Between Algeria and France: The origins of the Berber movement

Arabisation

A significant factor in the marginalisation of Kabylia and the Algerian Berber population was the 1962 policy of Arabisation. The idea behind Arabisation was to assimilate all Algerians into a unified new nation, consolidate power, and demonstrate cohesion and unity with the other newly independent nations of North Africa. In Algeria the government wanted to replace the language of the coloniser, French, with an official and national language, Arabic. To that end, the Algerian constitution states that Islam is the official religion, and Arabic is the official language of Algeria. It was not until 2002 that the constitution was amended and Berber was recognised as a second national language. The process of Arabisation – which was to be implemented in classical Arabic, which few people in Algeria spoke or read – was intended to permeate all aspects of everyday life. Moreover, this process was controlled by the state, and was directed especially towards public programmes in the education sector, official services and media, especially radio and television. The result was an absurd failure, as the majority of Algerians, who only understand colloquial Arabic or Berber – and French – were not able to participate in civic life. And so this process of Arabisation, which was often accompanied by a programme of Islamisation – that is, the enforcement of an orthodox notion of Islam displacing or eradicating North African traditional Muslim practices ⁴ –was felt by many to be an imposition from above and negative public reaction and dissent against the programme followed.

In his article on Arabisation in Algeria, Gilbert Grandguillaume claims that two poles of resistance developed against Arabisation. One came from the Francophone speakers who were immediately accused of being of ‘the party of France’, and the other came from people who spoke Berber, especially in Kabylia. Opposition was also expressed by major intellectual Algerian figures such as the renowned novelist and writer Kateb Yacine and the playwright Abdelkader Alloula (see Grandguillaume, 1998). Several years later, Yacine reiterated his opposition with stronger words when he stated that the deepest alienation for an Algerian is not to think that he is French but that he is Arab. He writes,

L’aliénation la plus profonde, ce n’est plus de se croire français, mais de se croire arabe. Or il n’y a pas de race arabe, ni de nation arabe. Il y a une langue sacrée, la langue du Coran dont les dirigeants se servent pour masquer au peuple sa propre identité! (Yacine, 1989: 8)

In his article, Grandguillaume also contends that the result was that the Algerian conscience developed negatively: that is, as ressentiment against the French entity and identity – and worse, in opposition to political and linguistic pluralism in Algeria (1998: 21). In a vivid testimonial to his high school years, Professor Hend Sadi recalled how his Arabic-speaking teachers tried to ‘Arabise’ the students, all the while condemning the French language and dismissing Berber. This awkward language situation and the way these teachers – who were recruited by the Algerian government from Egypt and other Arab countries, and who appropriated the Algerian War although they did not participate in it – bred discontent and led many of the students to embrace Berber militancy. Sadi writes:

Au lycée, les enseignants d’arabe, ‘baathistes’ ou ‘frères musulmans’ pour la plupart, s’acquittaient de leur mission avec zèle. Ils s’employaient à nous arabiser … il nous fallait en conséquence apprendre à aimer la langue arabe que nous devions faire notre, mais aussi abandonner le kabyle, un ‘dialecte’ sans valeur et renier l’identité berbère, un concept ‘créé par le colonialisme’ aux dires de nos professeurs … Pour légitimer leur discours au lycée, les arabisants l’inscrivaient dans des diatribes anti-françaises … La légèreté avec laquelle ils nous marginalisaient, leur volonté de s’approprier un combat auquel ils n’avaient pas participé, le sans-gêne avec lequel ils accaparaient une libération que nous avions payée au prix du sang, tout cela nous heurtait profondément. (Sadi, 2010b: 23)

In October 1962, in pursuing this new policy, the national board of education discontinued the chair of Berber at the University of Algiers. In response and beginning in 1965–6, Berber students in Kabylia, Algiers and Paris began to gather into groups to work on Berber cultural, archival and pedagogical projects. As with the earlier nationalist movement, once again France constituted an important gathering place to develop research and to organise, in addition to the fact that the Kabyle public were available, engaged and beyond the reach of the repressive Algerian state. It follows, then, that political claims were enmeshed with cultural issues.

