and about how she was the first person to ever eat cereal with chocolate milk. At multiple occasions, other patients around her grumble with frustration. She’s just as Moroccan as they are, they remind Marwa; get off your high horse and speak Arabic like the rest of us! Upon which Marwa looks down her nose, tells them that “vous comprenez très bien le français,” and continues her story.<br /><br />And finally, Marwa says the unsayable; she breaks all taboos. She laughs about her own promiscuity, and argues that the Prophet Mohammed was a pedophilic rapist. Her sacrilegious talk has led to numerous heated arguments with other patients, and to at least one patient’s attempt at exorcising the evil spirits that must be haunting her (while Marwa, cool as a cucumber, simply remarks that it is not she, but the exorcising patient who is really ‘possessed’).<br /><br />I am not allowed to interview Marwa, lest my tape recorder become the object of another conspiracy theory. But my initial unease with her stories (how to react when someone tells you about military bases on other planets?) quickly transforms into endless fascination, and she is happy to have found a gullible listener. What I love most about Marwa is that to her, life is a reflection of literature. Her books – a collection of aged French paperbacks – are her treasure. She keeps them hidden underneath the blankets on her bed, and always carries a few with her when she’s walking around. In these books, she finds solid proof for her theories. She passes effortlessly through time and space, reality and fantasy, to expose hidden connections between certain people or events. The true mission of the helicopter from Black Hawn Down, she tells me, was the search for a pirate ship with gold. And Hitler is in reality the reincarnation of a 17th century French author. Here, she says, pointing to a drawing in one of her books. Do you see the resemblance in this portrait?<br /><br />And the thing is, I kind of do. I cannot help but smile.<br /><br />In turn, literature also becomes a reflection of life. Amongst her books Marwa has notebooks in which she is writing various novels. Fantastical stories they are, involving reincarnations, bodily possession, and time travel. They’re all true stories, too, she says. It’s all happened to her at one point or other, she explains as she puts a smile on her face, stares into space, and reminisces about boyfriends in Paris or international heists she pulled with the CEOs of various companies.<br /><br />For the other patients, Marwa is a prime example of what it means to be “folle,” crazy. But as preposterous as most of her stories are I am increasingly inclined to wonder if she is mentally ill, or simply eerily perceptive. Her characterizations of other people (doctors, patients) are often dead-on. She imitates them perfectly, getting their gait, their catch-phrases, even the look in their eyes just right. And once in a while, her theories of hostility and conspiracy expose painful anomalies in the hospital’s daily rhythm of life – anomalies perhaps much less ill-intentioned or serious than Marwa perceives, but true nonetheless.<br /><br />And so I wonder, might there be some grain of truth to her other stories as well? If we take the literalness of her stories with a grain of salt – if we look at them with unfocused eyes, as it were – and interpret them a little more abstractly, might she not be on to something?<br /><br />Besides, who are we to decide what’s true, anyway? It might be worthwhile just to sit back, smile, and let Marwa take you on a ride of fantasy and excitement...Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6715206307508471859.post-70224038682750003472010-05-19T21:28:00.000+01:002010-05-19T21:36:34.381+01:00Nostalgia for the BeyondAfter 18 months in Morocco, I’ve finally set foot in a region I’ve always been curious about: the Rif mountains along Morocco’s Mediterranean coast. <br /><br />I’ve left behind the now fairly routine rhythm of fieldwork in pursuit of a few days of relaxation. Unable to settle on another good yet economically modest holiday destination (and limited by the Icelandic cloud of ash that obstinately continues to paralyze airway traffic), I managed to convince Farid, my good friend and colleague, to take me north, to his native land. <br /><br />And so here we are, ensconced in the heart of the legendary Rif. We’re taking day trips west to Al Hoceima, and longer ones east, to Temsamane, Anoual, Nador and Oujda. Other than that we spend most of our days in Beni Bouayach, a small village east of Al Hoceima. It was built only recently, but now serves as a business epicenter of sorts for a number of smaller villages in the surrounding hills. Their dirt roads now meet up on the new main street of this town: a busy, café-lined thoroughfare for tractors and trucks, donkey carts and regional taxis (here painted in a greenish turquoise, in reflection perhaps of the nearby Mediterranean). <br /><br />The area is full of history, and family trees – centuries old, yet still blooming – are rooted deeply and firmly in its soil. It awakens in my own quite rootless existence a nostalgia for a feeling I’ve never quite had. Each hillside hides a story; each valley is the stage for a family saga. Most of these stories are colored by a theme of opposition against outside forces. The Rif Berbers have long been proud resisters of submission to centralized control, and make subtle claims to separate-ness on a daily basis. It is, first and foremost, a separateness borne by language. The people in this region understand Moroccan Arabic, but their language is Tariffit, and as a matter of principle, they prefer not to speak what they consider the language of the occupier. So as not to grate against local ears, I resort to Arabic only for the most essential communication, but otherwise rely on Farid’s expertise as interpreter.<br /><br />My own communicative efforts have thereby been reduced to a minimum; as such, the mental complexity of my daily life has been dialed back to a primordial level of simplicity. With my fieldwork in Rabat being so heavily dependent on human interaction, this brief period of virtual deaf/muteness has actually been a welcome respite from my regular life, and amplifies my sense of really being ‘away’. Without that mental exertion directed outward, I’ve been able to focus on turning inward. I’ve had time to think, to process, to formulate new directions for my research. And for the first time in what feels like months, I’m finding time to write again – something other than field notes, that is.<br /><br />I’ve never spent this much time in a Moroccan village this small, and I adore the snapshots that I am being given of daily life in this region. Traipsing through fields of wheat, groves of olive trees, and patches of coriander plants, making sure everything is growing as it should. Checking the level of water in the well – it’s been flowing generously ever since the earthquake of 2004. Looking in on the presses where, come December, olives will be converted into olive oil. Eating apricots straight from the tree. Bringing bread and fruit to community members in need. Taking lunch to the imam after Friday prayers. Shopping at the market, where you can pick out your own live chicken for slaughter. Whiling away evenings in plastic chairs on the sidewalk, chatting about future prospects over mint tea and sunflower seeds. And spending the occasional night hidden away on a rooftop, furtively drinking wine and whiskey.<br /><br />The latter, I must qualify, are activities distinctly reserved for men. Women generally do not show themselves outside after dark. In fact, the foundational principle of Riffi social organization seems to be that the family’s women are to be protected from the gaze of strangers’ eyes. I am told that Riffi families place great value on privacy. Life in a city apartment is unacceptable: they could never share a hallway, even a front door, with strangers. All families here thus live in the Moroccan equivalent of townhouses. The entire village is made up of them: boxlike constructions, three floors high, with colorful plasterwork facades. The ground floor provides space for a garage, or even a store; the two floors above are each outfitted as fully functional apartments, including salon, kitchen, and bathroom. This is local logic: with what essentially constitutes two separate apartments for each family, men and women can entertain separately. Male and female worlds seem in fact to constitute parallel, but completely separate domains; beyond the private realm of the immediate family, there is very little informal mixing. Even weddings are single-sex affairs. <br /><br />As a foreigner and outsider I am exempted from these standards of propriety, and so I get to be there for the nightly tea or wine. But being the only woman who shows herself outside after dark, I am nevertheless an anomaly. And being a blonde woman, I’m an anomaly about which people draw particular conclusions. Farid explained it to me as follows. As we drove onto the main street of Beni Bouayach, he informed me that to those who don’t know him well, the sight of us together will lead to the assumption that he has “found one” – that is, that he’s managed to find himself a European woman who will marry him for ‘papers’. <br /><br />Departure is a common wish, a shared dream, a notion ever-present. There is common agreement among the people of this region that opportunity – fortune, career, a future – lies beyond. Regardless of how far the beyond on which one has set one’s sights, young adults all feel that there is little for them here among these hills. They’ve grown up with fathers, uncles, older cousins away in northern Europe, and these migrants’ stories have nourished the next generation’s dreams of leaving. Each summer, visiting emigrants’ display of European wealth and worldliness further widens the chasm between reality and desire. For the young men of this region, stunted in their masculinity and adulthood, a woman from the West can – literally – be one’s passport for departure.<br /><br />For me, in turn, this region illustrates the sadness of stifled potential. The people’s stories of lack and limitation strikingly contradict the beauty of these hills, their obvious fertility. But this contradiction is born not so much of misperception; it emerges rather from the problematic relationship between the Rif and the central government. In a vicious cycle of cause and consequence, the Rif Berbers have always resisted submission to centralized power, and the government has, in subtle and not so subtle ways, consistently and systematically neglected this region. The tribes here are fiercely independent-minded, and always at the ready to fight for their autonomy. This volatile combination has helped Morocco battle for its sovereignty in the past (against the Ottomans, then the Europeans), but now poses what is perhaps the greatest threat to the power of the monarchy. A threat the government attempts to contain through isolation. This is a forgotten corner of Morocco: roads are in dangerous disrepair, there is a dire lack of schools for higher education, and no irrigation systems at all. After an earthquake devastated the region in 2004, the government failed tragically to help re-build. Internet connections are twice as slow as anywhere else, and radios receive more Spanish than domestic channels. <br /><br />Apart from neglect, there is also silence. The region’s colorful and volatile past – battles, victories, independence and subjugation – has systematically been left out of the Moroccan history books. To the people themselves, stories of oppression are often too shameful to recount. This new generation of stunted young men has thus, sadly, grown up ignorant of its people’s illustrious past, of the sagas that link them to this ground. They are unaware of their rootedness – laboring under a sense of lightness, perhaps, that further nourishes their dreams of a beyond?<br /><br />Without government investment, the community around Beni Bouayach has become surprisingly self-sufficient. Community funds (much of it from emigrants in Europe) have financed the installation of electricity, the construction of new housing, and the charity that cares for those who are less fortunate. Without government investment the community is, unfortunately, not (yet?) able to create long-term opportunity for its people. But their pride nevertheless refuses to be stunted. The people find subtle, daily ways of resisting subjugation. Their language is alive and vibrant; used often use to tell jokes at the expense of Arabs, or to grunt at the presence of “er makhzen,” the government.<br /><br />Yet, lest we forget that even this remote and neglected corner of the country still bows under the rule of its King, the government has nevertheless managed to put its stamp on the region. Frequent displays of the Moroccan flag and portraits of Mohammed VI help to remind us that the notion of a Rif Republic remains but a mere nostalgic idea…Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6715206307508471859.post-53709582377924058132009-11-26T16:57:00.002+00:002009-11-26T17:13:17.863+00:00Reflections on Fieldwork at the ClinicTomorrow marks the end of my fourth week of research. And after twenty mornings of observation, 4 different wards, and more than 50 typed pages of field notes, I’m more excited than ever about this project.