Dear readers,
The first week in our English class, we discussed the role of memory versus history. Which one is more reliable? Memory is generally expressed in the first person, informal, and authentic. In contrast is a social science history is in the third person, formal and based on “facts”. However, the fact presented as historical is not always correct. I started thinking about the “civil war” in Algeria and how french books and analysists did not admit it was not an anti-colonial rebellion and an independent struggle. For a very long time, France considered the war as “national amnesia”.
Algeria was colonized by France for over 70 years (1890 – 1962). The war began on November 1st, 1954 with attacks by the National Liberation Front (FLN) against the French administration. The French government did not publicly address the attacks. Instead of admitting the truth, the government chose to tell French citizens not worry and that the French security forces were taking care of it. Even after the agreement of Evian in 1962, the French government still did not admit engaging in a civil war and continue to hide information from its citizens. In other words, the government chose to deny history. At that time, historians wanted to do more research on Algeria but access to sources were limited. For example, the movie “The Battle of Algiers” by Gallo Pontecorvo in 1966 was banned in France for 5 years. In France, most citizens forgot about the war and it was overlooked by French textbooks. People could only count on memoirs, autobiographies, and photographs to remember what actually happened.
The challenge is that some memoirs are contradicted and have different interpretations of different historical events. For example, French citizens living in Alegria (know as the pied-noir) had an ideal vision of their colonial life in Algeria. In contrast, the descendants of Algerians immigrants from Algeria have different interpretations of events. In 2005, French historian Benjamin Stora started a petition on the “liberty of history” insisting that it is not up to the government to define history. Till this day, Algeria is still waiting for an official apology from the government of France admitting that Algeria struggle independence for which was a civil war.
A Memoir is a subjective interpretation of events that the author has experienced. Memoirs can be individual or collective. But we need to be careful interpreting memoirs because the author is setting up the narrative to make the readers think in a certain way. Memoirs can be used on a sensitive topic such as the Holocaust.
To conclude, we need to rely on different memoirs and interpretations of different sources to supplement our history, texts and national narrative. To understand history, it is very important to gather a variety of points of view to interpret historical events. A deeper understanding can be gained by reading historical texts and memoirs of individuals who witnessed at the time.
http://www.birmingham.ac.uk/research/perspective/algeria-anissa-daoudi2.aspx
https://www.thenational.ae/world/mena/algerian-war-memories-divide-france-1.325105
http://ir.uiowa.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1023&context=iowa-historical-review
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2006/11/a-chronology-of-the-algerian-war-of-independence/305277/
https://www.icrc.org/eng/resources/documents/interview/2011/algeria-history-al-insani-2011-04-01.htm