The objective of Arabisation was not simply to eradicate the language of the former coloniser (again, French was the language of communication and culture) but also to eradicate the Berber language and references to Algeria’s pre-Islamic past. Thus this process of Arabisation addressed administrative offices, education and media, and also included the names of places and streets names. Francis Gandon discusses the Arabisation of the urban environment in Algeria and gives numerous examples of this practice (Gandon, 1978). Public places, street names, stores and all kinds of sign boards were renamed. If these places had a local, cultural or historical referent, an Arabic name with a new connotation in accordance with the current political context was substituted (Gandon, 1978: 16). All names linked to Berber identity or reminiscent of the colonial past were obliterated. In Kabylia, the Berber presence was erased – literally rubbed out. Gandon gives many examples of this nationalist cleansing such as the substitution of an Arabic name for the ‘Star of the Morning’ (linked to the Punico-Berber cult of Ishtar) or the substitution of a martyr of Algerian independence for the Numidian king Massinissa. The new designations had a common denominator: that is, recourse to a putative conception of the Orient associated with a moral and stereotyped content such as notions of ‘happiness’, ‘rectitude’ and ‘beauty’ replete with poetic images and references to the colour pink, and names such as ‘Leïla’ and ‘Schéherazade’, or cultural references such as ‘Ibn Wassil’ or ‘Antar’ (Gandon, 1978: 18).

In addition to the process of Arabisation, other events fed the rising indignation towards Boumedienne’s dictatorial regime. In 1970 revolutionary Kabyle leader Krim Belkacem was assassinated by the military security apparatus (SM or Sécurité Militaire) in Frankfurt. In 1973, the Berber course taught by Mouloud Mammeri at the University of Algiers, which was permitted by the authorities only with great reluctance, was cancelled. It was a time when songs by the famous Kabyle singer Slimane Azem were forbidden and the transmission strength of the only Kabyle radio station in Algeria, Chaîne 2, was continually reduced. Young people were arrested and charged by the government, often simply because they held Berber documentation. ⁵ The 1970s in Algeria were generally perceived as a time of arbitrary abuse of power and brutality – in short, dictatorship. Most of all, these years were synonymous with the repression and denial of Berber identity.

The showdown between the Berber population of Kabylia and the Algerian regime came about through two particular incidents, among several others. In 1974, the Algerian ruling party, the FLN, organised ‘la fête des cerises’ in Larba Nat Iraten, a Kabyle town in the mountains near Tizi Ouzou. More than 5000 spectators gathered, all Kabyles, expecting Kabyle singers, but were presented instead with Arabic-speaking performers. A massive protest followed and was met with violence by the gendarmes, the Algerian national police. Several gendarmes were killed and more than 50 spectators were wounded (Bessaoud, 2000: 139).

Another significant event took place in 1977 during the Algerian Cup soccer championship, a popular national tournament. The Kabyle team, the JSK (Jeunesse Sportive de Kabylie), which was (and still is today) a symbol of Berber identity, was to play in the Algerian Cup in Algiers. The stadium was full and President Boumedienne attended the event. Nearly all the spectators, possibly 90 per cent of them, were Kabyle and the game became a focus for the Berber cause. Many incidents took place during the game. The president was booed (youths chanted ‘Down with Boumedienne’ and ‘Down with dictatorship’), and the singing of the national anthem was disrupted as was the minute’s silence for the martyrs of the revolution. The JSK won the game and, given the tension in the stadium, the president had to leave via an underground passageway. The crowd celebrated the victory and marched towards the centre of Algiers carrying banners written in Tifinagh (the Berber language). ⁶ In both events, for the first time, a new word appeared and was chanted by the spectators: ‘imazighen’. The ‘Berber movement’ took several years to mature and give birth to what is now called the ‘Berber Spring’. The very use of the word ‘imazighen’ testifies to the success of the underground work undertaken by pioneer figures of the Kabyle cause.

‘On n’arabise que ce qui n’est pas arabe’: the Berber Academy and beyond ⁷

In a poignant and polemical narrative, Mohand-Aarav Bessaoud retraces the creation and influence of the Berber Academy, a cultural association that he created with a small group of individuals in Paris. Bessaoud, an ardent Berber militant, was also a charismatic figure who dedicated his life to promoting the Berber culture and communal identity. He went underground in 1955 as part of the nationalist resistance in the war of independence, and later served as an officer in the Algerian army. His difficult war experience is recounted in Bessaoud (1991) in which he reveals that the Kabyle revolutionary leader Abane Ramdane did not die fighting as was generally acknowledged but was assassinated by Boussouf, the head of the Algerian MALG (the predecessor of the Military Security). In 1963, Bessaoud joined Aït Ahmed in his rebellion against the Algerian one-party system. His next book (1966) was about his disappointment with Aït Ahmed and his newly created political party of opposition, the FFS (Front des Forces socialistes). He accused the revolutionary leader of turning his back on political pluralism and dismissing the Berber question. Bessaoud’s underground activist life was difficult, and he left for France where he engaged in Berber activism in a more open public political space.