<br /><br />I start each day at the <span style="font-style:italic;">réunion de staff</span>, a meeting in which the residents and professors get together to discuss all new admissions of the day before. Afterwards I head to one of the wards, where I observe the daily goings-on. I sit in on medical consultations or meetings between nurses. I participate in recreational activities for patients, walk around the ward, look at the schedules and announcements posted in the nurses’ office, get a sense of the way in which records are kept, listen to doctors discussing treatment options with one another, or simply sit in a chair and watch. I have informal conversations with the staff, in which I’ll ask them about their method of diagnosis, their protocols for treatment, or about the backgrounds of their patients, and they’ll ask me about my research plans. <br /><br />For the moment I am simply an observer; apart from these informal conversations I’m not engaging in any actual interviews yet. But even just these brief mornings of watching have produced more data than I had ever expected at this stage of research. Everything I see and hear at the Clinic is material. I’m picking up data and learning new things at multiple levels, all at the same time. I’m learning linguistically: I write down the French terms for disorders, symptoms, and other phenomena. I’m becoming so used to being in a francophone hospital environment that I’m beginning to have trouble thinking of the English equivalent for words like <span style="font-style:italic;">prise en charge</span> (care), <span style="font-style:italic;">sevrage</span> (withdrawal), or <span style="font-style:italic;">infirmier chef</span> (head nurse?). <br /><br />At the same time, I’m learning on a medical level: I’m becoming familiar with psychiatric symptomatology, its clinical presentations, and its biological consequences. I frantically write down every snippet of general medical information that I glean from my observations, and spend most of my afternoons googling the names of medications I’ve seen prescribed, the workings of different neurotransmitters, or the DSM-IV description of personality disorders.* I’m learning about the Clinic’s procedures for admission, treatment, and discharge, as well as national laws governing hospitalizations, and am getting a sense of how clinical observations are recorded and communicated between doctors and nurses.<br /><br />And finally, I’m gathering ethnographic data. I observe how residents interact with their professors, how doctors talk to nurses, and how staff communicate with patients. I’m getting a sense of how patients express their symptoms, and how doctors listen to these explanations. I’m taking note of the gender balance and how this affects the relationship between patients and staff. I’m beginning to get a sense of how psychiatric theories interact with popular belief in spirits and magic, how medical knowledge is imparted to students, and of how medical expertise lends power.<br /><br />All of this data makes for almost incessant note-taking, and a bit of internal conflict sometimes about what to write down, and what to let slide. In that sense I’m also learning about myself as an observer – about what I pick up on and what I miss, what I consider important, and how I position myself vis-à-vis the people among whom I am doing research. I spend a fair amount of time talking to two other foreign women spending some time at the hospital – a student of clinical psychology and a psychiatrist. As we exchange impressions and reflections, I find a lot of my observations reinforced, but also curiously take note of differences in interpretation, or of interesting bits of information I had completely missed. Their viewpoint is valuable to me – the extra eyes and minds add more data to my notes, but also allow me an additional dimension of reflection on what I’m seeing. Their experience of clinical practice in France provides me with a valuable comparison for the things that strike me about psychiatry here, and provide me with a sounding board on which I can test some of my own budding interpretations.**<br /><br />This wealth of input only makes me hungry for more, and I’ve never felt more motivated or energetic about my project. At the same time, however, the wealth of sensory input gets a little overwhelming sometimes. There is so much to take in that I feel as though I’m left without enough time to process it all, to wrap my head around it and make sense out of what I’m seeing. As far as my ethnographic work is concerned, this might not be something to worry too much about. There’s something to say, perhaps, for just diving in at this stage of the project – of immersing myself completely and just letting it all flood over me. It might even be too early to try and distill some interpretations or theories out of what I’ve seen – if I draw conclusions now, perhaps I’ll blind myself to new evidence that might contradict what I think I’ve learned?<br /><br />But personally, it’s difficult sometimes to relinquish that sense of control, that sense of knowing what’s going on. And for the purposes of this blog, I do wish that I were a little bit more able to distill a few coherent ideas out of my field notes, just enough for a post or two. There is so much I want to write about – the communication between doctors and patients, the concept of ‘psychiatric expertise’ and the way in which it shapes that communication, the notion of hysteria (so outdated a term in Europe and the US, but so commonly used here), the role of gender in shaping interactions, treatment plans, and diagnoses. All of these ideas are floating around in my mind, but I just can’t seem to find enough clarity to pin them down with adequate, descriptive words. Hopefully I’ll find a bit of coherence in due course. I’ll try to keep posting about once a week – and I’ll try to return to writing about things other than my research, as well.<br /><br /><br />* This level of learning has made me particularly conscious of how much I miss medicine. How intrigued I am not just by the human mind, but by the human body as well. I don’t want to use the word regret because I don’t for a moment regret choosing anthropology, but I do regret making a choice in general; I regret having decided at some point that I wouldn’t be able to do both medicine and anthropology. It’s never too late, I suppose, and in theory I could apply for medical school once I finish my PhD. When that time comes, I guess I’ll have to ask myself what I’d rather do: start another rigorous four years of education when I’m in my early thirties, or spend the rest of my life knowing that a part of me will always miss medicine?<br />** In addition, I’m finding it incredibly valuable to be able to talk about what I’ve seen with others who have shared the experience. I’m observing at the Clinic’s emergency room this week, and a few of the people who’ve come in for psychiatric help have really struck me in their sadness and hopelessness. More so than on the other wards, observation this week has affected me emotionally, and it’s been helpful to talk about these observations with others who were there.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6715206307508471859.post-75128308495184520772009-11-18T08:46:00.000+00:002009-11-18T16:52:08.678+00:00Ethnography of a Psychiatric Ward: The Meaning of Psychosis“What’s the point?” she asks. She looks fragile as she sits in that chair, her shoulders drooping and her face nearly hidden by the pink hoodie she’s pulled over her hair. She looks at the doctor with a bit of frustration in her eyes, her hands digging themselves deeper into her hoodie’s pockets.<br /><br />“It’s gone, and I feel good. Isn’t that all that matters?”<br /><br />Doctor Mourad leans back, and lets out a subtle sigh. Then he responds:<br /><br />“But it’s important that we talk about this, you and me, so that I can help you.”<br /><br />The consultation is suddenly interrupted when the door swings open and another resident walks in. She shares this consultation room with Dr. Mourad, and she’s here to pick up her bag. As the two physicians exchange a few pleasantries, I notice the patient’s head sinking lower and lower, until it is cradled by her hands. Rhythmic tremors running through her shoulders betray that she is crying.<br /><br />But she has not given in. After the female resident leaves, Dr. Mourad tries again, to no avail. He is hoping to convince his patient to talk about her experience of possession by what she calls a <span style="font-style:italic;">diable</span>, a devil (or, in Arabic, a <span style="font-style:italic;">shaitan</span>*). I cannot help but think that he’s doing so in part for my benefit; ever since the doctors on this ward have learned about my research interests, they are constantly calling me in to observe their interaction with patients who claim to have been possessed or cursed – an experience the doctors categorically define as a particular kind of hallucination. None have been as unwilling to discuss the subject as this young woman, and I am struck by her defensiveness. <br /><br />Her next argument calls on notions of expertise and authority, as she hopes to excuse herself from the responsibility of having to explain what happened to her:<br /><br />“You shouldn’t ask me,” she says. “I don’t know anything about <span style="font-style:italic;">jnoun, diables</span> or <span style="font-style:italic;">shaitans</span>. All I know is what it says in the Qur’an. If you want any explanations, don’t ask me. You need to talk to an expert, some kind of scholar.”<br /><br />The doctor tries to explain that he’s not interested in theory; he just wants to know what happened to her. But it’s no use, and a few minutes later we escort the patient back to her room. She’s staying in the closed women’s ward: a dreary concrete courtyard where about twenty five very sick women spend their days doing little more than wandering around. Paint flakes off the walls and ceilings, there is little more than a few rusty old hospital beds to sit on in the recreational room, and a stale smell of abandonment hangs in the air. It is a far cry from the state of the art facilities where I spent my first week at the Clinic. Having moved on to a third ward at the time of writing, I’ve learned that this closed ward is by no means representative of the rest of this hospital. Nevertheless, it struck me in its sadness, and I think the difference in environment between this and other wards is worth exploring.<br /><br />The dreariness of this ward is matched by a complete lack of stimulation or activity for the patients. Doctors tell me that a hair dresser comes to the ward to do the patients’ hair once in a while, and nurses will sometimes hang out with the women, listening to music or dancing a little. But there is no exercise equipment like there was on the addiction ward, nor are there musical instruments, books, or a television. Nothing is allowed on the ward; in their psychosis or suicidality, a fair amount of these women cannot be trusted not to do something harmful. On the one hand, I wonder how these women make it through the day, with nothing to do. On the other, even I can see that the majority of these patients are too sick to be able to participate in any kind of activity. <br /><br />Most of the patients on this ward suffer from a psychotic disorder. They are heavily medicated: each morning, the nurses enter the ward with a tray full of Haldol, Largactil,** and other anti-psychotics and tranquilizers. The medication is often administered by injection – pills can be refused, I guess. There is no privacy; each room accommodates five to six women. Without curtains or doors to hide behind anywhere, patients are injected right there on the courtyard, <span style="font-style:italic;">en plein public</span>.<br /><br />Despite this medication, the women seem truly sick. Many of them spend their days walking around the courtyard, talking animatedly to the voices in their head. They slur their speech when they talk, and jump from one subject to the next. They crowd around the locked glass door that separates the ward from the nurses’ area, and sing famous <span style="font-style:italic;">Sherine</span> songs.*** When they notice me, sitting there with the staff, they blow me kisses, and call out that I’m <span style="font-style:italic;">trop belle</span>. A few of them even begin to recite the <span style="font-style:italic;">Fatiha</span>, the first verses of the Qur’an. I’m struck by this ‘strange’ lack of inhibition, and take it as a sign that these women are really sick. Nevertheless, when that glass door opens and they all come in to greet me, they are friendly, and normal, and simply curious. They just want to know my name, where I’m from, how I’m doing. The next day, I see genuine recognition in their eyes as they greet me again.<br /><br />A lot of the patients, the doctors tell me, believe they have been possessed, or cursed. One of the residents tells me, almost self-consciously, that for a psychiatrist, this is a hallucination. An anthropologist might feel differently, she adds, but for her, it is part of a psychotic symptomatology. I don’t have time to respond – she’s in consultation with a patient at the moment, and simply turns to me once in a while to ‘translate’ what the patient is saying into psychiatric terms. But it makes me realize that I need to come up with a ready answer for questions such as these. I am so often asked these days if I believe in possession, or in the effectiveness of countercurses. Regardless of how I might feel about these issues, I think I’ll say “I don’t know.” True objectivity is an illusion, I know that, but I think it’s a better idea not to weigh in on these questions with the people who are participating in my research, and try to maintain some kind of neutrality.