| Part ofa series on the |
| Culture of Algeria |
|---|
 |
| People |
Traditions |
| Mythology |
| Art |
Music and performing arts |
Monuments |
Theculture ofAlgeria encompasses literature, music, religion, cuisine, and other facets of life in Algeria.
The state religion of Algeria isSunni Islam. About 99% of the Algerian population are Muslims, specifically Sunni Muslims.[1] It also has Christian and Jewish minorities who make up less than 1% of the population.
Islam was introduced to Algeria with theMuslim conquest of the Maghreb in the 7th century. UnderUmayyad rule,Musa ibn Nusayr continued the program of spreadingIslam and theArabic language through missionary activity and chose seventeen religious scholars to convert the locals. Many people became Muslims at the hands of these scholars and the inhabitants of the Maghreb gradually converted to Islam.[2] CaliphUmar ibn Abd al-Aziz sent to the governor of IfriqiyaIsmail ibn Abdallah all scholars and men of culture, who were ordered to teach the religion of Islam.[2] They were distributed around the regions of the Maghreb. In less than one century, the great majority of Christians converted to Islam with 'great zeal that they sought martyrdom', and the final conversions took place in the first two centuries after thehijrah.[2] TheArab migration to the Maghreb consolidated this process.
Since independence after theAlgerian War, regimes have sought to develop an IslamicArab socialist state, and a cabinet-level ministry acts for the government in religious affairs. PresidentHouari Boumédiene sought to increase Islamic awareness and to reduce Western influence, although the rights of non-Muslims continued to be respected.[3]
Greetings in Algeria have been described as lengthy. In addition to handshaking, Algerians ask about health, family and work to show concerns for others. Friends and family also exchange kisses on the cheeks. Some Algerian men might avoid prolonged eye contact with women and avoid personal questions. These behaviors are observed out of respect and to maintain appropriate social manners.[4] Most Algerians uphold Arab traditions of hospitality, and are friendly and helpful.[5]
![[icon]](/mt/?noimg=&dark=on&url=http%3a%2f%2fen.wikipedia.org%2fwiki%2fFile%3aWiki_letter_w_cropped.svg) | This sectionneeds expansion. You can help byadding to it.(December 2008) |
Algerian cuisine features cooking styles and dishes derived from traditionalArab,Amazigh,Turkish, andFrench cuisine. The influence ofJewish,Spanish,Berber, andItalian cuisines can also be observed.[6] The cuisine is flavorful, often featuring a blend of traditional Mediterraneanspices andchili peppers.[6]Couscous is a staple of the diet, often served with stews and other fare. Other popular Algeria dishes includedoulma,chakhchoukha, andchtitha.
Algerian clothing, influenced by the country's rich history and cultural heritage, varies among different regions and communities in Algeria. Traditional Algerian clothing isIslamic custom, although there are Algerians who adopted clothing based on Western style, especially in the cities.[7] In urban areas, there is a mix of traditional clothing and increasingly common Western style clothing, whereas traditional clothing is much more common in rural areas.[8] As an Islamic country, Algeria has limits on dress code. Most Algerians follow Islamic dress codes, and foreigners are expected to show modesty, such as female visitors having to avoid exposing their shoulders, knees or chest.[9]
One of the most common traditional garments for both men and women in Algeria isdjellaba. The djellaba is a long, loose-fitting robe that typically reaches down to the ankles. It is made from various fabrics, such as cotton or wool. The djellaba usually has long sleeves and a hood, and it is often worn over other clothing. In rural areas, women often wear a traditional dress calledhaik. The haik is a large rectangular piece of fabric, usually made of wool or cotton, which covers the body and is wrapped around the head as a hood. The haik is typically white, but it can also be found in other colors and patterns. It is ofAndalusi Arab origin.[10] The traditional dress for men in Algeria includes a loose-fitting shirt calledgandoura. The gandoura is usually made of lightweight fabric and is worn oversirwal. Men also wear a variety of head coverings, such as turbans orfez hats.In urban areas and on special occasions, Algerians often wear modern Western-style clothing. However, traditional garments are still highly valued and are worn for cultural celebrations, religious events, and weddings. Other examples of traditional Algerian dress includes theqashabiya,kaftan andkarakou. InKabylia and theAurès,Berber jewellery made of silver, beads, and other items was an important component ofBerber identities up to the mid-20th century.[11]
Modern Algerian literature, split betweenArabic andFrench, has been strongly influenced by the country's recent history. Well-known poets in modern Algeria areMoufdi Zakaria, Mohammed Al Aid,Achour Fenni,Amar Meriech, and Azrag Omar.Famous novelists of the 20th century includeMohammed Dib,Albert Camus,Kateb Yacine,Ahlam Mosteghanemi, andAssia Djebar. Among the important novelists of the 1980s wereRachid Mimouni, later vice-president of Amnesty International, andTahar Djaout, murdered by anIslamist group in 1993 for his secularist views.[12]
In philosophy and the humanities,Jacques Derrida, the father ofdeconstruction, was born inEl Biar inAlgiers.Malek Bennabi andFrantz Fanon are known for their writings ondecolonization.Augustine of Hippo was born inTagaste (modern-daySouk Ahras), andIbn Khaldun, though born inTunis, wrote theMuqaddima while staying in Algeria.