The famous singer and writer Taos Amrouche hosted the first meeting of the Berber association at her Paris residence. A small group of diverse personalities formed the original association, such as the pharmacist Mohand-Saïd Hanouz, a professional soldier, Abdelkader Rahmani, and Professor Mohamed Arkoun, among others. To avoid any misconceptions about the nature of the association, ⁸ it was named the ‘Académie berbère d’échanges et de recherches culturelles’ in 1966 (Bessaoud, 2000: 28). For Bessaoud, the main objective of the association was to raise Berber consciousness ⁹ and so, from 1966 to 1972, he walked up and down the streets of Paris, visiting cafés where Kabyles met in order to discuss Berber issues and spread the ‘Berber word’. The association was officially authorised in March 1967 and was promptly attacked from different sides, ¹⁰ while disagreements regarding its future role emerged from within. While some aspired to a less popular and more intellectual association, Bessaoud remained convinced that a grassroots presence was key. Of the founding members only Hanouz continued to support him.

In 1969, after overcoming numerous difficulties, Bessaoud organised the first Berber concert with great success. ¹¹ The event, which launched the new Berber Academy (Agraw Imazighen) marked a turning point in Berber cultural life in France. The new Berber Academy activists were older and popular political militants who had a strong following among the Kabyle immigrant population in Paris and its outskirts. Bessaoud continued to address the working-class Berber constituency, and with the help of students and factory workers he published a bilingual monthly bulletin (in French and Berber) called Imazighène. The bulletin (30 issues were published) was distributed throughout the diaspora and in Kabylia, especially among students who passed it around hand to hand. It provoked many discussions and debates and its influence on the Berber youth in Algeria is notable. In 1970 Bessaoud received thousands of letters of support from Algeria and thousands more from Morocco – the latter were seized by the Moroccan security services (Bessaoud, 2000: 88 and 136). ¹² The word ‘imazighen’ and what it conveys in terms of Berber awareness could not be ignored. The bulletin’s main focus was on the ancient history of North Africa and the defence of the Amazigh language. Its aim was to popularise Berber history and recover major Berber heroes such as Massinissa, Jugurtha and Kahina who are now well-known figures. This history was essentially directed towards a wide public and especially towards Berber youth. While its radicalism and sometimes virulent content led some to dismiss it or to disassociate themselves from it, the impression it left on students in Algeria was unforgettable. Saïd Khelil (in Salhi, 2010: 88) recounts ‘the emotional charge’ conveyed by the simple use of the Tifinagh alphabet. ¹³ For Khelil and his companions it was ‘the proof that we actually existed’, it was a ‘discovery’ and to know that their roots went so far back in history conveyed ‘a marvellous dimension’.

Parallel to this militant activity, whose discourse would eventually mature and become more flexible with the development of a sensibility for other cultural minorities, an academic movement also emerged and was best realised in the activities of the Groupe d’Études berbères at the University of Paris VIII, then located in Vincennes. It started to function in 1973 and fully emerged with the adoption by the university of a programme of courses in the Berber language and civilisation taught by Professor M’barek Redjala. ¹⁴

Yet even before the official formation and implementation of a Berber programme of study, there was an informal Berber group active at the university. For example, workers and militants from the Berber Academy, Mustapha Bounab and Belkacem Idjekiouane, made presentations on the Berber alphabet at the university, thanks to the help and support of Professor Georges Lapassade, an intellectual and leftist scholar. Thus the initiative of the Berber presence at the University of Paris VIII came from the working class (see Galand-Pernet, 2006: 17), a success which also had to do with the democratic and innovative nature of the University of Paris VIII where education was made accessible to all, especially workers, and was the academic home to the radical philosopher Michel Foucault. This last aspect of the Berber movement at the university was more academic and more moderate in its expression, focusing on scientific methodology as well as language pedagogy, literature and civilisation (see Chaker, 1990: 25). The group published a range of periodicals and didactic tools to support this programme. The Groupe d’Études berbères (GEB) produced a bulletin called Le Bulletin d’Études berbères, which was replaced in 1978 by the journal Tisuraf (‘Small Steps’). The GEB was influential in the emergence of political and cultural activism in the Berber movement of 1980, for the Berberist movement discourse had now evolved and earned acceptance and credibility with its admission into the academic world.