<br /><br />A central question in my research, however, is what happens when two different theories about mental illness meet. What does it do to a person’s experience of being sick, when his or her belief about possession is explained (dismissed?) by a psychiatrist as a ‘hallucination’? I cannot help but wonder if this has anything to do with that young woman’s unwillingness to tell Dr. Mourad about her experience. As we talked about her reticence, Dr. Mourad explained that she might worry that her <span style="font-style:italic;">diable</span> will come back if she talks about it. Alternatively, she might be afraid that talking about devils will lead doctors to conclude that she warrants longer hospitalization. Dr. Mourad, however, feels that she will not truly be well enough to leave until she is able to talk openly about her experience. I can see his point; I tend to believe in the idea that talking – externalizing – provides a necessary kind of catharsis. Nevertheless, I wonder what it’s like for a patient like this young woman; to be asked to open up about a very traumatic experience to someone who might not agree about what that experience meant, and who has no more than twenty minutes a day to speak with you. <br /><br />All of it makes me wonder about the nature or definition of ‘pathology’. Who has the right to define what’s normal and what’s not, and who gets to decide what it all means, or what should be done about it? I’m thinking here not just about the meaning of possession. Aside from these beliefs, another problem most of the patients had in common was a history of prostitution. Nearly every patient I met on the ward had, according to the doctors, engaged in some kind of prostitution at some moment in time. This behavior was often seen as a symptom of illness: a sign of mania, or psychosis. Some patients talked openly about it all, while others denied ever having sold their bodies – a sign, for the psychiatrist, of that patient’s impaired judgment. I couldn’t help but wonder, though, whether it might not be at least a little understandable that a woman might deny having engaged in something considered to be so shameful?<br /><br />In addition, I wonder how much cultural beliefs and social expectations have weighed in on the high occurrence of ‘prostitution’-as-pathology among these patients. Morocco is a modernizing country, but extramarital sex is still, and will probably long remain, highly unacceptable for a woman. Does that mean, I wonder, that the definition of ‘prostitution’ here in Morocco is broader than ours? Once, when discussing an alcoholic male patient’s extramarital affairs with girls, a resident insisted that he must have slept with prostitutes. Anything else was simply not possible, she said; any girl who has extramarital sex is by definition a prostitute. Perhaps some of these female patients had engaged in behavior that, by Western standards, would not necessarily be termed prostitution? And in the same way, I wonder if the particular unacceptability of extramarital sex might mean that doctors here are more likely than elsewhere to label promiscuous behavior as ‘pathological’? Excessive promiscuity is often included on lists of the kind of reckless behavior that the DSM-IV lists as a possible symptom of mania, or various personality disorders. Nevertheless, I wonder if cultural mores weigh in here to create this particular tendency to label people with deviant sexual behavior.<br /><br />I spent a lot of my time on this ward in a chair in the nurses’ lounge, observing the women on the ward through that glass door. And as they crowded up against that door to wave or sing to me, I began to wonder: what really is the difference between me and them? Aren’t we both curiously and unabashedly observing the other? I am as interested in them as they are in me. As a foreigner I, too, don’t always behave according to the social rules. Aren’t I, then, as abnormal as they are? When the nurse pulls a screen in front of the door, I am not sure whose gaze she is trying to avert – theirs, or mine.<br /><br />I had hoped to do my research on this ward, but the level of pathology might pose a problem. I can interview only those who are capable of understanding the goals of my research, and of providing informed consent for participation. I did not meet a single patient who would have met those criteria – an observation later corroborated by most of the residents. I haven’t yet visited the open women’s ward, but hope this may be a better fit. Part of me is relieved, not to have to spend a few months on that dreary, tragic ward. But the other part of me continues to think about the women I’ve met there, wondering how they’re doing now, half a week since I last saw them, wondering also where they might end up, once they leave the Clinic.<br /><br /><br />* though curiously, this woman argued that a <span style="font-style:italic;">diable</span> is not the same thing as a <span style="font-style:italic;">shaitan</span>. It was one of the few things she was willing to explain – though she couldn’t tell us what exactly the difference was. I continue to be intrigued by the way in which Moroccans mix French and Arabic - and her distinction between these two concepts interestingly contradicts the idea that the two languages are conceptually interchangeable...<br />** Largactil is known as thorazine in the US, I believe.<br />*** <span style="font-style:italic;">Sherine</span> is a famous middle eastern singer. Egyptian, most likely.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6715206307508471859.post-80497280191534945022009-11-12T08:12:00.001+00:002009-11-12T13:22:51.891+00:00Ethnography of a Psychiatric Ward: Addiction in RabatMr. Abbas is a thin, clean-shaven man in his fifties. He is well-spoken, but restless as he meets with his treating physician, a young petite woman in her second year of psychiatric residency. Sitting on the edge of his seat, he keeps getting up and walks around the room, as though he is acting out the story he is telling. He is beating around the bush, and the resident repeatedly calls him on it: you’re not answering my question, she tells him.<br /><br />He isn’t providing the resident with the information she is looking for. Neither is he speaking her language: while she poses her questions in Moroccan Arabic, he insists on answering in French, and utters not a word in dialect throughout the meeting. At first I think he may be doing this for the benefit of the observers in the room: two master’s students in clinical psychology, a psychiatrist from France, and myself. Our presence probably did have something to do with his conduct. But there was more to Mr. Abbas’ very performative behavior. <br /><br />Mr. Abbas is an alcoholic, and he has checked himself into the Clinic in order to conquer his addiction. When his doctor introduces us, the observers, during this particular consultation, Mr. Abbas responds with a polite and pleasant <span style="font-style:italic;">enchanté</span>, and proceeds to introduce himself with a quite elaborate story. He is a successful lawyer, he tells us, well-educated and fluent in French. Over the course of the consultation he talks about his practice, his nice car, his wife – none of which the resident asked about. After he leaves, his doctor tells us that Mr. Abbas hasn’t worked in three years. His wife has left; in fact, the life he just described to us has been destroyed by his addiction. What emerges at that point is the sad picture of a man dethroned; a man who has lost everything he thought to validate his existence; a man who desperately tries to maintain an image he knows he has already lost. <br /><br />And it made me wonder. What does alcoholism mean for a Moroccan man? Alcoholism is destructive to anyone, but in this country, where alcohol is forbidden by religious decree, what does it mean to be an alcoholic? What does it do to Mr. Abbas’ sense of who he is? To his identity as a man, as a Moroccan, as a Muslim?<br /><br />Mr. Abbas is but one of the patients I met during my week of observation on the <span style="font-style:italic;">service de toxicomanie</span>, the Clinic’s addiction ward. It was the inaugural week of my research project; though I will not actually be able to do anything I mention in my research proposal until I obtain authorization from a local ethics board, the Clinic’s director has given me permission to kick-start my research with a period of general observation. Dr. Rachidi and I designed a schedule that would put me on a different ward each week, and as of last Monday, I spend every weekday morning looking around, shadowing doctors and nurses, and sitting in on meetings and rounds. <br /><br />The <span style="font-style:italic;">service de toxicomanie</span> has been running for a number of years, but recently moved into new housing: a newly built two-storey construction just inside the hospital grounds. Clearly the recipient of considerable funding, the service stands out from the rest of the hospital by virtue of its size and its modern and clean appearance.<br /><br />But despite its large quarters, the service is small. Aside from Dr. Rachidi, who is the attending on this ward (here she is called <span style="font-style:italic;">professeur</span>), the place is staffed by two residents (<span style="font-style:italic;">résidents</span>) and about three nurses per shift. The number of patients, too, is small; I can count them on my two hands. All are male, and most are there because of their dependence on alcohol. From a poster that charts the service’s functioning over the past five years, I learn that this is the norm for the ward. The men range from late adolescence to late adulthood, and come from equally varied backgrounds. I see wedding rings on a few hands, and I wonder about their families, their friends. Who comes to visit them? I’ve already learned that the patients themselves are not allowed to communicate with the outside world; one of the first things I am shown is the therapeutic contract that each patient is asked to sign upon admission (all patients on this ward are admitted to the hospital voluntarily). This list of rights and obligations indicates that each patient is to surrender all means of communication. A total of two visiting hours are scheduled for the weekends. I wonder what this restriction of contact is like for a Moroccan family – togetherness is so important here, and I get the sense that that is especially true in times of sickness. The crowds of loved ones around each hospital bed left a lasting impression on me when I visited a public hospital in Fes, a few years ago.<br /><br />The average length of stay is a month, though some stay longer. When I arrive with the doctors around 9.30 every morning, the men are usually grouped together in a small courtyard off the main corridor. This is the only place where they are allowed to smoke, and all of them make eager use of this right. They lounge on benches or hang around in the doorway, chatting with one another, occasionally requesting something from a doctor or nurse. The patients don’t seem to get much of this kind of down time, however. Their days are highly structured; a weekly timetable posted on the bulletin board in the main corridor allocates every hour of every day to a particular activity. An hour of every morning is scheduled for consultations with the <span style="font-style:italic;">médecin</span>, the doctor, and each day devotes an additional hour or two to a particular form of therapy (group discussions, during which patients discuss a theme of their own choosing, but always related to addiction and substance abuse; motivational therapy; <span style="font-style:italic;">psycho-éducation</span>, during which awareness is created about the negative impact of substance abuse; or relaxation therapy, for instance). Afternoons and evenings promise activities of a more recreational variety, such as television, reading, ping-pong, or cards. There is time for exercise, and even for music – I have already seen the well-equipped gym and music room upstairs. It is a full schedule and indeed, it seems that the patients and staff are always either coming from one activity, or about to start another.<br /><br />The doctors (and I) begin their mornings at the Clinic-wide staff meeting, where they discuss new admissions. The presentation of patients is formalized; it is formulaic and ritualistic. In contrast, on-ward communication between doctors, nurses, and patients is informal and easy. After the doctors’ arrival on the ward, the staff briefly gathers to exchange pertinent information from the past night or weekend. They meet in one of the recreational areas off the main corridor or in the nurses’ station, a round space enclosed by glass at the end of the corridor. This room is furnished with a desk and a few bookcases that hold all records, files, prescription pads, and other necessities. The station makes me think of a Foucaultian watchtower; as particular patients are discussed, I notice doctors and nurses glancing at the man in question through the glass, sometimes even pointing as they review his behavior last night.<br /><br />While the Clinic-wide staff meetings are held exclusively in French, the conversation between doctors and nurses is an even mix of French and Arabic. When speaking the latter, everyone addresses one another with the familiar <span style="font-style:italic;">tu</span>. There are jokes and laughter, and everyone speaks at once. No one wears a name tag, and only the two residents walk around in white coats. There are no pagers; just cell phones. Dr. Rachidi is warm and approachable toward everyone; while she does not hesitate to point out flaws in her residents’ approach to their <span style="font-style:italic;">prise en charge</span> (care), her criticism is always constructive. “You’re supposed to make mistakes,” she even tells them during one particular meeting, “you’re residents, you’re here to learn, not to do everything perfectly at once.”<br /><br />Both residents on this ward are female. This reflects a general Clinic-wide gender-balance: of the 22 residents being trained here, sixteen are women. Likewise, there are three women among the six professors of psychiatry that teach and practice at the Clinic. In contrast, most of the nursing staff is male. The French psychiatrist, who began a six month fellowship here during the same week that I began my observation, tells me this is common at psychiatric wards throughout the world; a big strong man is often better able to deal with aggressive patients than a woman, she explained. Nevertheless, this particular gender balance provides an interesting contrast with traditional notions of professional roles within the world of healthcare, where men are in charge as doctors, and women are nurturing nurses. It’s a contrast also with traditional Arab conceptions of masculinity and femininity – conceptions that are very much alive here in Morocco. I very much wonder what this inversion of traditional roles does to the balance of power on the Clinic’s wards – especially on a service such as this one, where the patients are so predominantly male. For patients such as Mr. Abbas, who feel so dethroned, I wonder what it’s like to be treated by a female doctor. I’m curious to see how this plays out on other wards, and it could be an interesting angle for my research.