Claire Cécile Mitatre is an anthropologist and a lecturer at the Paul-Valéry Montpellier 3 University and the Paris-Saclay Ecole Polytechnique, as well as a member of CERCE (EA 4584-E1). Since 2003, she has been conducting research on the Saharawis of Western Sahara, based on long-term fieldwork. Her work brings to light networks of correspondences between social events of very different sizes, ranging from micro-relationships (kinship relations, breastfeeding, the body, image production) to large-scale events (inter-tribal relations, the slave trade, nationalism, international politics, cultural heritage). Her publications include El Melhfa. Drapés féminins de l’ouest saharien (Malika éditions, Casablanca, 2011 /2014 for translation into English and Arabic). C.C. Mitatre is a member of OUISO.
© 2021, School of Advanced Studies in Social Sciences
In the oases of the Wad Nûn, there is no apology for autochthony, no pre-eminence of the first to arrive: everyone comes from elsewhere and is careful to preserve and display the memory of it. This elsewhere is oriented: to the south, prestigious, is attached an ideal of purity of the Hassāniyya language and nomadism; to the north, a sedentary and Berber-speaking culture from which the Saharan Arabic speakers seek to distinguish themselves. From bodily techniques to kinship relationships, from marriage ceremonies to ties to the land, many of the Tekna’s practices are influenced by this tropism, against the backdrop of the conflict in the Western Sahara. Claire Cécile Mitatre has endeavoured to bring this out in a detailed ethnography that is lively and attentive to the reflexivity of those involved.
- Title : Au nord du Sud : Espace, valeurs et passion au Sahara atlantique
- Author : Claire Cécile Mitatre
- Editor : School of Advanced Studies in Social Sciences (EHESS, coll. “En temps & lieux”)
- Date of publication : 2021
- Number of pages : 272
- ISBN : 978-2-7132-2899-5
- Price : 25,90 €