Oral Knowledge in Berber Women's Expressions
of the Sacred

Fatima Sadiki

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One of bastions of women’s orality is the family. Moroccan women have always been associated with the family. All of women’s family functions have been significant for the family structure; from wives, sisters, female in-laws, to mothers, they are the ones who have been shaping and transforming the deep cultural views and values on the family. The most culturally significant family events, namely, marriage, birth, circumcision and death, are historically celebrated, transformed, and transmitted by women’s songs and rites. These family rituals are accompanied by songs, music, drums and dancing which often describe the family ceremonies, their significance in keeping the kin united. For example, marriage songs describe the three stages of a wedding: the dfu’ (day of offering gifts and presents to the bride), the henna (a traditional ceremony of hand and feet decorating performed for the bride prior to the wedding ceremony), and the dakhla (the physical meeting of the bride and groom). The bride is ushered to her would be husband’s house by her female kin. The songs also depict the traditional hospitality and generosity of Berber families. In the Berber wedding songs, the bride’s mother usually expresses feelings of joy and sadness, as she is happy to wed her daughter; “you are better than a beautiful singer,“ but also worried that her in-laws mistreat her; she advises her daughter to be watchful. Local versions of the same songs are found throughout North Africa.

In Morocco, family-related rituals are centred on sexuality, often dominated by women. To avoid social anxiety, caused by a clash of women’s power rituals and the patrilineal system of kinship whereby descent is validated by paternity, women mitigate this by the use of Henna, religion and family ties.

Rituality is linked to blood, taboo and women in Berber culture. The most culturally significant rituals accompany events such as births, circumcision, marriages, and death, magic, and saint veneration. Blood is related to sacrifice and women’s life cycles such as virginity, menstruation and menopause which all involve blood. As for taboo, some of the strongest taboos function as a means to control and socially sanction women in heavily patriarchal communities. In defiance to this heavily patriarchal system, Berber women use rituals to maintain power in an outside the family. These rituals include family events, magic, and saint veneration.

Berber women’s rituality is also linked to saint veneration and spirituality (Rausch 2006). Various scholarly studies on Berber language and culture have associated women with saint veneration. However, these studies have in the majority of cases dealt with the topic from a male point of view in which women’s “popular“ religion is regarded as less worthy than men’s orthodox and “right“ religion. For women, saint-veneration is a ritual. Women visit saints for a variety of reasons: search for solace, expressing faith, socializing with other women, talking about deeper concerns, or simply enjoying a moment away from a harsh reality.

In the pre-Islamic era, people worshipped gods and goddesses. With the coming of Islam, this type of worship was banned as “heretical,“ and as Islam was revealed in a patriarchal system, women were relegated to the private space. They instead resorted to saint visiting.

Today, saint veneration in Berber culture often involves pilgrimages to the tombs of pious ones (igrramn “male marabout,“ tigrramin “female marabouts“). In doing so, women often seek counsel and blessings but lack the means to make the more orthodox haj to Mecca. While intercessors between God and the believer is forbidden in doctrinal Islam, women have kept this tradition alive. According to Justinard’s 1933 volume on Moroccan Sahara history to the 16th century, great saints lived in the 16th century in the southern region of Morocco and up to now, regular moussems (festivals) continue to draw Berbers from as far away as Europe. This type of saint-veneration is called “popular religion“ in Morocco. Whereas men adhere more to orthodox Islam, women prefer saint-veneration. The type of teaching acquired in saint-visiting may be termed “knowledge“ which may be acquired by illiterate women as opposed to schooling which is more acquired by men. Female participation in annual moussems is impressive as saints are regarded by women as semi-mythical historical figures. As for art, it is mainly focused on carpet-weaving and cloth- making (Becker 2006).

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Oral Knowledge in Berber Women’s Expressions of the Sacred

by Fatima Sadiki