Avuncular American

January in Black & White

Our just-concluded January series of four films, every Monday evening, on the theme of race relations, ended with a record turnout for "Prince Among Slaves," the award-winning PBS documentary about the African prince who, thanks to his Muslim faith and literacy in Arabic, was taken for a "Moorish" prince.

The case of mistaken identity led to his eventual freedom, because "his emancipation would greatly please the Emperor of Morocco."  It's a story we love to tell, because it involves Morocco, the United States, and the Tangier American Legation.

Earlier this month, we also showed feature films "Goodbye Bafana" (a worthy but perhaps factually flawed film about Nelson Mandela and his white jailer) and "The Defiant Ones," a 1958 Oscar-winner with Tony Curtis and Sidney Poitier, chain-gang escapees in racist America.

And we couldn't let Martin Luther King's birthday pass without another showing of "Freedom Riders," always moving, about the struggle to integrate interstate buses in the American South in 1961.

We got an early start with African American History Month, in large part due to travel in February.  And we're glad that the Tangier public was more interested in content than in timing.

Gerald Loftus

Moroccan Roots of the Spanish Foreign Legion

La Legión Española

A weekend break in the nearby Spanish enclave of Ceuta (one of two Spanish territories remaining in North Africa; Melilla is much further east, near the Algerian border).  A chance to visit the Museum of the Spanish Foreign Legion - itself a lesson for those who may have thought that France had a monopoly on the Foreign Legion brand.

Built into the coastal fortifications of this ancient city, the Legion Museum is a paean to the martial spirit that has ruled the Legion since its inception.  In 1920, Spain was embroiled in the very costly Rif War in its northern Moroccan Protectorate, and the Legión was originally modeled on its French counterpart, though most of its recruits were in fact Spanish.

Though it is not per se a Franco museum, the Generalissimo himself is frequently portrayed, as he rose to fame during the Rif War of the 1920s and was one of the Legion's first commanders.  The charcoal portraits of fallen Legionnaires from battles like Annual and Chaouen give way to those of the Spanish Civil War in the 1930s, when General Franco launched his counter-Republican military campaign from Spanish Morocco, at the head of the Foreign Legion.

Here I'll inject the learned comment of Shannon Fleming, who has written in scholarly journals of Spanish Morocco and the Civil War:

A couple of comments concerning this interesting essay. First, I am not sure there would have been portraits of fallen legionnaires from the actual Annual debacle of July 21-22 1921 as the two banderas of the Legion did not arrive in Melilla from Ceuta until July 24th. Second, Franco actually launched his campaign from Spanish Morocco at the head of the "Army of Africa" which included not only Legion units but also regular Spanish units and units of "regulares" or indigenous Moroccan troops. Once Franco left Spanish Morocco in August 1936 for the peninsula he was bascially in charge of the "Army of Africa" in the peninsula and by September 30, 1936 was proclaimed "Chief of State" and thus head of the entire Nationalist military effort.

Too bad visitors can't take photos inside, or I'd show you Mariano Bertuchi's take on Franco, gazing out over the Strait of Gibraltar from Africa, to a Spain presumably under the yoke of the atheistic Republic, with the Virgin Mary beckoning from the clouds.  It's almost as if the museum was frozen in the time of Spain under Franco, which ended almost 4 decades ago.

Actually, Ceuta is perfect setting for the Legion Museum, as the theme of "la muerte" in Legion lore (in its motto, its hymns, its imagery) is ubiquitous.  Ceuta's charming churches, once you're inside, are somewhat morbid repositories of the art of Catholic martyrdom, with plenty of "dolor" and "muerte" to inspire Legionnaires and all the other contingents of security forces who help keep Africa (especially African migrants) at bay.  Along with the church bells, visitors are awakened to the sound of the bugle sounding reveille.

There's a piece of the Legión just beyond the border with Morocco, in what was the Spanish Protectorate until Morocco regained its independence in 1956.  "Dar Riffien," the old Foreign Legion barracks, dominates an entire hillside a few kilometers south of Ceuta.  Apparently turned over to the Moroccan military in 1961, it is sadly going the way of much of Morocco's colonial architecture.  "Macmuseo" has a nice photo essay on the ruins.