<br /><br />This week, I've moved on to a different service (more ethnographic sketches to come…). <span style="font-style:italic;">Toxicomanie</span> is not the ward where I will be doing my research. Nevertheless, I was reticent to leave – not only because I found everything about the place so interesting, or because I would like a chance to answer the questions this week has brought up. I’m also reluctant because I was finally beginning to feel a bit more comfortable with my presence there. I had become familiar with the doctors, the nurses, the patients, the languages. I was losing some of my reticence about bothering busy doctors with my questions, or disturbing a patient with an inappropriate question. I am more of a wait-and-see person than a go-get-‘em-girl, preferring the slow, subtle approach to the direct and bold one. This can work well in anthropology, but not necessarily during the set-up phase of research; I often have to push myself to be assertive and ask the questions I want an answer to.<br /><br />But I’ll do as much pushing as I have to. This week has proven, I think, that it pays to be direct, to stop worrying about things like bothering people, or misunderstanding them, or worse – not being able to make myself understood. For the first two days on the <span style="font-style:italic;">service de toxicomanie</span>, I was incredibly anxious about issues of communication. I worried that I wouldn’t understand everything; my exhaustion at the end of each day reminded me how much energy it takes me to follow a conversation in medical French or Arabic. I panicked every time I realized I’d been dozing off and had missed a crucial turn in the discussion – something that tended to happen particularly at those moments that I spent worrying. I was even more nervous not being able to make myself understood: of tripping over words or, worse, not being able to think of any. I spent those mornings’ rounds in fear that I’d be asked to explain my research, to explain why I chose Morocco. But on day three I began to realize that, despite exhaustion, I had actually been understanding enough to have a good sense of what’s going on. And later that day, I suddenly found myself in various conversations, perfectly able to describe what I was doing there, even receiving a compliment on my French. And so I moved on to the next ward, perhaps not fearlessly, but at least with a good dose of faith that maybe, just maybe, this project of mine will be doable, after all…Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6715206307508471859.post-30564048055422077522009-11-09T17:31:00.002+00:002009-11-09T17:36:02.210+00:00Things to Do in Rabat on a Saturday NightLast Saturday night, I believe temporarily forgot that I was in Morocco. <br /><br />Around seven PM, I met up with a group of NIMAR-affiliated ladies downtown. After a pleasant dinner at Le Petit Beur, a small restaurant close to the Parliament, we headed over to Théatre Mohammed V for “ABBA the Show,” a big spectacle, as the Théatre always calls it, of classic ABBA songs put on by a sizeable and very enthusiastic ABBA cover band. Complete with lighting effects, original ABBA members and 1970s costumes, the show was fabulously entertaining. The theater was packed with fans screaming and singing aloud so fervently that one would have thought the original singers were up there on stage. Had it not been for subtle references to Morocco through the lighting effects (a ‘DH’ sign lighting up on the stage backdrop amidst Euro and Dollar symbols during the song <em>Money, Money, Money</em>; a collection of red and green lights creating an image of the Moroccan flag at the end of the show – and sending the crowd into ecstasy), the entire ambience would have made me forget where I was.<br /><br />The <a href="http://www.tnmv.ma/def.asp?codelangue=23">Théatre National Mohammed V</a> is one of Rabat’s primary theater venues. It offers a wide variety of entertainment to the Rbati public, from plays in Moroccan dialect to Flamenco concerts and hip hop dance performances – to quote a few offers from the upcoming winter program. But those who seek to spend a <em>soirée</em> out on the town have more than just this theater to choose from. The various cultural institutes scattered around the city center (The German <a href="http://www.goethe.de/Ins/ma/rab/frindex.htm">Goethe Institut</a>, the Spanish <a href="http://rabat.cervantes.es/es/default.shtm">Instituto Cervantes</a>, and the <a href="http://www.ambafrance-ma.org/institut/rabat/index.cfm">Institut Français</a>, for instance) each offer their own selection of music, films, and other performances around town. The result is a weekly offer of cultural activities that will certainly not leave you wanting for entertainment.<br /><br />You might start your cultural evening out at one of Rabat’s many decent restaurants – in one’s choice of price range and cuisine – and end it at a swanky bar or nightclub. For contrary to what one might think about a country where alcohol is prohibited by law to 99% of the population, nightlife in Morocco’s larger cities is alive and thriving. The offer of venues runs the full gamut from dark and dingy dive bars, where the only women present are there in a professional capacity, to hip and trendy nightclubs. The latter are places to see and be seen. Dressed to the nines, groups of men and women lounge around the table they’ve reserved, making their own drinks from the bottle of alcohol they’ve purchased and the mixers – coke, sprite – they’ve been given for free. They laugh, chat, and occasionally dance – first to American hip hop, later to the techno and house that follow it. Girls wear revealing tops and skinny jeans; boys wear shiny fitted shirts and leather shoes. There is an ease of interaction between the sexes that seems to contrast with daytime social conventions.<br /><br />Whenever I am out, whether it be at the theater or at a club, I cannot help but wonder about the identity of the people I see around me. Who frequents these places – from what socio-economic background do they originate? The nightclubs I have seen are a swanky affair. There seems to be an elitism to the whole experience, a suggestion of luxury; the advertisement of a certain level of wealth and a certain brand of modernity. It’s in the way people dress – the glitter, the brand names – but it’s also in the money one ostensibly spends for a night of dancing. The cover charge for Amnesia, one of Rabat’s most famous clubs, is 200 Dirhams – a small fortune, if you imagine that a large proportion of the Moroccan population lives on a salary of 1500 a month or less. Admission comes with a free drink, but any subsequent beverage runs at least 80 Dirhams.<br /><br />However, my friend Hatim tells me that the real regulars never pay. The secret, he tells me, is to get to know the bouncer. To strike a deal, and get a discount. It’s not the upper classes that one will encounter at the club, he explained – those elites have their own, private, establishments. No, the trendy patrons at Amnesia are individuals just like you and me; they’ve just managed to bargain their way inside, to an evening of luxury at a discount price. Once again, the suggestion emerges that everything in Morocco is negotiable, and nothing is as simple as it seems (… but the true elite always remains out of reach).<br /><br />Yet my question remains. Who, then, frequents places like Amnesia? Where do they come from, and where do they live? What kind of jobs do they hold, where do they go to school, and how does their behavior at the club fit into their daytime social roles? <br /><br />When thinking about these questions I often catch myself imagining each of these nameless young individuals to be a kind of Jekyll-and-Hyde – possessors of a nighttime alter ego whose behavior is incommensurable with their daytime identity. I’m intrigued by the contrast that seems to exist between the social conventions of Moroccan society, and the vibe I encounter at these clubs. On this blog, I often write about the various ways in which ‘tradition’ is idealized and upheld by Moroccan society, and the ways in which particular interpretations of ‘modernity’ emerge and interact with old customs and conventions. I’m interested in the ways in which these two concepts seem, ostensibly, to contradict one another. And so I take note of the way in which I see girls dress and behave at Amnesia – and then contrast it with the grumpy man Fatima and I once encountered as we walked home at 3 AM, who asked my friend if her mother knew she was out so late, and then added that she must be a prostitute.<br /><br />But if there is one thing I have learned about Morocco, it is that nothing is ever as simple as it seems. ‘Modernity’ and ‘tradition’ are not entities but ideas with very fluid boundaries. They are not polar opposites but rather converging and diverging ideologies about the meaning of our socio-cultural rules and conventions. We all live lives that combine elements of the modern with notions of tradition, and this need not make us Jekyll-and-Hydes, unless we ourselves allow it to. So, too, for the men and women I see at Amnesia. Because in the end, what is so strange about a girl who dances in an outfit she’d never wear to work, or a boy who purchases more alcohol than he’d ever admit to his parents? Don’t we all behave a little more freely under the cover of dimmed lighting, thumping beats, and a bit of alcohol?Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6715206307508471859.post-61288347767967650452009-11-05T08:00:00.000+00:002009-11-05T08:00:05.462+00:00About pregnancyLast Friday, Moroccan blogger <a href="http://cabalamuse.wordpress.com/2009/10/30/i-am-pregnant-and-i-exist/">calabamuse</a> posted an article about the following magazine cover:<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiMcf0s3yyLqtfJKx5P360L3QRTxl7sA7jB83eb_ei7sML4SdeCCEaiIt9FykEXpGsNMAJ6kO8b4SU_l-G0PJq3PsHKdeEKFIO3Q4lxHPAj5T7phkvIwXau_uESazT90lhbTgQvOnmyGl8/s1600-h/femmes-du-maroc2.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 228px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiMcf0s3yyLqtfJKx5P360L3QRTxl7sA7jB83eb_ei7sML4SdeCCEaiIt9FykEXpGsNMAJ6kO8b4SU_l-G0PJq3PsHKdeEKFIO3Q4lxHPAj5T7phkvIwXau_uESazT90lhbTgQvOnmyGl8/s320/femmes-du-maroc2.jpg" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5400324198419500226" /></a><br /><br />This is the November issue of Femmes du Maroc, and the cover prefaces a multi-page feature on pregnancy. Beside the article discussing this particular television personality’s impending accouchement (labor, childbirth), the magazine includes an exposé on the deplorable state of OB-GYN facilities at public hospitals and clinics, advice about how to deal with post-partum depression, a description of a cesarean section, and even a special on fashionable maternity clothes.<br /><br />I picked up this issue myself last Thursday while shopping at Marjane, and was completely intrigued by the provocativeness of the cover. And indeed, this is the main theme of Calabamuse’s thought-provoking post. The writer suggests that pregnancy, like many other issues relating to sex or the reproductive system, is a phenomenon that makes Moroccan society highly uncomfortable:<br /><br /><i>The exclusionary and sometimes castigating treatment pregnant women are subjected to is a leading cause of abortion in Morocco where the number of out of wedlock pregnancies have dramatically risen. The pool of medical doctors performing abortions today has grown exponentially. They charge 3000 Dirhams ($391.00). Additionally, an increased number of women, especially in rural areas where medical oversight is minimal and sometimes non-existent, die from standard pregnancy complications.<br />The message of the magazine’s cover is a loud and clear confirmation of the self: I am pregnant; I am beautiful, and I exist. I agree. In our society, pregnant women need to feel less excluded and be viewed in a more gratifying fashion. For a country like Morocco, where television channels are flipped at the mere sight of a man an a woman kissing, where, in neighborhood foodstuff stores, menstrual pads are stuffed in a black plastic bag to conceal them from the embarassed looks of customers, the idea is outrageous.<br /></i><br />Intrigued by this apparently ambiguous regard for pregnancy, I decided to ask around. I used a word that Calabamuse didn’t, and ultimately proved to be too strong a connotation: was pregnancy <i>hshouma</i>, shameful?<br /><br />Yes, Farid told me, he did think that pregnancy is shrouded in a kind of <i>hshouma</i>, but I needed to be aware that there are two ways to translate this culturally powerful term. Pregnancy is not so much a source of <i>shame</i>, he explained, as it is a source of <i>embarrassment</i>. There are certain topics you simply don’t discuss with certain people, like your parents or your boss, and pregnancy is one of them. It’s a matter of respect, Farid added. As he said this, I suddenly remembered how reluctant Karima, the NIMAR’s housekeeper, had been to discuss her pregnancy in the presence of our director or any other male associate.* Exactly, Farid said. This reluctance wasn’t shame so much as it was just the maintenance of a certain kind of propriety.<br /><br />A new part-time co-worker at the NIMAR, Aicha, likewise didn’t think pregnancy was seen as shameful. She did, however, remember being told to cover up her pregnant belly in looser clothing when going outside, and she recalled how surprised her parents had been to find out that she had been open about the development of her second pregnancy toward her young son. There did seem to be a kind of discomfort about open manifestations of pregnancy, she concluded. Her environment tended to explain this as a way of avoiding the evil eye.