Discovering the Moroccan Language Varieties

Written by Lahcen Lqoul

Lahcen Lqoul is the teacher of (Tashlhet) Tamazight, Darija and Standard Arabic in Dar Si Hmad's CELAR program.

     I am an educator, translator and language and cross-culture facilitator. I have a Master’s degree in Comparative Studies in Literature. I teach undergraduate courses at the university of Arts and Languages, Ait Mloul (the larger Agadir Region). I also worked with the Peace Corps as a language and cross-culture facilitator, teaching Darija and introducing volunteers to Moroccan culture. I am currently occupying the same position at Dar Si Hmad, an NGO based in Sidi Ifni with an annex in Agadir.

    My teaching experience with Dar Si Hmad started in 2018. When I was given the opportunity to collaborate with DSH, I considered it as a means to develop several inter/intrapersonal skills in terms of communication, cultural exchange and professionalism. At the end, what I achieved has, surprisingly, exceeded all my expectations.

    First, I started teaching classes in darija (Moroccan Arabic). Then I taught (Tashlhet) Tamazight. After that I taught Standard Arabic. To be able to manage and maintain teaching these three languages, DSH developed a language program called CELAR. This program offers courses in the mentioned languages. In order to learn the language in a relatively short period of time, these courses are most of the time intensive, 6 to 10 hours a week. DSH made this teaching and learning process more convenient. They provided me with a suitable working environment and the needed teaching materials, such as textbooks, equipment and so much care.

      During the period in which I have been working for DSH, I met and taught many interesting students from all over the US. There were Fulbright researchers in different fields of research, English teaching assistant, students in internship in DSH and some of DSH staff. Due to various interests in learning these languages, I taught these three languages for different purposes: for general communication in everyday life like shopping, transportation and so on; for research like writing and translating questionnaires and interviews with or for local people in their communities. In these courses, there are students who started knowing one word and ended up in an intermediate level; there are others who brushed up on one of the languages I mentioned and moved to an upper level. I also taught groups of students from other universities and organizations who came to learn about Moroccan culture and language. I taught students from (WGEI) Women's Global Empowerment Initiative, students from Quinnipiac University and students from Lewis and Clark University. These students showed great interest in learning the languages we use in Morocco and to learn about Moroccan culture in general. And that motivated me a lot to do my best and for me to learn more about my multiple cultures.

     Working with DSH gave me the chance to develop and sharpen my teaching, social, and personal skills. They also helped me to discover other personal and professional teaching skills. For me, Dar Si Hmad is a cross-cultural zone where different cultures meet and deep exchange happens. I met different people from different countries and different backgrounds; people from Morocco, US, Ghana, and Tunisia. Working with these people was fun. It was a fruitful and a professional and resourceful experience.

Learning Across Continents: America sharing knowledge with Africa

Written by DSH Fellow Katie Tyler

Katie is a recent graduate from Princeton and a fellow of Labouisse Fellowship. She is working with Dar Si Hmad on the capacity building project for NGO's .

Dar Si Hmad Intern Katie Tyler

A little more than five years ago, I found out that I had received the opportunity of a lifetime. Thanks to the National Security Language Initiative for Youth (NSLI-Y), I had been awarded a scholarship to study Arabic in Marrakech. I had never lived outside of the U.S. before, and I was excited for the chance to be immersed in studying a foreign language. At the end of my six-week experience, I was able to speak Modern Standard Arabic a little better, but I wanted to continue improving my language skills.

When I entered college the following year, I knew that I wanted to continue studying Arabic and different cultures of the Middle East and North Africa. Becoming a Near Eastern Studies (more commonly known as Middle Eastern Studies) major at Princeton University was an obvious choice for my course of study.

During my third year of college, I spent a year writing an independent research paper the reconstruction of Agadir after the 1960 earthquake. Reading books about Moroccan history and newspaper archives from Agadir reminded me of how much I missed living in Morocco. Based on my experiences interning at a youth homeless shelter in Newark, New Jersey, I also knew that I wanted to gain more experience in working with nonprofit organizations that fight poverty. 

A mosque in Agadir (Taken by Katie)

I was lucky enough to attend a university that is able to support my career aspirations to work in sustainable development abroad. I am able to work in Agadir with Dar Si Hmad thanks to the Labouisse Fellowship, named after Princeton alum Henry R. Labouisse, who was most notably awarded a Nobel Peace Prize for his work as the president of UNICEF. The Labouisse Fellowship provides graduating Princeton seniors with the funding to pursue a yearlong project in international development in partnership with a local nonprofit organization.

