Representations of Women and Sexuality in Francophone North African Literature

This study will examine the ways in which Francophone literature from Morocco and Algeria appears dissident to the rise of Islamism, whilst often negating the many lived realities of women and their experiences with Islam. In doing so, this project will probe the understudied ways in which contemporary authors either challenge Western notions of power and rights by offering alternat ive

representations of subaltern voices, or unintentionally reinforce colonial tropes and limit the opportunity for a positive reassessment of Islam. To do so, this project will compare the recent works (2005 - 2018) of Moroccan authors Leïla Slimani and Abdellah Taïa with Algerian writers Mourad

Djebel and Kamel Daoud, as they occupy the same generation of post-Independence Maghrebi writers using French to engage heavily in these themes (Arabic and Berber are the official languages in Algeria and Morocco but French is widely used in creating writing and wider intellectual debate). The project

will analyse their novels, essays and journalism to explore how the form of the text contributes to a subtle change in our understanding of representations.