Elizabeth Alalou and Ali Alalou, illustrated by Julie Klear Eskalli
Charlesbridge
February 2008
ISBN 978-1-58089-127-1
As young Nora waits impatiently for her mother to come home from work and for her father to serve the long-simmering couscous that smells so delicious, her father tells her about his childhood in Morocco. During a famine, when Nora's grandfather had to travel far to find work and bring food for the family, her father learned the valuable life lessons of patience, perseverance, and hope.
The Butter Man is a Junior Library Guild selection.
Hope and Other Dangerous Pursuits by Laila Lalami. October, 2005: Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill.
Hope and Other Dangerous Pursuits marks the book debut of a Moroccan-American woman who is one of the most creative and talented upcoming writers in the United States. Born and educated in Morocco, she went on to study in Great Britain and California, and with a master’s degree and a doctorate in linguistics, she found herself in Los Angeles working as a computational linguist. At age 30, she decided to follow her bliss and become a full-time writer. Now living in Portland, Oregon with her husband and daughter, she is blazing across the literary firmament.
Friends of Morocco Book Review by George McFadden (Morocco 76 – 79)
FOM Digital Library: A collection of publications
on the WWW. Volunteer and referrals needed to build this collection
Marrakesh Express:
Suggested Books on Morocco Excellent collection of key (English) literature
by Susan Shaffer-Davis (FOM Board of Directors) covering social science (women,
society, history, politics), culture (textiles, food, travel, crafts), Islam,
literature and language.
English language non-fiction books about Morocco
An extensive historical listing based on the collection of FOM member Bob
Drake. Publications purchased from this page benefit (15%) Friends of
Morocco. Books in Chronological Order
Francophone
Literature of the Maghreb (Authored by FOM members Mike Toler and
Debbie Folaron)
Tingis is a quarterly
magazine that highlights the cultural concerns, ideas, and issues of Moroccans,
friends of Morocco, and all those who have some interest in Morocco or the
larger Arab and Muslim worlds. Because Moroccan views have no representation
in English-speaking cultures, particularly in the United States, Tingis fills
this gap and, at the same time, highlights the diversity within Arab and Muslim
thought. The magazine also seeks to present the views of non-Muslim Moroccans
whenever possible. The pages of Tingis are wide open to all critical inquiries
into the nature of identity, religion in the 21st century, nationalist ideologies,
globalization, and communication across faiths and cultures. Tingis encourages
self-critical thought but eschews polemical treatises that exacerbate misunderstanding
or trivialize intellectual inquiry.
The goal of Ketabook.com, the first
online bookstore of the Maghreb, is to provide in the first place books published
in Morocco, Algeria and Tunisia to all academics or institutions of scholarship
and research at affordable costs and with a maximum of e-technology efficiency.
Being academics ourselves with years of university service in the field of
humanities and social sciences and enjoying close relations with the publishing
circles in the region, we plan to put our experience at the service of the
academic community and the specialized libraries throughout the world. IN
THIS WEBSITE YOU WILL FIND... Books: History, Society, Economy, Politics,
Literature, Art, Linguistics, Islamic Studies...; Music: Andalusian,
Modern, Rai, Popular, Sufi...; Maps: We have a large stock of
large and small-scale maps of Morocco, the Sahara, and parts of Algeria and
Mauritania. Rare Books: A number of books now considered rare,
either from the 19th century lithograph press or from the French and Spanish
colonial times are still circulating in the Maghreb. and Periodicals: Our customers can order a number of Maghrebi periodicals using ketabook.com.
A list of the most important Moroccan, Algerian and Tunisian periodicals appears
on our website.
RPCV Morocco writers Publications by RPCVs
from Morocco. More information at Peace
Corps Writers. Web publishing
by RPCVs from Morocco.
Glory
in a Camel's Eye : Trekking Through the Moroccan Sahara
by Jeffrey Tayler (PCV Morocco 88-90) Hardcover: 256 pages ; Publisher: Houghton
Mifflin Co; (June 2003) ISBN: 0618155473
Review
by RPCV writer Vic Cox
Saharan
Boy by Richard Bellamy (TEFL 75-78 Errachidia & Goulmima)
* Paperback: 216 pages. 1stBooks Library; (November 2002)
* ISBN: 1403360103
Book
review by Adam Labriny
CASABLANCA
NOTEBOOK, by Louise Roberts Sheldon.
A fascinating peek at a very foreign land by a seasoned reporter and illustrator
who lived there for a total of eight years. Louise Sheldon grew to know and
love Morocco and its people in a way that few journalists or diplomat's wives
(and she is both) are permitted or qualified to do. ...
Culture
Shock!: Morocco by Orin Hargraves (TEFL 80-83, Staff (trainer 1983)
El Hajeb)
Paperback (June 1995) Graphic Arts Center Pub Co; ISBN: 1558682414.
Orin Hargraves, author of Culture Shock! Morocco knows whereof he speaks.
As a Peace Corps volunteer to that North African country in the early 1980s,
he learned firsthand about the customs and culture in the Maghreb. Hargraves
covers the bases with a basic but thorough overview of Moroccan history, geography,
and politics. He delves into the psychological and cultural mores of the Moroccan
people, from their attitudes about men, women, and family to their views on
homosexuality, hospitality, and religion. The areas for potential misunderstanding
between western visitors and Moroccans soon become clear, and Hargraves does
his best to offer clear explanations of Moroccan thought and behavior.