Algerian culture has been strongly influenced byIslam. The works of theSanusi family in pre-colonial times, and ofEmir Abdelkader and SheikhBen Badis in colonial times, are widely known. The Latin authorApuleius was born inMadaurus (Mdaourouch), in what later became Algeria.
TheAlgerian musical genre best known abroad israï. Originating in western Algeria in the early 1900s as a combination of popular music and traditionalBedouin desert music,[13] it emerged as a major world-music genre in the 1980s.[14] It is a pop-flavored, opinionated take onfolk music, performed by internationally-known talent such asKhaled andCheb Mami. It sounds like pop music, sung in Arabic with tonal and instrumental influences of traditional Bedouin music, as well as cultural and religious influences.[13] Singers of Raï are calledcheb (Arabic: شاب, orshabab, meaning young) as opposed tosheikh (Arabic: شيخ,shaykh, meaning old). Within Algeria,raï remains the most popular musical form, but older generations tend to prefershaabi, performed by singers such asDahmane El Harrachi.
Althoughraï is now generally welcomed and praised as a cultural emblem of Algeria, in the post-independence period the form was often attacked or criticised by Islamic and government authorities. These attitudes began to change around 1985, partially due to the influence of Colonel Snoussi, an ex-military officer turnedraï artist.[15] Another reason for the shift in attitude towardraï was the music's growing popularity in France, which the Algerian government viewed as positive.
Andalusi music, brought fromAl-Andalus byMorisco refugees, can still be heard in many older coastal towns.
Kabyle music, exemplified byIdir,Ait Menguellet, orLounès Matoub, also enjoys a wide popularity.
In comparison to otherMuslim majority countries,Algerian women overall have historically possessed more levels of freedom. Algerian women have seemed to be offered more leniency and have continuously proved to have an important voice in Algerian society.[16] However, while they seem to receive leniency, they still suffer from an overall lack of protection of legislation or cultural norms.
 | Theneutrality of this article isdisputed. Relevant discussion may be found on thetalk page. Please do not remove this message untilconditions to do so are met.(March 2024) (Learn how and when to remove this message) |
Examples of leniency can be depicted through women only having to wear their veils inside cities, not throughout their daily life regardless of their location. Historically, oppression of Algerian women grew during the French imperial period in 1965. Culturally, French influence caused Algerian men to have their voices oppressed and denied their pride, causing them to lash out in their domestic lives. However, this is not a direct representation of Algeria culture. The women's rights movement in Algeria continues to be a prevalent cultural movement to this day.[17]
During the first half of the twentieth century, artists mainly recuperated models and patterns imported – or imposed – by an imperialist French power.[18]
AsEdward Said argued in his bookOrientalism in 1978, Algerian artists struggled with the perception and representations of Westerners. Almost a century after the conquest by the French,Azouaou Mammeri (1886–1954),Abdelhalim Hemche (1906–1978),Mohammed Zmirli (1909-1984), andMiloud Boukerche (1920–1979) were the first to introduce easel painting. They benefited from "breaches" in the educational system and were able to pursue a training in plastic arts. Even though they attempted to focus on the reality of Algerians' everyday routine, they were still to a certain extent incorporated in the orientalism movement.
The tradition of oriental illumination andminiature was introduced around the same period, through artists such asMohamed Racim (1896–1974) orMohamed Temman (1915-1988). It is the two main expression of figuration in a country where popular abstract symbolic, Berberian or Arabic, are integrated mainly through architecture, furnitures, weaving, pottery, leather and metal workmanship.
How to reappropriate one's own history is a dynamic in Algerian contemporary art, reflecting on the deep social changes people experienced.
Artists attempt a successful introspective work in which the duality in terms of identity creates a dynamic that overcomes "orientalism" and exotism. The main stake is for the artist and the spectator to reappropriate a liberty of expression and interpretation.Main artists of that period are:Boukerche,Benaboura,Ali Ali Khodja,Yelles, orBaya.
The vast majority of the artists incorporate the thematic of the independence war, from those who lived it to the artists that use it as a legacy. Impregnated by all the artistic and ideological movements that marked the first half of the twentieth century, artists are concerned with the society they live in and denounce segregation, racism and injustice that divided communities of colonial Algeria.A clear shift in operated from orientalism and exoticism: new themes such as the trauma and the pain appear, for instance in the portraitThe Widow (1970) byMohamed Issiakhem.