Henry R. Labouisse

I reached out to the former NSLI-Y program coordinator for advice on finding a partnership with a Moroccan organization, and she enthusiastically recommended Dar Si Hmad. When I researched Dar Si Hmad’s work to provide water to rural communities and empower young people, I did not hesitate to get in touch. I worked with Jamila Bargarch, Dar Si Hmad’s Executive Director, and Maisie Breit, the former EFS Manager, to devise a plan for how I would use the Labouisse Fellowship to support some of the organization’s new projects during my time in Morocco.  After spending so many hours reading and writing about Agadir it felt surreal to be moving to the city for an entire year in late June.

One of the main projects that I am working on here at Dar Si Hmad is the new capacity building project. I am working closely with Jamila and Hafida Mazoud, DSH’s Communications Officer, to design and implement an eight-month-long training series for a group of small associations in Agadir, Tiznit and Sidi Ifni regions. Our beneficiaries are working with a diverse range of issues, such as literacy in refugee communities, women’s empowerment through income-generating initiatives, the preservation of cultural manuscripts, and the use of solar energy in villages. In the training, we will cover topics such as administration, financial management, and program management.

Our Intern Katie and
Communication officer Hafida

The goal of this project is to equip local leaders with stronger management skills so that they can expand their organizations’ reach and social impact more effectively. Each participant will develop and implement a new project or campaign by the program’s conclusion in June. We intend to equip participants with the tools to materialize their visions to change their communities. We are also committed to incorporating principles of environmental sustainability and gender inclusion throughout the project. I am especially hopeful that this capacity building workshop will continue to benefit communities in southern Morocco long after my fellowship concludes.      

In addition to my work on the capacity building project, I am assisting Jamila with research on Dar Si Hmad’s ongoing fog project. Outside of the office, I enjoy trying delicious new pastries from the bakeries around Agadir and going to BodyPump classes. I am improving my Darija, and I have recently started learning Tachelhit with Lahcen, a teacher who partners with Dar Si Hmad. I wrote my undergraduate thesis about how Tuareg communities attained mass literacy in the Tifinagh script, so I always try to read the Tachelhit signs written in the Tifinagh script around the city. 

If you see me in the DSH office, I am always excited to hear new recommendations on books about Morocco, as I am trying to learn as much as I can during my stay here! 

 Katie at the office

Learning Across Continents: My first travel abroad experience

Written by DSH intern Ambar Khawaja:

Ambar Khawaja is an American intern on a gap year of service through UNC’s Global Gap Year Fellowship. She is working with us on an upcoming project that we will reveal more information about in the future on our blog. 

Traveling means a different thing to each person who experiences it. When I was preparing to come to Morocco, I had no idea what it would mean to me. I listened to stories of other people’s travels overseas with wide eyes, peppering them with questions with the intent to satisfy what I believed I had not yet experienced. 

I spent hours scrolling through my social media, seeing beautiful, vibrant images of adventures and locations in different countries. These images fed into the preconceived notion I had of traveling and living abroad, which I have now learned is highly misrepresentative of one’s true experience. Life here is not constantly the “picture perfect” snapshot you imagine when moving to a foreign country; Instead, it resembles life in general, with its ups and downs, but with tremendous space to grow.

There are many facets of my identity that have helped me blend into Agadir. As an 18-year-old, Muslim, Pakistani-American woman, I physically do not stand out in the crowd. Basic words, like “salam”, “shukrun”, and “inshallah” come easily to me because of my second language: Urdu. At a glance, I am just like everyone else around me, but ask me a question in Darija and you will be met with a blank stare. 

The first thing I learned how to say when I arrived was “ana Pakistaniya” so that I could communicate to the confused Moroccans around me that I myself was not Moroccan. This physical similarity with those surrounding me has given me some privileges, like not being overcharged by a taxi or not being stared at like a tourist while walking down the street. Conversely, it has made my experience traveling as an American much more complex than I expected. Because of this situation, however, I have learned an absurd amount about myself and my skills, or lack thereof in some cases.

On the surface, I fit in, but the nagging knowledge that I don’t speak the language or know the culture as well lends itself to a lot of cognitive dissonance. I definitely feel embarrassed when the person I am out with has to explain that I speak English, however, I wonder if this sense of self-consciousness is because my looks don’t match up with my language. I ask myself “how different would I feel if I matched the stereotypical image of a white American”, and “how would the privilege of looking like what my nationality is ‘supposed’ to look like change my interactions with people”. 