Two influential figures of the Berber movement: Taos Amrouche and Mouloud Mammeri

Two charismatic and intellectual figures played significant though different roles in the vast and popular movement that provoked the uprising in Kabylia in 1980: namely, Mouloud Mammeri and Taos Amrouche. They both operated inside and outside the Kabyle community, as they belonged to a social elite and inhabited a separate academic world. ¹⁵

Mouloud Mammeri was already an accomplished novelist and scholar in the 1970s: he had published La Colline oubliée (1952); Le Sommeil du juste (1955); L’Opium et le baton (1965) as well as several short stories, a play and several articles on Berber society and anthropology. In 1969 Mammeri published Les Isefra poèmes de si mohand-ou-mhand, a collection of poems by the Kabyle bard Mohand U Mhend (1848–1906) translated into French. This work had a major impact on the self-awareness of Kabyles. He later published a Berber grammar book (1979) but his Berber courses at the University of Algiers were especially influential. According to Ouerdane, young Kabyles enrolled by the hundreds on his course as a result of the groundwork done by the Berber Academy, which had instilled in them an important sensitivity with respect to their Berber identity (Ouerdane, 1990: 185). When Mammeri’s course was cancelled in 1973, it displaced linguistic and cultural Berber affirmation from the university out into the street (Ouerdane, 1990: 186). In his testimony on his student years, Mohand-Ouamar Oussalem, one of the leaders of the 1980 Berber Spring, declared that the importance of the framework created by Mammeri’s Berber course was that ‘it was both a place of gathering and collective affirmation and a place of discovery and learning about our culture and language’ (Salhi, 2010: 83). Within the framework of this course, multiple contacts were made and students learned Berber notation and were exposed to other Berber dialects and literature. The course was both a discovery and a search for legitimacy (Salhi, 2010: 83). And so, when Mammeri came to the University of Tizi-Ouzou to speak on his new collection of ancient poems (Mammeri, 1980), he was forbidden access to the university, and this triggered the riots of the ‘Berber Spring’.

Taos Amrouche was and remains a major figure in Berber culture in several respects. Unlike Mammeri, who was engaged in an immediate sense, Amrouche worked on other fronts. She was a significant novelist (though, for complex reasons, not established or recognised) who published Jacinthe noire in 1947 the first francophone novel written by a woman in North Africa, followed by Rue des tambourins (1960) and L’Amant imaginaire (1975). She also sang traditional Berber songs, which she collected from her mother, though she gave these songs a particular dimension, singing them and recording them as part of a patrimony on the brink of extinction. Singing outside her own community to foreign audiences in France and elsewhere (Spain, Morocco and Senegal), she coupled her recitals with a new discourse about authenticity and the danger her Berber heritage faced – a patrimony that, she reminded her audience, also belonged to the world, so it was important for it be saved and protected (Aïtel, 2013, forthcoming). Her role, then, was predominantly involved with the recognition of the Berber situation and the cultural and historical mission of its supporters. She endowed her songs with an international prestige and provided them with a place in world music. But Taos Amrouche also addressed her compatriots (though she was born in Tunisia, she always asserted her direct kinship and link to Kabyle culture) through radio shows in France from the 1950s to the early 1960s. She was the host of several shows in French and Kabyle on RTF. ¹⁶ One of her shows was aptly called A d n emmekti tamurt (‘Let’s remember Kabylia’) with Kamel Daoud and the famous Kabyle singer Kamal Hamadi. Both hosts would discuss and dissect Kabyle poems and tales. The Kabyle diaspora in France was eager to listen to her radio shows, and listening to them over the French airwaves surely contributed to renewed pride and interest in Kabyle identity.