Before you get to the present day exhibits on the Foreign Legion's UN peacekeeping deployments, there are other reminders - photos, flags, weapons - of the long goodbye (or shall we say adiós?) that Spain and its Legion said to its African territories.  There was action in Ifni in the late 1950s, and of course in the Western Sahara as late as 1975 ("The Last Patrol"), both now absorbed into Morocco.

So, for students of Morocco's long struggle for independence and territorial integrity, a visit to this military museum is a must.  We salute our fellow museum dedicated to history!

Gerald Loftus

Saharan Crossroads: Views From the Desert-Edge

Herein we broadcast the Call for Papers (CFP) from the joint AIMS (American Institute for Maghrib Studies, of which TALIM is the research center in Morocco) WARA (West African Research Association) conference for June 2013.  Please note that the deadline for submission of applications and abstracts is December 30, 2012.

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CALL FOR PAPERS

Saharan Crossroads: Views from the Desert-Edge

An AIMS-WARA-CRASC Conference

22-24 June 2013 - Ghardaïa, Algeria

This conference is part of a series of activities organized by the West African Research Association (WARA) and the American Institute for Maghrib Studies (AIMS) aimed at strengthening the cultural, artistic and historical links among the peoples living within and across the Sahara Desert.

The 3rd international conference « Saharan Crossroads: Views from the Desert-Edge » is planned to be held in Ghardaïa, Algeria June 22-24, 2013.  The Centre d’Etudes Maghrébines en Algérie (CEMA) is partnering with the Centre National de Recherche en Anthropologie Sociale et Culturelle (CRASC) in planning this conference to be held at the University of Ghardaïa.

This conference’s theme is “Mapping information flows within and across the Sahara.” Throughout the ages, Africans circulating in Saharan regions engaged in cultural, intellectual, religious and political exchanges. Through oral and scriptural media, and by way of foot, caravan, truck and other traffic, people conveyed information and ideas that transformed and connected societies across distances. The committee is interested in studies focused on Saharan and trans-Saharan exchanges of information and ideas, past and present. Ghardaïa, in the heart of the Mzab region, is a propitious locale to hold this conference. This ethnically and religiously diverse oasis town was once a major center of exchange, and a northern terminus of caravans originating from markets such as Timbuktu, Agadez and Kano.

Proposals for papers and panels are invited for the following suggested themes:

1.       Circulation routes and information nodes

2.       Art, music and stylistic trends

3.       Cultures and ritual traditions

4.       Centers of learning and scholarly circuits

5.       Religious and Sufi networks

6.       Legal opinions and jurisprudence

7.       Political movements and ideological waves

8.       Evolution of communication technologies

9.       Migration and information flows

10.    Water management technologies and oasis agriculture

11.    Urban and architectural design

12.    Comparative Saharan archaeology

Applications and Abstracts of no more than 200 words should be submitted by December 30^th, 2012 at the following website: http://fs9.formsite.com/westafricanresearchassociation/form10/index.html.

For further enquiries, you may contact the conference organizers at [email protected].

Conference Organizers:

Ghislaine Lydon (University of California, Los Angeles)

Robert Parks (Director, CEMA-Oran)

Jennifer Yanco (Director, WARA)

Aomar Boum (Vice-President AIMS, University of Arizona)

Sidi Mohamed Trache (Université d’Oran et associé CRASC)

This conference is partially funded by a grant through the US Dept of State Bureau of Education and Cultural Affairs.

Captive in Timbuctoo: Robert Adams Rediscovered

When I saw it first, I was lost in the bowels of the London Library, searching for an obscure volume on shrunken heads...

A leather-bound book, an inch thick, jammed up against a water pipe.  Without thinking, I reached up and yanked it out.  Cupping the book gently in my hands, I pulled it open at the title page and began to read.  That was the moment my obsession with The Narrative of Robert Adams began.