**<br /><br />These stories do betray a clear sense of ambiguity with regard to the phenomenon of pregnancy. It doesn’t seem to be a source of outright, negative shame, but it certainly makes people uncomfortable. It’s the clear connection to sexual intercourse, Farid explained with slight embarrassment. Pregnancy may be the source of new life, but it is also an unconcealable confirmation of a woman’s nature as a sexual being.<br /><br />And that, I think, is true for every civilization on earth. I think that pregnancy may harbor that double meaning for almost all of us, because it lies at the heart of the very conflicted way in which nearly every culture deals with human sexuality. Sex is powerful: not only because it is one of our most primal and strongest instinctual drives, but also because it is fundamental to the propagation of our species and civilization. It signifies the glory of future development, but in its sheer primal power can also lead to utter chaos and the destruction of any kind of social order. This is why nearly every civilization has sought to exercise control over its society through the strict regulation of sex.<br /><br />And let’s not forget the Madonna/Whore complex that torments so many of us. We want to see women as mothers, as the innocent and morally upright nurturers who teach our future generations about right and wrong – but we also want to see women as sexual objects, as the embodiment of sexual desire. Perhaps because we are conscious of the potentially destructive power of sex, we see these two identities as polar opposites that cannot be reconciled with one another – yet they are merged, in the phenomenon of pregnancy.<br /><br />And so, as curious as I think the abovementioned attitudes toward pregnancy are, I don’t think the ambiguity of it is typically Moroccan, per sé. The way in which it is expressed may be culturally specific, but I’m inclined to believe that this particular stance is one we all have in common as humans who are overwhelmed by the power of their own sexuality. I agree with Calabamuse that pregnancy must be celebrated as something beautiful – but I think a larger problem highlighted by this month’s Femmes Du Maroc is the deplorable state of OB-GYN facilities in the country’s public hospitals and clinics.*** These places suffer from a desperate lack of resources, which results in understaffing, a lack of necessary equipment, and thus a lack of adequate care. Patients are obligated to purchase and bring all necessary materials by themselves: from towels to sedatives to suturing thread, it is the patient’s responsibility to make sure these items are present, because the hospital simply does not provide. Femmes Du Maroc also describes widespread corruption: nurses and other staff provide their services only in exchange for ‘bonuses’ of a few hundred Dirhams. Public healthcare services are officially offered free of charge, but adequate care is thus ultimately received only if one has a considerable sum of Dirhams to spend.<br /><br />Add to these issues the fact that in rural areas, even such public clinics are few and far between. Obstetric facilities have this in common with nearly every other kind of medical service – including that of psychiatry. Reforming the healthcare system is an important part of Morocco’s development goals, and this month’s Femmes Du Maroc also features an interview with Morocco’s minister of health, Yasmina Baddou, who speaks of everything that’s already been done and who is optimistic about further improvement. I’m hopeful, and curious to see what reforms and improvements will be implemented in Morocco’s healthcare system over the next few years.<br /><br /><br />* Two months ago, Karima gave birth to a baby boy. When I and a few other female NIMAR co-workers went to visit her and her family, she never talked about how the actual labor and birth had been. We didn’t ask, but amongst ourselves did speculate about how it had been. I remember finding this surprising. This is the kind of thing Dutch women talk about readily, but clearly not something Karima wanted to discuss.<br />** According to the literature, individuals in transitional phases are particularly susceptible to the gaze of the evil eye. Newborn babies, newlyweds, and pregnant women are often cited as examples. The evil eye can be seen as a kind of curse that can lead to all kinds of malaise. If caught, it can be fought off in a variety of ways, including herbal concoctions or counter-spells. A <i>shouafa</i>, or medium, can often help.<br />*** At the time of writing, Femmes Du Maroc’s website did not yet publish the article. But <a href="http://www.femmesdumaroc.com/Accueil">here</a> is their website.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6715206307508471859.post-18247933885856409122009-11-04T18:51:00.000+00:002009-11-04T18:52:16.871+00:00ReturnedAfter a vacation of what turned out to be about five weeks, I am back in Rabat. I won’t deny that I miss home and that this kind of extended vacation was exactly what I needed, but I’m also happy to be back and excited to get started on my research. As of this past Monday, I’ve started spending my mornings at the Clinic, where I have begun a period of general observation. Until my permission from the local Moroccan ethics commission comes in, I’ll spend a week on each of the Clinic’s wards, following doctors and nurses around as they go about their work. So far, it’s been utterly amazing. I feel as though the three mornings I’ve observed so far have already provided me with enough material for twice as many blog posts, so if I can work my random observations into a coherent post, I’ll be sharing some of my experiences with you soon. In the meantime, now that my vacation is over, I hope to be back to my regular schedule of posting twice a week… I hope I still have some readers left! If so, thanks for sticking around…Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6715206307508471859.post-25551702584400521112009-10-10T19:56:00.003+00:002009-10-10T20:09:47.277+00:00Dreaming in MoroccoIn lieu of a written post, I'm going to present you with a visual today. This was sent to me by Hatim, my good friend from Fes. I'm grateful to him for sharing it with me, and will now pass it along to you.<br /><br />This is a short film entitled "Dreaming in Morocco." It was made in 2007 by Pamela Nice, an independent filmmaker from Minnesota. Hoping to dispel the stereotypes (and perhaps ignorance) that we in the West often hold about Arab youth, Nice interviews a set of young adults in Morocco about their dreams and aspirations. The individuals featured in this film come from all walks of life, and thus showcase some of the incredible diversity that renders Morocco such an intriguing country. The film does not delve into the societal and political issues that confront these youth as they pursue their dreams, and as such does little more than scratch the surface of the true complexity of life in Morocco - but it's an interesting, well-made, and thought provoking film nonetheless. Enjoy!<br /><br /><object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/avWCeo205b8&hl=en&fs=1&"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/avWCeo205b8&hl=en&fs=1&" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6715206307508471859.post-46296755227597694932009-10-01T14:41:00.002+00:002009-10-01T14:48:02.402+00:00Running in the parkLast night, I was to have arrived back in Casablanca. I would have de-boarded the plane around nine thirty (had the Air Arabia flight from Brussels not experienced any delays, of course), and I would have tried to catch the ten PM train to Rabat – entering the country would have gone smoothly, because I wouldn’t have checked any luggage.<br /><br />But in reality, I cancelled both this flight and the one that would have taken me from Chicago to Brussels, and now remain, for the time being, at my parents’ house in Hyde Park. The short version of the story is that, as a Legal Permanent Resident of the United States, one cannot just go and spend two years in a foreign country without keeping the authorities abreast of your intentions and activities. Which is what I am now doing, by means of an application for what is called a re-entry permit.<br /><br />Hopefully this will be no more than a few weeks’ delay – I told the Clinic that I’d like to start my research around November first, and I hope I can hold myself to that promise. But for now, I’m enjoying the changes of fall (after three years in San Diego, it’s been awhile since I’ve seen leaves change color) and keeping myself busy with episodes of <span style="font-style:italic;">Dexter</span>, movies from Netflix, and new recipes from the Top Chef cookbook. And this morning, I went running along the trail that spans the better part of Chicago’s lakefront. It didn’t go too well – I hadn’t expected otherwise, considering that my last run dates back to the weekend before the start of Ramadan. But whether I’m running, walking, or gasping for air, it’s always a pleasure to be out on that trail and see the Chicago skyline emerging on the waterfront, right as the road curves west around 52nd street.<br /><br />Ramadan was neither the first, nor the longest break I’ve ever taken from running. In fact, running has only recently become a permanent part of my life in Morocco. Until this past May, being in Morocco always entailed a dire lack of opportunity to exercise – something I tried to make up for by walking everywhere I went (to the great frustration of many a host family, who would rather see me traveling in the safe confines of a taxi).<br /><br />During my first three-month stay in Morocco – it was Fes, and it was the spring of 2005 – I was advised that exercising was not really something women did. The inescapable (and highly verbalized) male gaze on the street was enough to make any woman think twice about going for a jog – and thus attract even more attention to herself by traversing the public sphere in a run, wearing exercise clothing, and sporting an iPod). Gyms, like cafés, were a man’s domain – and anyway, I was told, I wouldn’t find much there, other than some scant, outdated exercise equipment, eighties-era photos of Arnold Schwarzenegger or Jean-Claude van Damme, and Moroccan men high on testosterone.<br /><br />It simply didn’t seem as though there was much more to do than some at-home yoga. I resigned myself to this situation and concluded that exercise must be yet another ‘thing’ that separated the world of Moroccan women so inherently from that of Moroccan men. And I wondered, did the lack of exercise opportunity mean that Moroccan society entertained standards of female health and beauty that didn’t involve thinness and fitness? Or did it entail that women’s bodies will simply always be one step behind men’s in attaining those ideals?*<br /><br />In any case, I didn’t pack my running shoes the next time I went to Morocco, nor did I bring them the time after that. This was never a decision I regretted, until recently. Stories from people I’d met through the NIMAR led me to discover that, where exercising is concerned, Rabat is no Fes. In my neighborhood alone, there are at least four or five gyms that offer a busy schedule of aerobics and ‘danse orientale’ classes – and every week, that schedule includes a few classes reserved exclusively for those women who wish to exercise in single-sex company.** I’ve even heard reports of actual yoga studios in Agdal – something I will definitely check out personally, if I can afford the rather hefty tuition fees.<br /><br />But most importantly, there is a certain well-known park in the city’s southern quarters whose name, to most Rbatis, is virtually synonymous with ‘jogging’.<br /><br />The Hilton park in Rabat is no lakefront trail, but it’s a close second. Located in Souissi, the park spans about a square kilometer of green forest situated right next to the hotel from which it takes its name.*** The park features picnic tables and soccer fields on which families spend their weekend afternoons, but mostly, this park is used by joggers: it features a 3500 meter track that runs along the perimeter and supports consistently heavy traffic, even at my preferred running time of 8 am on Saturday morning.<br /><br />I encounter people of all shapes and sizes on that trail. Some of them run, and some of them walk. Some are alone, while others exercise in groups. Some listen to music while they run, and others like to chat. I certainly see more men than women, but the women are there – and they are there in all varieties. There are women in full jellaba and headscarf (sometimes topped by a baseball hat to shield against the sun), and women in running outfits like mine. Some wear tracksuits bought from a stall in the medina, and some sport gear from Nike, Zara, or Guess. There are middle-aged mothers, and there are young university students. I run past coiffed and primped groups of friends who chat, laugh, and check their phones for text messages as they stroll around the track – and I am passed by sole women who time their heartbeat as they run and monitor the speed at which they sprint around the track.<br /><br />I love every minute of my weekly runs at the Hilton park. I love watching this great variety of people out on that trail, and I love the fact that this kind of thing is possible here in Morocco – not just for me as a foreigner, but for all women. And I wonder, what explains the fact that this park is here, now, in Rabat, when there was nothing like it in Fes? Is this a difference between cities – is the culture or population of Fes truly that different from Rabat? Does it perhaps reflect a change in standards of acceptable or ideal behavior that took only four years to take effect? Or is it me – did I simply not see (or take advantage of) the opportunities that existed back then in Fes?<br /><br />If I have any female Moroccan readers (anyone?), what is your experience or impression of opportunities for exercising in your city, and how is the situation now in comparison to the (recent) past?