Moroccan cookbooks including Come with me to the Kasbah: A cook's tour of Morocco by Kitty
Morse. Buy this and other Moroccan cookbooks here.
Younger
Than That Now: A Peace Corps volunteer remembers Morocco by Michael
Moran. 1994. Read a review by Bob Drake.
Return
to Childhood : The Memoir of a Modern Moroccan Woman by Leila Abouzeid
(Modern Middle East Literatures in Translation Series by Layla Abu Zayd, et
al.) Paperback (March 1999)
Year of the Elephant: A Moroccan Woman's Journey Toward Independence,
and Other Stories by Leila Abouzeid ; translation from the Arabic by Barbara
Parmenter ; introduction by Elizabeth Warnock Fernea Center for Middle Eastern
Studies, University of Texas at Austin [c1989] Distributed by the University
of Texas Press 103 p.; ill., map Includes glossary. SERIES: Modern
Middle East literature in translation series.
LC: 89062509 Class: PJ7806.O99. ISBN: 0-292-79603-X Paper $9.95
Street
in Marrakech by Elizabeth Warnock Fernea. Paperback (November 1988)
Waveland Press; ISBN: 0881334049.
This is a reflexive account of an American woman and her family's unpredictable
journey through the private and public worlds of a traditional Muslim city
in the process of change. As a Western stranger in Marrakech, Fernea was met
with suspicion and hostility. The story of the slow growth of trust and acceptance
between the author and her Moroccan neighbors involves the reader in everyday
activities, weddings, funerals, and women's rituals. Both the author and her
friends are changed by the encounters that she describes. A Street in Marrakech
is a crosscultural adventure, ethnographically sound, and written in an accessible
style.
The
Children of Morocco (The Worlds Children) by Jules M. Hermes Reading
level: Ages 9-12 Paperback (March 1995) Carolrhoda Books; Gr. 3-6. After
an introductory map section, Hermes tells the story of many different Moroccan
children--nomadic Berbers, village dwellers, and city children from Casablanca,
Rabat, and Tangier. Some of the children are living with families; others
are on their own in cities. Children's contributions
to the economy are explained in some detail, and Hermes supplies a respectful
treatment of Islamic culture. The color photographs are well chosen, presenting
a combination of individual portraits and pictures of the children's surrounding
world.
La Vie Economique:
Premier hebdomadaire d'Information du Maroc
Gender
on the market: Moroccan women and the revoicing of tradition. Deborah
A. Kapchan. 1996. See two reviews
State,
Society and Democracy in Morocco: The Limits of Associative Life by Azzedine
Layachi
Political Scientist Azzedine Layachi examines relations between the state
and society in Morocco and finds that perennial multiparty politics and an
active associative life have neither generated a pluralist and open political
process nor stimulated the development of a civil society. He calls in to
question the empirical significance and analytical usefulness of the whole
notion of civil society in a country where the boundaries between state and
society are blurred by strong institutional practices and by cultural and
religious beliefs.
1998 Paper $16.95 120 pp. ISBN 0-932568-25-4 Buy
the Book Today!
American
Institute of Architects (AIA) offers several books relating to architecture
and urban planning in Morocco and North Africa. Included in their current
lists are Morocco:
Design from Casablanca to Marrakech, by Lisl and Landt Dennis.
It is a verbal and photographic description (over 300 photos) capturing the
skill and imagination with which Morocco' decorative arts and crafts are used
in houses and furnishings. The book is $45.00 for non-members. Also available
is Afrocentric
Architecture: A design primer by David Hughes. Contrary to many
authors writing on African arts and architecture, Hughes does not believe
that the culture of Egypt and the rest of North Africa should be separated
from African culture. He also believes that Eurocentric culture does not account
for its treat influence on the remainder of the mother continent. Contact
the AIA in Washington DC, at 202.626.7475.
Historical
Dictionary of Morocco, New Edition was released 1996, by Scarecrow
Press in London. In the book, Thomas K. Park fills the pages with information
about Morocco' history, political activity, commercial and agricultural situations,
genealogical trees for the major dynasties, geography, and demography. Also
included are numerous clear maps, a bibliography, and a listing of libraries
and archives about Morocco in Europe, Morocco, and private hands.
The Architecture
of Memory, a Jewish-Muslim Household in Colonial Algeria, 1937-1962 ,
by Joelle Bahloul, recalls how they lived in a single house that was occupied
by several Jewish and Muslim families, in the generation before Algerian independence.
Uprooted and dispersed in the early 1960s, these former neighbors constantly
refer back to the architecture of the home itself, which, with its internal
boundaries and shared spaces, structures their memories. Here, in miniature,
is a domestic history of North African Muslims, Jews, and Christians, living
together under French colonial rule. Buy
the Book Today! The book is also available from Cambridge University
Press.
Medieval
Isma' History and Thought, also from Cambridge University Press,
is based on authentic Isma' texts discovered in the 1930s, in private collections
of the Islamic world. The texts threw new light on the history of the Shi'
Muslim community. Written as a series of essays by leading contemporary authorities,
the book deals with important historical and doctrinal issues, as well as
the specific literary and intellectual traditions of the Shi'. Farhad Daftary
is editor of this publication. Buy
the Book Today!
The International
Journal of Middle East Studies has published a series of original
research papers and reviews concerning the countries of the Arab World - covering
time from the 7th Century to the present. For a list, contact the Journal
at Cambridge University Press, North American Branch, 40 West 20th
Street, New York NY 10011-4211, email: journals_marketing@cup.org.