This photo was taken by Ambar

I have observed that it is more likely for local people to change the way they approach a conversation with this stereotypical image of an American because they feel the need to adapt to them, rather than the foreigner to adapt to the culture they are in. This is the privilege of speaking English. However, I appreciate my physical appearance making it more difficult for Moroccans to pinpoint where I am from, because I am then placed into more situations where I must adapt to this new language environment. Sometimes I must resort to speaking in English, but this is because I understand the limits I have when trying to communicate in French or Darija.

The language barrier has been the single most difficult experience for me thus far. When I first arrived, I found myself speaking a mix of English, Urdu, and Spanish, since these languages lead to conversations in my world. Pointing, hand gestures, and shaking my head “no” have proved to be an effective way of communication for me when my interlocutor doesn’t understand English. While humorous on many levels, it has also provided me with the opportunity to learn non-verbal communication skills and living with a host family has given me the chance to sharpen them. 

My host mom, in particular, speaks very little English, yet we have formed a beautiful bond in the short amount of time I have spent here. Helping out in the kitchen, watching the sunset together in awe and admiration, having the same faith, and sharing photos of each others’ lives has created a relationship between us that couldn’t have been created by words, since words sometimes get in the way of moments. This is not to say that language is not beneficial since our relationship is finding new joys in language exchange, with me starting to learn Darija and teaching my host mom words in English. Learning the language of the place I am living in will also remove the barriers I have in trying to interact with locals and will prevent my overarching privilege of speaking English from interfering in conversations. Lucky for me though, I do not face these problems in my workplace.

  I have found a lot of purpose in my work here as an intern. Being the youngest person in the office has helped me fine-tune some of my skills since I am constantly surrounded with more experienced coworkers offering me constructive criticism to help improve and add to what I already know. It’s an interesting experience to learn more about my capabilities by doing things I have not done before, like tutoring English and planning programs for high schoolers. 

Being in the presence of these amazing people has helped me adjust much faster to living here than I would have if I had to figure out everything alone. Because I have people to show me their favorite places in the city and teach me how to order food or buy something at the “hanout”, the transition has been much smoother. I have been given a solid foundation on which to venture out alone on.

A picture of the souk "taken by Ambar"

Traveling solo for the first time has enforced the concept that I am accountable for myself. There is no external reason that I can’t go out and try something new, face a fear, or take a risk. All of my choices are in my own hands, and that is a very liberating feeling to have because it opens up my life to a lot of personal growth. Now is the perfect time for me absorb everything around me.

Morocco's Rich Language Landscape: Studying Darija & Berber at Dar Si Hmad

As a language enthusiast, Morocco’s linguistic diversity never ceases to amaze me. As a native Spanish speaker, self-proclaimed Francophile turned Arabic aficionado, I was drawn to Morocco because of its convoluted linguistic intersections. While interning at Dar Si Hmad, I used some of my spare time to learn Darija and some basic Tachelhit with the excellent instructors at the Ethnographic Field School. I also look forward to continuing my studies of conversational Darija and Modern Standard Arabic during the remainder of my time at Dar Si Hmad.

But what inspired me to study three languages over the course of my time with DSH?

The linguistic landscape of Morocco is has been molded by its heritage, colonial past and aspirations to be a major player in the global stage. In Morocco, depending on where you are, you may encounter five or more languages on a daily basis: Moroccan Darija, Tamazight regional dialects, Standard Arabic, French, Hassaniya, Spanish and English. Each of these languages carry significance in Morocco’s cultural history and serve unique functions in society. We can certainly say that Moroccans are natural polyglots, as many speak at least three to four languages by the time they reach adulthood!

To start out, Moroccan Darija is a colloquial dialect that has strong foundations in classical Arabic, or Qur’anic Arabic, which came to this region from the Arabian peninsula during the Islamic Conquests and Arabization of the “Maghreb” in the 7th to 12th century. Classical Arabic has evolved into Modern Standard Arabic (MSA), which is a commonly used and mutually understood written and spoken version of Arabic throughout the Arab world. However, MSA is not a widely spoken language. It is reserved for formal professional or academic settings and literary texts, such as books, newspapers, magazines, and official documents. Due to MSA’s function as a strictly formal version of Arabic, each country throughout the Arabic-speaking world has their own colloquial dialect that is an off-shoot of Arabic. The further away you go from the Arabian peninsula and the Middle East, the greater variety you find in the spoken Arabic of the people in those different countries. A linguistic comparison can be made to dialectal diversity you would notice between Murcian castilian and Andalusian castilian in Spain, for example.