<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;">***</div><br />I always have some trouble finding inspiration for this blog when I’m not in Morocco. I’ll try to keep writing in the next few weeks as I wait for my paperwork, but I’m afraid my posts will not be all that exciting… please bear with me; I hope I’ll be back to my regular blogging schedule soon enough…<br /><br /><br />* Islamic theology shares in the very common worldwide belief that women’s bodies are impure during menstruation. According to Scripture, Muslim women cannot pray, cannot touch or read the Qur’an, and cannot fast when they are on their period. I don’t think this necessarily means that Scripture considers women to be inherently inferior to men, but I can’t help but think that this kind of thinking contributes to such a viewpoint, and it’s always made me uncomfortable. And so I wonder, could the lack of opportunity for women to exercise contribute to a general sense that women’s bodies are further away from the healthy or pure ‘ideal’ than men’s?<br />** For those of you who read Dutch, a friend of mine wrote a fabulous <a href="http://lilianleahy.waarbenjij.nu/?page=message&id=2734330">blog post</a> about her local Rbati gym last year.<br />*** The ‘Hilton park’ is an unofficial moniker. I don’t actually know what the park’s actual name is, but as with many other well-known locations in Rabat, it is the moniker rather than the official name that seems to have stuck to the place.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6715206307508471859.post-27760297693252102532009-09-24T17:06:00.000+00:002009-09-24T17:08:42.264+00:00Sign of LifeI am temporarily home, as planned, and am reveling in the temporary comfort of family and familiarity. <br /><br />However, not as planned, I’ve been busy dealing with some unexpected paperwork. My apologies for the delay in posting! Please bear with me; I should be back to my regular schedule by next week…Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6715206307508471859.post-27229816695419114012009-09-17T11:59:00.002+00:002009-09-17T12:05:51.174+00:00Wukal Ramadan - Eating RamadanA <a href="http://riadzany.blogspot.com/2009/09/moroccan-news-briefs_16.html">curious</a> <a href="http://www.ennaharonline.com/en/society/2027.html">story</a> has been traveling the internet and Moroccan newspapers for the past three days. I am certainly not the first to report on this <a href="http://moroccotimes.over-blog.com/article-36123428-6.html">story</a> and don’t want to bore you with what by now is pretty old news – but I do want to briefly highlight this incident, because it constitutes an interesting perspective on the meaning of Ramadan in Morocco.<br /><br />This past Sunday, a group of young protesters that calls itself MALI (Mouvement Alternatif pour les Libertés Individuelles – the alternative movement for individual liberties) gathered at the train station in Mohammedia (between Rabat and Casablanca) for a public picnic in broad Ramadan daylight. Their intent was to protest against the Moroccan law that forbids Muslims from eating in public during this month of fasting – because, they say, not all Moroccans are Muslims. According to the latest news, it seems that this group will be persecuted for their violation of said law.<br /><br />They are right, of course, and in making this point they highlight a sticky issue that complicates the enforcement of a number of Moroccan laws. The Moroccan legal code includes a number of ordinances that are inspired by and based on religious proscriptions. An example is this particular ordinance against eating in public during Ramadan; another is the prohibition against the purchase of alcohol. In recognition of the fact that not all Moroccans are Muslims, the law officially applies only to those who abide by the tenets of Islam. But the issue is this: how does one determine, exactly, who is Muslim, and who is not? The Moroccan <span style="font-style:italic;">Carte Nationale</span> (National Identity Card, affectionately called “la carte”) does not document a citizen’s religious affiliation, and as far as I know there is no other moment or way in which such affiliation is recorded. In the end, it is simply assumed (and every much expected) that all Moroccans are, in fact, Muslim.* And that is where the problem lies: without official documentation, religious affiliation is ultimately judged by appearance. If you look and behave as a Moroccan, you are expected to abide by Islamic proscriptions – in the same way that a European attempting to enter a mosque will be subjected to extreme testing in order to prove his or her Muslim identity.**<br /><br />This particular incident points out that this kind of legal arrangement doesn’t work. You cannot enforce a law that applies only to a select group of people, if you have nothing but appearance to go on in distinguishing this group from any other. Appearance is always an imperfect measure, and even more so in the case of religion. Headscarves and burkas aside, religion cannot be read on someone’s body; it is not a biological trait.<br /><br />This group is not the first to call attention to the problems involved with such legal arrangements. I remember a brief article in TelQuel a few months ago, in which the author called attention to the flawed logic behind the enforcement of the prohibition against buying alcohol. Just like this group of protesters, this writer remonstrated that you cannot and should not judge religion by appearance. <br /><br />Yet in practice, the laws on alcohol do not lead to that much daily conflict, and most Moroccans have little trouble purchasing their alcohol. The infraction of drinking ranks much lower on the scale of gravity than does the ingestion of food during Ramadan. <a href="http://bisahha.blogspot.com/2008/10/topic-of-todays-class-was-ramadan.html">I’ve written before</a> about the incredible cultural weight of fasting during this month. More so than any other pillar of Islam, participation in Ramadan is essential to the reinforcement of Moroccan identity. I suggested in that piece, and still think, that Ramadan embodies the essence of what Moroccans consider to be the hallmark of their culture: hospitality, openness, community-orientation, solidarity – and religion, of course. The result is that eating during Ramadan, unlike the drinking of alcohol, is much more than a religious infraction. Fasting is not just about God, but about the community – about cultural belonging.<br /><br />It is this cultural weight, I think, that explains the gravity of this particular incident. These protesters did much more than violate a religious law – they flouted one of the pillars of national identity. A few reactions to the various blog posts that reported on this incident seem to read these actions as just that. They denounce this incident as detrimental to the country, or as a betrayal of the laws and of society. According to <a href="http://www.larbi.org/post/2009/09/Manifestation-des-non-jeûneurs-de-Ramadan-au-Maroc">one commenter</a>, what MALI did was “défier la loi, défier la société” (defying the law, defying society); <a href="http://globalvoicesonline.org/2009/09/16/morocco-activists-break-fast-in-public-receive-punishment/">Jillian C. York</a> quotes another who writes that these protesters “should put this energy and effort into CONSTRUCTIVE actions, making our country better instead of Stupid events like these. Go out and DO something good for your country instead of finding everything wrong with it.”<br /><br />How to evaluate this incident? Yes, these protesters violated a law, but does this law make sense? We may disagree with the application of this law, but who are we to judge? Should religious proscriptions be enforced by national law, or could one argue that religion becomes much more than a personal choice when it’s been woven so tightly into the fabric of cultural practice and social organization? And then, was MALI’s action the most effective way to claim religious and cultural freedom, or was it mostly an unproductive form of provocation? <br /><br />What do you think?<br /><br /><br />* According to official statistics, about 99% is, in fact, Muslim. Of course this includes all those whose affiliation with Islam is no more than cultural.<br />** simply donning a headscarf will not work, I’ve ascertained from people who have tried this. You will, at the very least, have to recite something from the Qur’an.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6715206307508471859.post-9052632292706661242009-09-13T16:51:00.001+00:002009-09-13T16:55:47.644+00:00A Blank State of MindI am late in posting this week, and I apologize. I’m temporarily (hopefully…) suffering from a lack of inspiration – and a corresponding lack of excitement in my daily life. After three weeks of fasting I’ve comfortably settled into the rhythm of Ramadan: the highlight of my day now falls between 8 pm and midnight, while days are spent in a stupor of semi-wakefulness. Being an absolute morning person, this means that my habitual circadian rhythm has been turned completely upside down.<br /><br />I’m still glad that I decided to participate in Ramadan. I think that joining in has helped me discover aspects of this tradition that I don’t think I would have picked up on as easily, had I remained a spectator. I may still not fully <span style="font-style:italic;">understand</span> what Ramadan is like for the average Moroccan individual (there are certain boundaries between ‘insider’ and ‘outsider’ status that can never be crossed, I think, no matter how hard you try), but fasting has allowed me to come a little closer to that comprehension than I would have, otherwise. I ‘get’ how acute that feeling of solidarity is, during the first week of fasting. I ‘get’ how strong and motivating the cultural imperative to fast really is, and I think I ‘get’ how intensely participation can reinforce one’s identity as a member of Moroccan society.<br /><br />It has felt good to participate – despite the hunger. It feels good to join in a custom that seems to be so fundamental to the Moroccan sense of cultural identity. I enjoy the thought of being a part of something so full of meaning for Moroccans, of sharing both in its larger significance and in its smaller manifestations. Of standing in the kitchen making harira, as I smell the soup being made in kitchens across the street. Of eating that first date, knowing that everyone else in the neighborhood is likely doing the exact same thing. Of lying on the couch watching Mexican soap operas with the members of a Moroccan family, whiling away the last hour until <span style="font-style:italic;">ftour</span>. It simply makes me feel part of something – and this is a feeling that I often miss, living alone here in Rabat.<br /><br />But in all honesty, my body is – literally – exhausted and worn out by the rhythm of Ramadan. Lack of nutrition and lack of sleep have turned me into a daytime zombie whose body happily comes alive only at night, right when it should be winding down to sleep. It’s beginning to frustrate me – because while my circadian rhythm has been turned upside down, my work schedule has not. This has resulted in a complete lack of productivity that is beginning to really worry me.<br /><br />To give you an idea, let me describe an average day for you – starting at 6.45 PM, the hour of <span style="font-style:italic;">ftour</span> (the breaking of the fast):<br /><br />A cannon shot and the call for sunset prayer are our sign that we are allowed to eat. Gratefully, I immediately down a full glass of water, while Farid tells me to slow down: “it’s not good to drink too fast!” he will warn, in vain, as I ignore him.<br /><br />I follow the water with a date, and then turn my attention toward the hot bowl of harira (made from a package, most days, with some of my own ingredients added in) in front of me. Usually, my stomach is quite satisfied with one bowl of soup, but because our mental hunger has grown exponentially with each hour of fasting, we have filled the table with multiple plates of other delicacies that beg to be eaten. I’ll eat a croissant or a piece of quiche, some salad, and (of course) some <span style="font-style:italic;">chebakia</span>. I’ll drink more water, then have a glass of juice.<br /><br />At 8 PM, stomachs stuffed to capacity, we come alive – and thus become restless. We leave my house and take a walk downtown, reveling in the lights and activity of Ramadan evenings. We’ll stop at a café and drink our daily coffee, as we sit and do some work on our laptops.<br /><br />Around 11, I come home, still full of energy. I won’t at all be hungry, but I’ll convince myself to eat some fruit – to build up some reserves for the next day of fasting. I’ll read the news online, do some writing, and then make myself go to bed. Still energetic, I’ll lie awake for an hour and a half before I fall asleep.<br /><br />I’ll wake up every two hours to go to the bathroom – the liter and a half of water that I’ve had over the course of four hours will need a way to leave my body. During the first week of Ramadan, I’d also wake up at 4.30 for <span style="font-style:italic;">shour</span> – the last meal before sunrise. I’d have some yoghurt and a date, but even with this modest amount in my stomach, I wouldn’t be able to fall back asleep for those last two hours until morning. In the interest of a few more hours of sleep, I gave up <span style="font-style:italic;">shour</span> halfway through week two.<br /><br />At seven thirty, I am woken up by my alarm. A shower does wonders to wake me up, and I usually enjoy about two to three hours of mental clarity after that. This is when I try to do the bulk of my work – because after 11 AM, I become a yawning mess of semi-wakefulness. I will continue to try to be productive despite the haze that then seems to have settled over my brain, and let frustration mount as my frequency of typing errors rapidly increases and my ability to focus on what I’m reading falls to the bare minimum.<br /><br />At four or five PM, I head home and start preparations for that evening’s <span style="font-style:italic;">ftour</span>. I’ll mince some vegetables, cut up a piece of meat, and add it to the <span style="font-style:italic;">harira</span> from a package. I’ll put some dates on a plate, cut chunks of bread, and arrange croissants on a platter. I’ll mix work in the kitchen with brief stints of relaxation in front of the television until Farid comes over. We’ll set the table, sit down, and wait for the cannon shot – the sign that another long day of fasting is over.