Chaîne 2

Chaîne 2 was the sole Kabyle radio station in Algeria, and was founded after the Second World War when the ELAK (Émissions en langue arabe et kabyle) were created within Radio-Alger, which had been broadcasting in French since 1925. ¹⁷ According to Dehbia Abrous, at first the Kabyle programming was a prized aspect of the station’s format, though it was broadcasting only three hours a week. The station’s Kabyle programmes were especially directed towards women and aimed at drawing attention to the ‘civilising mission’ of France in Algeria during a time when the nationalist movement was starting to radicalise (see Abrous, 1988: 98). According to writer and journalist Malek Ouary, who worked at the radio station, there was much improvisation in the creation of the programmes and the running of the shows. At first the station staff copied French radio in their programming. However, little by little, the radio became the centre of intense intellectual activity and ‘attracted everything that could constitute an intellectual life’ (Ouary, 2001). Much energy was spent collecting, adapting, creating and translating Kabyle oral culture, since the Kabyle tradition was mainly oral. Malek Ouary’s own contribution to this effort is widely acknowledged. ¹⁸

The radio station’s audience grew rapidly with the availability of the first battery-operated portable radios in the mid 1950s. Its role and influence on Kabyle society was significant, as Abdelmadjib Bali, who spent 20 years working with the radio station, argues. At first some topics were avoided because of the conservatism of Kabyle society: for example, direct access to the closed world of women was considered particularly scandalous. Bali argues that the intrusion of the radio into people’s homes and intimate domestic spaces contributed to a profound cultural transformation for ‘the fathers of the Kabyle radio … defied prejudice and boldly tackled risky themes, such as woman’s emancipation and her right to education and work’ (Bali, 2010: 23). And so, progressively, the channel became omnipresent in people’s lives and propelled a traditional society into the modern world.

After Algerian independence, the RTA (Radio Télévision Algérienne) designated one station to broadcast in Arabic, Chaîne 1; one to broadcast in Kabyle, Chaîne 2; and one to broadcast in French, Chaîne 3. From the 1970s onwards, the transmission strength of Chaîne 2 was constantly reduced and the station was diminished and discriminated against. ¹⁹ During the Arabisation period, some questioned its very existence and wanted to shut it down altogether. ²⁰ On the other hand, under its control the government had access to a population that would otherwise have been out of reach, for, as one commentator stated:

The government has indeed no other way to communicate with a population whose rate of literacy barely exceeds 50 per cent and who understand neither French nor Arabic … Channel 2 allows the government to maintain contact with this population and to convey political messages to it. (Ihaddaden, 1992: 252)

The station was maintained but its broadcasting hours and the range of its radio transmitter were further reduced, all of which was known as the ‘translation of a policy of suffocation’ (see Oussalem’s testimony in Salhi, 2010: 84). Of course, people were outraged by this for the station was the only cultural space dedicated to broadcasting in the Kabyle language and it had a wide audience (Salhi, 2010: 82).

The new Kabyle song and other cultural forms

The New Kabyle song played a definitive role in the build-up to the Berber Spring. The New Kabyle song is a successful blend of old repertoires mixed with modern technology and contemporary politics. It was heralded by Ben Mohammed, a young poet who in 1970 was working to modernise Kabyle music by diversifying its themes, structure and composition. In 1973 he wrote the lyrics for Idir’s hit song ‘A Vava Inuva’ (among many other famous song lyrics) and he is commonly associated with the foundation of the new Kabyle music scene. ²¹ Anthropologist Jane Goodman goes further, arguing that Ben Mohammed and Idir’s work developed a new vision of Berber identity:

The genre that Idir and Ben launched … provides a compelling example of the use of intergeneric and intertextual relationships to develop a new vision of Berber identity. It does so through a creative intermingling of genres, blending the harmonies, instruments, performance modalities, and technologies associated with folk rock with rhythms, melodies, and texts drawn from Berber village repertoires. ²²

And indeed the Kabyle song played an essential role in the renewal of Berber identity and rights claims in both Algeria and France.

The few years that preceded 1980 were active in terms of cultural activities, which in Algeria took place mainly within schools and universities, to the extent that sociologist Brahim Salhi linked Berber identity formation to the sociological situation of its leaders: namely people who had access to education and modernisation and who enjoyed public service jobs (guaranteed jobs) (Salhi, 2010: 67). Certainly, school played an important role in the cultural and linguist awareness of the younger generations of Kabyles. It was a place where the youth of Kabylia experienced the rejection of their maternal language with incidents involving prohibitions on singing in Berber in a choir or in a stage play. They also had access to clandestine copies of journals or documents in which their Berber identity was reaffirmed. At the University of Algiers in 1968, while Mouloud Mammeri was teaching his Berber course, a cultural group (Cercle culturel berbère) was created by students. From this circle emerged a journal called Taftilt (‘Light’). Outside the university another journal named Itij (‘Sun’) was produced which used the Tifinagh alphabet. This period was also rich in creative productions such as drama which were written and performed in Kabyle. Kateb Yacine encouraged the translation of his play Mohammed prends ta valise (‘Mohammed take your suitcase’) into Kabyle, though the title was incorrectly interpreted by religious fundamentalists as an attack on the Prophet. Yacine also helped students to stage the play. This theatre company travelled all through Kabylia presenting Yacine’s play with great success. The company even won second prize for interpretation at the Carthage Theatre Festival in Tunisia in 1972. ²³