- Tahir Shah, preface to Timbuctoo

When Casablanca-based writer Tahir Shah came to the Legation last year, he and his family toured our research library before his book presentation.  With what seemed like x-ray vision, Tahir honed in on bookshelves and could spot titles from a distance.

It was almost a re-enactment of the scene from the preface.  He was ecstatic that TALIM owns an 1816 copy of The Narrative of Robert Adams (image, below).  Shah helpfully provides a facsimile of the original Narrative on his website.

Tahir Shah's rollicking romp through Regency London - with the illiterate Adams dictating his adventure to a scribe of the Royal African Committee - is a thoroughly enjoyable read.  It's clear that Shah has done his research on Adams and his time.  Not an easy time to be an American in London: the War of 1812 was just coming to an end, and Britons were used to thinking of Americans as the enemy.

You can't read Tahir Shah's Timbuctoo without thinking of another great historical novel based on an African adventure: T.C. Boyle's Water Music, the story of Mungo Park's fatal wanderings along the Niger River.  There is some of the humor of Boyle's work, though not in the parts of The Narrative on his capture and captivity that Adams is shown dictating.  That's all pretty grim - we're talking slavery - Adams as a Christian slave in the Sahel 200 years ago.

No, the rollicking is all in London, and Shah has created a colorful back story to what was a major challenge to Adams' credibility: everyone in London was convinced that Timbuctoo was an African Eldorado.  Fascinated as Londoners were with Adams' tale of survival, his description of Timbuctoo as nothing more than a collection of mud buildings flew in the face of the Royal African Committee's plans for a gold-hunting expedition.

Just as Tahir Shah's Timbuctoo was being released, the real life Timbuktoo in Mali was being overrun by Islamist rebels, bent on destroying the city's real treasures: its UNESCO World Heritage buildings, and perhaps its priceless manuscripts.  Tahir Shah appeared on the BBC to condemn these acts of cultural barbarism.

I was provided with a complimentary e-book version of Timbuctoo, my first experience reading a book on something other than paper.  And I must say that the electronic page-turning was fun, though I still much prefer reading a "book," in the tangible sense of the word.  Here is a link to the official Timbuctoo site, with excerpts and plenty of background material.

 

From The Narrative of Robert Adams, TALIM research library

Gerald Loftus

 

What the Africanistas Saw Across El Estrecho de Gibraltar

... they saw Africa.

Notes from a trip across the Strait.

Well, of course they saw Africa: every primary school geography student knows that the Strait of Gibraltar (or, as they say north of the water, el Estrecho de Gibraltar) separates the continents of Europe and Africa.

But Spain's Africanistas were not academic "Africanists" - they were the officers of the Army of Africa, of which Dr. Francisco J. Romero Salvadó writes in his review of Sebastian Balfour's book Deadly Embrace: Morocco and the Road to the Spanish Civil War:

Balfour portrays convincingly the quasi-surreal world dominated by terror, alienation, corruption and unabated warfare which the Army of Africa inhabited. For the recruits, Morocco was a meaningless nightmare in which fear for their lives, anxiety to return home and appalling living conditions went together. However, for the Africanista officers of either the native-led troops or Regulares and the Foreign Legion, the Moroccan campaigns became the crucial part of their upbringing. Indeed, most Africanistas would have subscribed to Franco’s words: 'Without Africa, I can scarcely explain myself’.

Our photo above, taken from the lovely Spanish town of Tarifa, underscores the reality of the 14 kilometers which separate the two continents.  Though we look out across the Strait from Tangier and know that Spain and Europe are there, it was a revelation to see, as we did during our short Aïd al-Adha break, Africa looming up beyond the waters from the Spanish side.

So back to Spain and the Africanistas.  We've touched on Spain's Moroccan adventure before, most recently in our piece on the Lafayette Escadrille in the Rif War in the 1920s, and earlier in Caitlyn Olson's piece on Moroccans On Both Sides in Spain's Civil War.  The Africanistas spent their formative military years in the former, and came to power with their leader Franco in the latter.