<br /><br />It seems to me that if you persist in maintaining a regular work schedule, participation in Ramadan seems to require a trade-off between sleeping and eating. When I make sure I get enough sleep, there is no time to eat enough – and when I make sure I eat, I don’t get enough sleep. The result, so far, has been that I do not get enough of either. I am not sure how to remedy this situation, other than to stop fasting – which, with less than a week left to go, would feel like giving up. <br /><br />I want to keep going. And I’m sure I’d be fine for one more week – if I didn’t have an impending important presentation to prepare for. This Tuesday, I will be presenting my research proposal to all psychiatrists at the Clinic. In French. It’s at 9 am, which luckily falls within my brief window of productivity, but I’m a little worried that in this state of mind (both the haze and the frustration over my lack of productivity), I won’t be able to prepare as well as I’d like.<br /><br />Oh well. It’s only a few more days, right? And luckily, the rest of next week promises to provide a considerable share of new excitement: I’m getting my hands henna’ed on Wednesday evening, will go see some interesting art during Rabat’s annual <span style="font-style:italic;">Nuit des Galeries</span> on Thursday night, and on Friday, finally, I fly home…Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6715206307508471859.post-29853058821890421852009-09-07T23:03:00.004+00:002009-09-07T23:19:25.235+00:00'Authentic' Moroccanness<div style="text-align: justify;">Today’s post on <span style="font-style:italic;"><a href="http://riadzany.blogspot.com/2009/09/travel-writing-about-morocco-29.html">The View from Fez</a></span> pointed my attention toward a <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/travel/2009/sep/06/casablanca-morocco-city-break?page=all">travel article</a> published yesterday in <span style="font-style:italic;">The Guardian</span>. In this piece, author Stephen Emms defends Casablanca against those who argue that the city, with its grand boulevards, 20th century architecture, fast pace, and skyscrapers, is not truly ‘Moroccan’.<br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">In response to these critics, Emms points to the authentically ‘Moroccan’ aspects of Casablanca that lie hidden beyond this “westernized” exterior: <br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><span style="font-style:italic;"><div style="text-align: justify;">“Yes, there are the tower blocks, and the five-star hotels, and the businessmen swarming around Place Des Nations-Unies, but the old medina, which dates only from the 19th century (although its ochre walls are older), spirals with timeless neighborhood life. Slip past stalls flogging teapots, watches and jewellery, all blinding in the glare of the sun, and you will discover pencil-thin alleys and tiny squares, where bleached towels cling to window sills and old men inch past in white djellabas, the shuffle of their slippers syncopating the sizzle of squid in oil. … The elegant “new medina,” called Quartier Habous, a layout of Provençal-style squares and arches built by the French as a place for Muslims to live and trade, is a clean and inviting souk selling anything from oil paintings to art deco statuettes. But even here, the “real Morocco” is nearer than you might imagine – just over the railway bridge is Rue Taroudant, from the dusty stalls of which dangle dried chameleons, hedgehogs, and live baby tortoises. “No photos!” the bearded sellers cried in unison as I whipped my camera out; these are ancient charms, after all, with their own magical powers.”<br /></div></span><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Emms here paints a stark contrast between ‘old’ and ‘new’ – between ‘western’ and ‘Moroccan’. It is precisely in the complexity of this juxtaposition that a former US Embassy worker, interviewed by Emms for this piece, finds Casablanca’s authenticity. “It’s the real deal,” she says, “like Marrakech was more than 10 years ago.” However, Emms himself seems to wonder what this mix of old and new, modern and traditional, really means for Casablanca’s status as an ‘authentic’ Moroccan city: <br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><span style="font-style:italic;"><div style="text-align: justify;">“Does Casa's roving eye to the future negate its past? Its art deco and neo-Moorish heritage certainly isn't as valued as you might expect: the Hotel Lincoln, opposite the Marché Central, collapsed earlier this year, and there don't appear to be any plans to salvage it. Other buildings on and around Boulevard Mohammed V (which boasts some of the most dazzling period architecture) languish unloved, as does the Parc de la Ligue Arabe. But perhaps there's something honest about such disregard - should Casablancans have to bow to their colonial past? And anyway, isn't Morocco's "real" past more than represented, as I discovered, in the medinas and back streets?” <br /></div></span><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">I am impressed with the appreciative way in which both Emms and the people he’s interviewed speak of Casablanca. However, I don’t think I agree with the way in which Emms defends Casablanca’s status as a ‘real’ Moroccan city – and by extension, what he implies about what constitutes ‘authentic’ Moroccanness.<br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">As much as Emms acknowledges, and even appreciates, the complexity and the dynamic juxtapositions that dominate modern Moroccan society, he ultimately concludes that what is truly ‘Moroccan’ lies in the country’s traditions – represented in this article by crowded medinas, jellaba’d men, and haggling for dried chameleon in dusty souqs. And that, I think, is dangerous. It superimposes one pair of polar opposites – old versus new – on top of another imagined polarity: Moroccanness versus Westernness. It creates a binary view of the world that may simplify matters, but ultimately blinds us from the complexities of reality, and minimizes a people’s agency in defining its own sense of authenticity.<br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">First of all, associating ‘authentic’ Moroccanness with tradition, or with the past, brings up some logistical problems of definition. To start with, how do you really separate tradition and modernity, or distinguish foreign from native? Where do you draw the line between ‘authentic tradition’ and ‘foreign invasion’ – which historical influx of foreign peoples ended true and pure Moroccan culture and opened the door to foreign influence? Was it the French? Or was it the Andalusian Muslims who returned during the Reconquista? Was it the Arabs, perhaps, or even the Romans? If Morocco’s authenticity lies in the past, how far back do you have to go to find it, exactly?<br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Moreover, are ‘tradition’ and ‘modernization’ that easily separable? Is Morocco’s current development a manifestation of purely Western influence, and have Morocco’s ‘traditions’ remained completely untouched by outside influences? Can we really say that Casablanca’s skyscrapers are purely western, the likes of which you’d find in France, England, the United States, while the old medina of Fes has remained pristinely Moroccan? In other words, how ‘foreign’ is Morocco’s modernization, and how ‘authentic’ have its traditions remained? I think this simple juxtaposition of ‘modern’ versus ‘traditional’ blinds us to the complex reality of Morocco – the unique brand of development that has given a distinctively Moroccan flavor to Casablanca’s modernity, and the dynamic adaptation of old traditions to current circumstances. Imagine the distinctly Moroccan patterns of hierarchy and social organization that may structure a company housed in one of Casablanca’s high rises, or the traditional carpenter in the Fes medina whose work has reached a wider audience through the website he’s been able to create with a laptop and wireless internet.<br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">But above all, the association of ‘authentic Moroccanness’ with traditions from the past is a dangerous one. By relegating Moroccanness to “timeless” traditions and picture-perfect scenes from the old medina, we deprive Morocco of a present – let alone of a future. It is the same process of thought that legitimated French colonial rule in the first half of the twentieth century. Our perception of authentic Moroccanness is a nostalgic image of medieval Arab life that we seek to preserve by freezing Moroccan culture in time and characterizing all development as ‘foreign’, and therefore invasive. It is an Orientalist process of thought that deprives ‘real’ Moroccan culture of any belonging in (or compatibility with) a modern, developing world.<br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">This is not to say that Morocco’s medinas and traditions should not be preserved. They should – they are a part of ‘authentic’ Moroccanness that should not be forgotten. It is also not to say that foreign (Western) influence was not invasive. It was. What I mean to say is simply that we should not so starkly oppose tradition and modernity, or past and present, and attribute ‘authenticity’ to a single pole on that binary scale. Cultures, like human beings, are living, breathing, porous things, and change is a fundamental strategy of survival. Cultures, like human beings, adapt to their ever-changing environment. No culture has ever been static, and no society has ever developed in complete isolation from foreign influences. It may not always have been the pervasive, imperial, and certainly destructive, influence of the West – but foreign influence has always been a fact of life. <br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The notion of authenticity is ultimately a difficult one that brings up more questions than it does answers. I think that a certain tension between past and present may be inherent to the state of postcoloniality, with national identity and notions of ‘authenticity’ stuck in the middle. How do you determine what is ‘real’ and what is ‘foreign’? What parts of history constitute the foundation for national identity, and which have been written by alien conquerors? To what extent should ‘foreign’ influence be resisted, and can (should?) traditions always stand the test of time? And who has the authority, anyway, to determine the answers to all these questions? Questions of what is ‘authentic’ are persistently and consciously present in the Moroccan public consciousness. There is a palpable preoccupation with the issue of how to define the relationship between ‘tradition’ and ‘modernity’, and nearly every political or social issue becomes a pretext for debates about the value of each for Moroccan society and identity. These are not debates that will be resolved any time soon, and I’m sure notions of ‘authenticity’ will be discussed for decades to come. But I don’t think this means that authenticity is lost, or under threat of extinction.<br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">I don’t think that change, dynamism, or foreign influence have to undermine any culture’s status as ‘authentic’ or ‘real’. What makes a culture ‘authentic’ is not its resistance against foreign influence, but simply its particular way of developing, its reality and meaningfulness for the people whose lives it frames. What is authentic is every society’s particular way of making sense of change, of foreign influence; its way of processing, internalizing, mixing new elements with what’s already there to create new meanings, new realities. In its very combination of incredible modernity and development with a high premium on the preservation of tradition, Morocco is, in every sense of the word, authentic. Morocco is a living, breathing culture in the flux of constant change and development. Casablanca, in all its economic enormity and modernity, is as much an example of true Moroccanness as Fes is in its preservation of traditions. And it’s time that we all not only recognize, but celebrate this unique kind of authenticity.<br /></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6715206307508471859.post-50664882597209694552009-09-03T08:27:00.005+00:002009-09-03T08:36:19.728+00:00The Power of LanguageOver the course of my conversations with the psychiatrists I interviewed last month, each practitioner explained that individuals mostly come to see them in search of <span style="font-style:italic;">la parole</span>. Rather than a pill, in other words, patients consult a psychiatrist in private practice in the hopes of procuring a ‘talking cure.’<br /><br />I found it interesting to hear that Moroccans – many of whom, according to my observations so far, seem very eager to solve an instance of bodily malaise with a quick pill – would prefer lengthy psychotherapy to pharmaceuticals. I found it surprising that there seems to be less stigma attached to counseling than there is to medication, as these psychotherapists claimed.<br /><br />But what also struck me, and what I want to write about today, is the psychiatrists’ choice of the word ‘<span style="font-style:italic;">parole</span>’. This French word can be translated as ‘speech’, or ‘spoken word’. Of course, ‘talking’ has been widely proven to be an effective form of psychiatric treatment. But what interests me here is the fact that ‘<span style="font-style:italic;">parole</span>’ suggests such a strong emphasis on the linguistic dimensions of that activity. I don’t think that these psychiatrists ignore the myriad other dimensions of communication, but in general, I am getting the sense that Moroccan psychiatry focuses heavily on the issue of language.