Finally, in 1978, the University of Tizi-Ouzou was established in the capital city and heart of Kabylia. The government’s stated and initial purpose was to relieve the overcrowded University of Algiers, and so the new university enrolled students mainly from the Kabyle villages around the city, and soon became a centre for protest, which crystallised within the university and spilled over to the local hospital and factories.

The Berber Spring

The Berber movement which was mediated by outrage and dissatisfaction towards the Algerian government concerning the political and cultural situation in Algeria, finally coalesced around one single event: the cancellation of Mouloud Mammeri’s lecture on ancient Kabyle poetry at the University of Tizi-Ouzou on 10 March 1980. The wali (governor) justified the cancellation of the lecture by pointing to the risk of public disorder. As a result, demonstrations and revolts took place throughout Kabylia for several weeks. The first march took place the next day and was followed by many others in the region. According to linguist Salem Chaker, this event bore two new features: its international resonance and the massive public protest that was mounted by all parts of Kabyle civil society (see Salem Chaker’s testimony in Aït-Larbi, 2010). Indeed, although the protest started at the university, it soon included the hospital of Tizi-Ouzou as well as nearby factories. The movement turned into a major social and popular protest. Along with riots, strikes and marches, the university, the hospital and factories were occupied, and there were many violent confrontations with the state police. On 20 April, ‘Operation Mizrana’ began. The police stormed the occupied buildings and arrested several hundred people, among them professors, students, doctors and workers. The next day, civilians confronted the police throughout the region. The situation looked like a regional insurrection (Guenoun, 1999: 50).

The political prisoners who were arrested during the protests and who had become the focus of attention were finally liberated on 25 June. In August a month-long seminar composed of citizens, linguists and historians took place in Yakouren. The Yakouren debate, as it was known, was the first of its kind where culture, identity, language and school were discussed democratically outside an official context (Guenoun, 1999: 55). At the end of this meeting, the Mouvement culturel berbère ²⁴ presented the Algerian government with a substantial document outlining political and social claims and propositions. ²⁵

For the first time since independence a social movement was able to affect a whole region and even challenge the power of the central government. Historian Benjamin Stora sees in this reaction the first violent signal of the people’s discontent with the one-party (FLN) Algerian state, an arrangement which collapsed after the riots of October 1988 (Stora, 2002: 47). The Algerian authorities saw the Berber riots as the work of foreign agitators and pointed the finger at Paris and Rabat (see, for example, Le Figaro, 1980; Libération, 1980b), while in France the communist newspaper L’Humanité, reluctant to criticise Algiers, declared that ‘reactionary elements’ were behind the Kabyle uprising (L’Humanité, 1980).

But the Berber uprising was not based only on a linguistic claim. ²⁶ It was also about claiming democratic rights, since, said Oussalem, to ask for Berber rights without democracy was meaningless (Salhi, 2010: 124). As Stora remarks, ‘though Kabyles are often suspected of weakening the national cohesion by claiming specific rights, it turns out that the battle they fight for plurality always announces major moments of transition towards democracy’ (Stora, 2002: 47). Only many years later, writes Salhi, were Kabyles able to measure the way in which the movement initiated a global movement in the claims for freedom and in the building of citizenship (Salhi, 2010: 141).

As I have argued here, in important ways the Berber Spring was the culmination of work dating back to 1965 by groups in Algiers and in the Algerian immigrant population in France, and this important moment also revealed an important solidarity between intellectual militants and the Kabyle population as a whole. In France there were marches in solidarity with Kabylia ²⁷ and support groups kept the movement alive, preventing its eradication in Kabylia by the government’s brutal repression. Moreover, spokespersons made the situation known internationally, which was a new phenomenon and broke the silence about the repression of the Algerian regime, a government which was otherwise revered as a unique revolutionary phenomenon. ²⁸ Lastly, exile, we must note, furnished a space and venue for this new immigrant Kabyle voice, facilitating the expression of dissent and a constructive reformulation of Algerian politics and the nation.