"Art is a form of resistance as it suggests and makes visible the invisible, the hidden, it stands alert on the side of life".[19]
It was also a time when Algerian artists start organizing themselves, through the National Union of Plastic Arts or UNAP (1963) for instance; artists such asMohamed Issiakhem orAli Khodja were part of it.
Abdallah Benanteur andMohamed Khadda opened a path forabstract (non-figurative) Algerian art. They were French since childhood and emigrated to France. They were followed by artists such asMohamed Aksouh, Mohamed Louail,Abdelkader Guermaz andAli Ali-Khodja.Mohamed Khadda wrote:[20] "If figurative painting appears asthe norm in terms of expression, it is the result of an acculturation phenomenon". Artworks liberately figurative are a form of liberation in that sense, as literal representations do not seem to fully emerge from the cluster ofexotism andorientalism.
The "Painters of the Sign" are Algerian artists born in the 1930s who, at the beginning of the 1960s, found inspiration in the abstract rhythm of Arabic writing. The term "peintres du Signe" was coined by the poetJean Sénac in 1970. He was hosting inAlger the "Gallerie 54". The first collective exhibition reunitedAksouh,Baya,Abdallah Benanteur, Bouzid,Abdelkader Guermaz,Khadda,Jean de Maisonseul,Maria Manton,Martinez,Louis Nallard andRezki Zérarti. He wrote in his presentation: "In this gallery 54, which aims at being a gallery of research in permanent contact with the people, we have brought together artists, Algerian or having deep links with our country" "We can assert, with Mourad Bourboune, that our artists do not only exhume the devastated face of our Mother, but, in the midst of the Nahda (renewal), they build a new image of the Man and stare endlessly at his new Vision".[21]
Algerian artists reconnected with part of their historical and cultural legacy, especially the influence ofBerber culture and language. A great deal of attention was brought upon the Berber culture and identity revendications after theBerber Spring in 1988, and it impacted the cultural production.Denis Martinez andChoukri Mesli participated in the creation of the groupAouchem (Tattoo), which held several exhibitions in Algiers andBlida in 1967, 1968 et 1971. A dozen artists, painters and poets decided to oppose the mainstream organization of art – especially of figurative art, they believe to be represented by the UNAP, the National Union for Plastic Art. They opposed their policy of excluding many active painters. According to its manifesto : "Aouchem was born centuries ago, on the walls of a cave ofTassili. It continued its existence until today, sometimes secretly, sometimes openly, according to fluctuations of history. (...) We want to show that, always magical, the sign is stronger than bombs".[22]
In spite of a surge of political violence following the war of independence, where the hegemony of the Arabic culture and language tended to overlap on the berberian culture, the plastic traditions of popular signs managed to maintain. Aouchem builds on this traditional legacy.
Since the 1980s, there has been a renewal and also a form of "naivety", trying to go past the trauma of the war and address new contemporary issues.Baya (1931–1998) is the example of a great Algerian success story.[according to whom?] Her work was prefaced byAndré Breton and exposed byAndré Meight when she was still a teenager. She who has not known her mother as she was doubly orphaned by the age of 5, produced colorful watercolors with fake symmetries, questioning the figure of the Mother. She is part of theart brut movement.
Expressionism was dominated byMohamed Issiakhem, affectionately nicknamed "Oeil de lynx" (lynx eye) by his fellow writerKateb Yacine. When he was 15, he had an accident with a grenade. Two of his sisters and his nephew died, his forearm had to be amputated. His personal drama resonates in work. He expressed themes like grief and loss through the use of thick pastes and universal figures; as an echo of the hardships of the Algerian war, as well as the universal struggle of those silenced and oppressed.
Since the 1980s, a new generation of Maghrebi artists has arisen. A large proportion is trained in Europe. Artists locally and among the Diaspora explore new techniques and face the challenges of a globalized art market. They are bringing together various elements of their identity, marked by the status of immigrant of first or second generation. They address issues that speak to the Arab world with an "outsider" lens.Kader Attia is one of them. He was born in France in 1970. In a large installation in 2007 calledGhost, he displayed dozens of veiled figures on their knees, made of aluminum foil.[23]Adel Abdessemed, born inConstantina in 1970, attended theÉcole des Beaux-Arts inAlgiers,Algeria and thenLyon,France. Through his conceptual artworks, he displays strong artistic statements using a wide range of media (drawing, video, photography, performance, and installation). In 2006, he exposed at the David Zimmer gallery in New York City. One of his artworks was a burnt car entitledPractice Zero Tolerance, a year afterriots in France and in the midst of a resurgence of terrorist attacks since11 September 2001.Katia Kameli[1] also brings in the multiple aspects of her identity and environment, through video, photographs and installations.
| This sectionneeds expansion. You can help byadding to it.(June 2008) |
Football, handball, athletics, boxing, martial arts, volleyball and basketball are the most popular sports in the country.
{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)