%0 Journal Article
%T De-Westernizing Morocco: Pre-Migration Colonial History and the Ethnic-Oriented Self-Representation of Tangier¡¯s Natives in Israel
%A Aviad Moreno
%J Quest : Issues in Contemporary Jewish History.
%D 2012
%I Fondazione Centro di Documentazione Ebraica Contemporanea  CDEC
%X The article presents and analyzes the self-representing narrative strategies through which westernized Jewish immigrants from Tangier (Morocco) de-westernize their personal pre-migration colonial history in the context of the ethnic conflict in Israel. By so doing, the article challenges from a new perspective the general post-Zionist notion according to which ethnic revivals among Moroccan Jews in Israel came about in opposition to the European-oriented national narrative; A narrative that had distorted their authentic Mizra i culture and history, often in the form of de-Arabization. In an attempt to explain the motivations for de-westernization, the article further implies that not merely did the ethnic revival of Tangier¡¯s natives not match the general post-Zionist notion, but moreover that it had often formed shape in the course of contrasting it. Only through de-westernized self-representations, could Tangier¡¯s natives contest the general representation of Moroccans as Mizra im with the sense of ¡°their own¡± Moroccan ethnic history.
%K Jews
%K Arab countries
%K Mediterranean
%K Israel
%K oral history
%K Morocco
%K Moroccan Jews
%K Tangier
%U Ben-Gurion University of the Negev (Beer-Sheva, Israel)