Women’s Identity Through Memories of Physical Violence in Assia Djebar’s Fantasia: An Algerian Cavalcade and Toni Morrison’s Beloved: A Comparative Study

Abstract

Women’s wounds are identity ‘museums.’ Unless this type of memory is inscribed, identity is buried with the subaltern victims. However, one’s sense of identity can be shaped by memories associated with experiences of physical violence. Even though Assia Djebar and Toni Morrison deal differently with them, women’s identities, whether colonized or enslaved, are the same because violence, for centuries, has equaled them. This article, therefore, examines this type of memory and its effects on women’s identity by comparing Fantasia: An Algerian Cavalcade by Assia Djebar and Beloved by Toni Morrison. No serious comparative study is undertaken to thoroughly bring the two authors in dialogue together. This is what this article purports to do.