<br /><br />Any time these psychiatrists spoke about establishing a sense of mutual understanding – and the importance of having a shared discourse on which to base that understanding – they would mention the importance of defining certain words, of ‘speaking the patient’s language’. In his writings about the history and practice of psychoanalysis in Morocco, Dr. Jalil Bennani even conceives of cultural beliefs as a kind of ‘language’. He suggests that a particular way of understanding and experiencing illness should be understood as a particular language, used to express feelings that are ultimately universal:<br /><br /><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">“</span><span style="font-style:italic;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">Il convient d’accorder à la tradition magico-religieuse la place qui lui est due en interprétant celle-ci comme un effet de langage et non pas comme un effet ethnique. Il convient de reconnaître dans le discours magico-religieux du patient le signe d’un autre discours afin de réussir à dépasser la frontière stérile du magico-religieux et du rationnel et déplacer les conflits en vue de faire retrouver au sujet une capacité de liberté par rapport à sa propre parole."</span></span><br /><br />Freely translated, he says the following: “we should see magico-religious tradition for what it is, conceiving of it as an effect of language, rather than an effect of ethnicity. We should recognize the patient’s magico-religious talk as marker of a different kind of speech,* so as to enable ourselves to transgress the sterile boundary between the magico-religious and the rational and to dissolve their conflict, so as to allow the subject to recover a capacity for liberty with regard to his own speech.”<br /><br />I’ve noticed this psychiatric focus on language <a href="http://bisahha.blogspot.com/2009/07/psychiatric-tower-of-babel.html">before</a> – at the Clinic, for instance, when Dr. Rachidi lamented that with so few diagnostic tools available in Moroccan Arabic, doctors and patients forever risk getting stuck in a cycle of mistranslation. And this focus makes perfect sense, given the particulars of the Moroccan context.<br /><br />Mutual understanding is always a crucial issue in psychotherapy. Doctor and patients may come from different (cultural, educational, economic) backgrounds, may ascribe to different ideologies, and may explain experience (and illness) in very different ways. Therapy is effective only if communication is; and in order to truly communicate, it is always important that these two participants understand the framework of assumptions and beliefs that the other is speaking from. In Morocco, where an incredible heterogeneity of beliefs characterizes not just society in general but most doctor-patient interactions as well, a difference in cultural background is often accompanied by a difference in language. Whereas the professional language of Moroccan psychiatry (and biomedicine) is French, the average patient who interprets his or her experiences as a form of spirit possession will not master this language, and will choose to explain said experiences in Moroccan Arabic – or in Tamazight, Tashelhit, or Tariffit.<br /><br />Communication training manuals, or books about interviewing techniques, often emphasize the immense importance of understanding messages that are communicated nonverbally. The ‘indexical meaning’ of a message (Briggs, 1986) – facial expressions, gestures, tonal inflections, and so on – carry important clues about the ‘real’ meaning of whatever is expressed in words. But as much as it is true that we shouldn’t underestimate the necessity of heeding this more easily forgotten layer of communication, these Moroccan psychiatrists suggest that we should also not forget what’s right under our ears.<br /><br />The same was suggested in a <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2009/HEALTH/08/31/online.internet.therapy.cbt/index.html?eref=rss_topstories">recent article</a> that appeared on CNN. It reported on a study conducted by medical journal The Lancet, which found that online psychotherapy may be as effective as actual, in-person counseling. A group of patients was given a remote form of psychotherapy: they communicated with their therapist online, through instant messaging. In comparison with a control group that received no form of counseling, this indirect form of therapy seemed to have as high a success rate as ‘traditional’ therapy does. This would suggest either that nonverbal cues may not be so necessary in establishing a therapeutically effective level of communication between doctor and patient, or that online therapy has a particular advantage that might make up for that lack. A therapist interviewed for the interview suggests that the lack of nonverbal communication may in fact be liberating for the patient. Through this indirect form of interaction, stripped of any social context, an individual might be less worried about the social repercussions of things he or she wishes to say. In his words I read the suggestion that a solely linguistic form of interaction – in which social norms, contextual factors, and other cues that alter the meaning of spoken words, do not come into play – may provide the patient with a therapeutic sense of agency, of power. Agency and power so often hide in the ability to be <span style="font-style:italic;">heard</span>, and for one’s words to be <span style="font-style:italic;">accepted</span>. If nonverbal aspects of an interaction make a patient feel as though his words are not openly accepted, even if a psychiatrists words do their best to convey that feeling, perhaps a strictly verbal interaction does create more openness.<br /><br />So what does all this imply about the nature of communication? What does it imply about the way in which we connect to one another, and by extension about the nature of our interpersonal relationships? How important is <span style="font-style:italic;">listening</span>, exactly, and how do <span style="font-style:italic;">listening</span> (to verbal communication) and <span style="font-style:italic;">observation</span> (of nonverbal messages) relate to one another in the process of (effective) communication? And, perhaps above all, how does each form of communication affect the power relationship between the two speakers? These are questions I would really like to explore further in my research. I want to examine the role of language in Moroccan psychotherapy: I’m interested in the importance of words in creating a sense of understanding or shared meaning. I hope to explore psychiatrists’ and patients’ conception of the role of language in communicating, in understanding, and more fundamentally in structuring personal experience. Most of all, I’m interested in the <span style="font-style:italic;">power</span> of language – the role that linguistic (mis)communication plays in structuring power relationships between psychiatrist and patient within this Moroccan context, in which ideologies and accompanying languages constantly vie for dominance. I will need to study Jacques Lacan, the French psychoanalyst who used Ferdinand de Saussure’s structuralist theories of language to explain psychic structures and processes, and who has had a major impact on French – and thus Moroccan – psychoanalysis.<br /><br />And I’ll need a methodology that creates room for the subtleties and conflicts of language. I’ll be using the format of person-centered interviews – a lengthy, open-ended and very unstructured genre of interviewing that, like Moroccan psychiatrists, assumes the power of words. It’s a psychodynamically oriented kind of interviewing, in which the point is not only to learn something from the interviewee about the cultural phenomenon you’re studying, but also to learn something about how the interviewee personally reflects on that phenomenon; what role it plays in his experience. The interviewee is thus not only informant, but also respondent, and person-centered interviews require heavy analysis of the meanings that do not lie immediately at the surface of the interaction. But aside from looking for nonverbal clues to those meanings, the trick is also to look for linguistic ones. Person-centered interviews encourage the respondent to structure the direction and content of the discussion, and to reflect on her experiences in her own words. The trick is to analyze the respondent’s choice of language, his “personally organized statements – clumping of themes, slips of the tongue, obvious defensive maneuvers, evidence of emotion, fantasy, and speculative thinking” (Levy 1973:xxii). Why did the respondent discuss that issue at this particular moment? Why did he choose that particular word, and the connotations it carries, to express that experience? What does all that suggest about the respondent’s feelings about the matter?<br /><br />It is thus crucial for anyone hoping to carry out person-centered interviews to learn the language of her respondents. There is no way you will pick up on the subtleties of certain linguistic choices if your level of competence in that language is merely conversational. I have a lot of work ahead of me in that regard. I’m beginning to establish a kind of feeling for the subtleties in French (even if I myself haven’t actively mastered them yet), but I have a long way to go for Moroccan Arabic. I’m considering this post a re-dedication to that endeavor. I’ve created a bit of structure in my work life, and hope that this will create some time for renewed language study. And perhaps I’ll find some time for that psychoanalytic reading, as well…<br /><br /><br />* the French <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">discours</span> is not the same as the english <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">discourse</span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6715206307508471859.post-21939483974037004642009-08-31T11:56:00.001+00:002009-09-04T22:35:52.077+00:00EmptyThe <a href="http://bisahha.blogspot.com/2009/08/cucumbers.html">story of my Mobilia couch</a> has ended not with a three-seater in my living room, but with my money back in my pocket.<br /><br />Last Wednesday, I was at last expecting my couch to be delivered – and in the right color, this time. But, in an instance of total déjà vu, what I got instead was a repetition of that first episode, of waiting and vague promises. It started with a call from Mobilia themselves, informing me they’d be a day late with their delivery, and followed with three days of my having to call them to ask whether they were still going to come, and being reassured that the delivery would certainly take place – tomorrow if not today.<br /><br />Me being incapable of getting verbally angry – let alone doing so in French or Arabic – Farid got involved and called the store. When, interspersed by a lot of <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">hshouma alikoums</span>, he told the salesman we’d come and get the couch ourselves, the truth came out: the couch was still in Casablanca and, once again, was the wrong color. Farid told him we’d come and collect my money the next day, and angrily hung up.<br /><br />I did not get my money the next day. Farid and I arrived at the store and were met by a very apologetic salesman who, nevertheless, persisted in telling us he couldn’t give me my money, that I’d have to wait until Monday. Farid yelled at him in French and Arabic; and I, for the first time in my life, found some words of my own to yell. In a combination of French and English I asked him how the hell he had the nerve to ask me, yet again, to be patient. How he was going to compensate me for all the hours of work I’d missed, waiting for a delivery that never came. Why he thought it was somehow better or easier to have me go through that charade of supposed delivery for days at a time – twice – than to be honest and open with his customers about the status of their orders.<br /><br />It is now Monday, I have just been to Mobilia to collect my money, and I am back at square one – with a modest sum of money, and no couch. On my way back to work I stopped by Kitea, the other budget furniture option, where the couches are slightly less attractive and slightly more expensive. I made a choice for their cheapest couch and got ready to place an order, only to hear that this model was no longer <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">disponible</span>, in any color.<br /><br />There are other options – I can buy a pricy couch at the upscale furniture store in my neighborhood, or I can have something made to order (a process I will have to figure out, first). But I am sitting here, and for a moment I am letting it get to me. This little episode of frustration has added to a number of other work- and research-related developments that have left me feeling utterly suffocated, incapable, and powerless. And as a result, I’ve let it happen: I’ve given into unproductive wallowing in homesickness.<br /><br />It’s not just the big things that I miss – the system, the structure, the familiarity, the natural ease of communication. It’s mostly the little things that keep popping up in my head. Like driving my car down University Avenue while listening to Weekend Players, or like walking across the Chicago River at Michigan Avenue with a Starbucks latte in my hand. Going running through the streets of North Park. Perusing books for hours at the Borders downtown. A glass of Chilean wine on my parents’ back porch. Warm brownies. The squirrels in Hyde Park. A smoked turkey sandwich. The New Yorker. A Chicago style pizza. Good sushi. DSW Shoe Warehouse. The number six bus. Real chocolate chip cookies. The beach in La Jolla. Lake Michigan and Chicago’s skyline. A huge glass of 2% milk. Barbeques on the point. Trader Joe’s. The Art Institute. A real Italian meal. Twiggs. The Living Room Café. H&M. Lake Shore Drive. Showtime. A hot dog. Banana Republic. HBO. Legitimate DVDs with movies in English. A good summer thunderstorm. The AMC at River East. MSNBC. Walgreen’s. NPR. The Sunday New York Times. And above all, my friends and family.<br /><br />I’m going home for a week at the end of this month. Right now, it couldn’t come soon enough. And I just hope that that week of comfort will make a difference – that I’ll retrieve or recover a bit of the energy I long for.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com4