An exploration of the ways in which the Algerian writer Assia Djebar seeks a path to the liberation of self and of the wider community in the colonial and postcolonial contexts, both through the re-examination of History and of the relationship of the individual and the collective to their respective histories. The paper will seek to show how her work charts the ways in which the possession of knowledge -- about history, about language, about cultural and individual identity, about self and other -- provides the possibility to resolve conflicts which may allow another way of being in the postcolonial world. In addition, the focus on the writing strategies employed will help to uncover Assia Djebar's own complex relationship to the task of the postcolonial writer.
Last modified: 7 May 2001