Moroccan Darija is the language used in everyday life in Morocco. It is heavily influenced by the languages spoken by the Spanish, French and Portuguese colonizers of this region who came and left in waves before Morocco officially gained its independence in 1956. For example, semana, the Spanish work for week is simana in Darija. In addition, the Darija word for hospital sbetar bears close resemblance to the French word hopital. These are just some of many examples of words that exist in Darija that originate from the languages of colonial powers. To further complicate the situation, the Darija spoken in the northern part of the country can vary from the Darija spoken in the south. Moroccans themselves recognize linguistic differences between Fassi Darija and “Casaoui” Darija, for the Arabic variety spoken in Fes and Casablanca, respectively.

While Darija is mainly spoken in the streets, it can often influence Moroccans when they speak a more refined MSA in formal settings, causing there to be a middle version of semi-formal Arabic. Despite this fragmented picture of linguistic differences, many Moroccans hold on dearly to Arabic as their main language due to its association as the language of Islam, or the language in which the Holy Qu’ran was received by Prophet Mohammed. The place for MSA in a Moroccan society that is mostly Darija-speaking has been the topic of much debate in Morocco.

Furthermore, there are Amazigh languages spoken by the indigenous people of Morocco. The word “Berber” has been often used to refer to the Amazigh people, but some perceive it as derogatory term because it derives from barbarian, which was used by colonial powers when they first arrived in the country. However, “Amazigh” actually means “free and noble men,” an identity that continues to be a point of pride for many Moroccan Amazighen. While statistics on what percentage of Moroccans are of Amazigh background vary, a great majority of Moroccans claim Amazigh roots. There are three main dialects of Amazigh spoken in Morocco: Tirifit in the north, Tamazight in the center, and Tachelhit in the south of the country. The dialects that are closer in geographic proximity to each other can be understood by native Amazigh speakers. However, a native Tachelhit-speaker from Agadir will find it very difficult to understand a native-Tirifit speaker from Nador. While Amazigh languages may be transcribed in both Latin and Arabic characters, the ancient Tifinagh alphabet was standardized and officially recognized by Morocco in 2003. Through the efforts of some Amazigh nationalists, Tamazight was recognized as an official language in Morocco when the new constitution was passed by King Mohammed V in 2011. Tamazight is mostly spoken at home among family members and relatives. However, it has become increasingly present in Moroccan public spaces. For example, administrative buildings now provide signs translated in Tifinagh and Arabic scripts, Tamazight is taught at select public schools, and locals in predominantly-Amazigh cities like Agadir speak it casually amongst themselves.

While the colonial period officially ended in 1956 with the abolition of the French protectorate, traces of the colonial influence are still undeniably present in Moroccan society, especially when it comes to language. Following decades of French and Spanish influence in most of the country, the languages of colonial powers have made their way into almost all spheres of life. When colonial powers finally withdrew from the country, newly independent Moroccans found themselves inheriting colonial education systems and governmental structures. For this reason, French and, to a lesser degree, Spanish have left their mark on the Moroccan linguistic landscape. Spanish is widely understood and spoken in northern Morocco (and Dar Si Hmad’s hometown of Sidi Ifni). Places in the vicinity of Tangier and Tetouan have major Spanish-speaking populations, which is fueled by tourism from nearby Spain and the Spanish enclaves of Ceuta and Melilla. While Spanish is not spoken at home or enforced at school, you may find Moroccans speaking it with each other or tourists in the area.

French has a longer and more complex history in Morocco. Due to the French colonial influence in pre-state and newly independent government institutions, the French language has maintained a strong presence in Moroccan society. While Moroccans learn Arabic, most who pursue education beyond the primary level can speak French at least conversationally. By the time Moroccans reach the university level in the humanities, almost all of their coursework is likely to be in French. Many Moroccans believe that French language skills are necessary in order to progress professionally in the country.

Similarly, English is now starting to gain popularity in Morocco as a global language, especially in a country that aims to open itself up to international business. Interestingly enough, Moroccan youth also see learning English instead of French as an act of resistance to France’s cultural hegemony over Morocco. Nearly half of the Moroccan university students participating in Dar Si Hmad’s RISE program prefer English over French for professional communication.

As you can tell, the linguistic landscape of Morocco is as complex as it is diverse, mirroring the richness of Moroccan society. There is no doubt that many linguists are attracted to Morocco because of its unique diglossic situation in order to make sense of this complexity. Certainly, the country will never cease to inspire those who are willing to take the time to unpack its many layers.