Today, the competition across the Strait is more commercial, with the night lights of the new port of Tangier-Med beckoning to the incessant maritime traffic - "Come here, don't get stuck in Algeciras."  By the looks of the lineup of ships awaiting space in Algeciras Bay (photo below, taken from atop the Rock of Gibraltar), Tangier Med (a) might entice ship owners with lower demurrage charges for shorter offshore waiting periods or (b) is 14 kilometers too far south from where the ships want to dock: Europe.

   If Spain still has Africanistas, they are more akin to Africanists elsewhere, people who are more interested in culture than in conquest.  Like the Fundación Tres Culturas, which promotes understanding among the three main religions across the Mediterranean, an echo of the days when al-Andalus represented the ideal of tolerance of the diverse cultures that made up Moorish Spain.

Gerald Loftus

His Emancipation From Slavery Would Be Agreeable To Morocco's Emperor

Note: In our continuing series of posts touching on the long history of Moroccan-American relations, we reproduce below the text of a passport issued to the "Prince Among Slaves," Abd al Rahman Ibrahima Sori.  Passports in those days were not what we think of today; they were basically safe conduct letters.

The President at whose orders the passport was issued was John Quincy Adams, a tireless opponent of slavery, and the Secretary of State who signed it was Henry Clay (below photo of Clay's signature from Prince Among Slaves website).

I was not aware of the intervention of the Moroccan sultan to free Muslim slaves in America until reading Jonathan Curiel's excellent article in Saudi Aramco World Magazine in April 2010.

Prince Among Slaves, Terry Alford's 1977 book, was made into an award-winning film (whose website provides excellent historic background on slavery and Muslim slaves in America).  The book provides the text of Ibrahima's passport, which will become part of an exhibit here at the TALIM museum.

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                                                                Department of State, Washington, 17^th January 1829

            The President of the United States, having been informed that the bearer hereof, Abduhl Rahhahman, was held in a state of slavery by a citizen of the United States, that he was of Moorish descent, and a person of much consideration in his native country of Africa, and that his emancipation from slavery would be very agreeable to the Emperor of Morocco, the undersigned Secretary of State of the United States was directed by the President, to adopt measures for the liberation of the before-mentioned Moor, Abduhl Rahhahman, and for his transportation to his family and connections and native country.  His manumission was accordingly procured from the citizen of the United States who held him as a slave, and he came to this City, at the public expense, last spring.  It was the President’s intention to have him transported to Tangier, to be delivered to the Emperor of Morocco, but as Abduhl Rahhahman prefers going to the American Colony of Liberia, on the coast of Africa, from whence he expects to be able to reach his relations, the President yields to his desire, and accordingly he proceeds to Norfolk, in company of his wife, to obtain, at the expense of the United States, a vessel chartered by the American Colonization Society, which is preparing to sail for Liberia, about the 20^th of this month.

            In testimony of the foregoing I have hereunto set my hand and affixed the Seal of the Department of State this 17^th day of January, in the year of our Lord 1829.

                                                                                    H. Clay

Gerald Loftus

New York #1 - Tangier Number Two

It's official: Lonely Planet has ranked the World's Top Ten Cities for 2011, and this city on the tip of Africa has made it to runner-up position, just after the Big Apple.  Here's what they say:

From its extraordinary position perched on the northwestern-most tip of Africa, Tangier looks in two directions: one face towards Spain and Europe, and the other into Africa. The ‘white city’ announces a culture excitingly different from that of its close cousins across the water. With the recent arrival of a new city governor, the town beach now sparkles, the hustlers are off the streets and even the taxi drivers are polite. A stylish new Tangier is being created with a dynamic arts community, renovated buildings, great shopping and chic new restaurants.

While we locals appreciate the plug, the hype might have gone a bit overboard, especially that bit about the hustlers.  But there is a definite "buzz" about Ibn Battuta's home town.

Local Woman Hits Big Time

Another bit of news is the selection of Yto Barrada, Tangier woman of culture (Cinémathèque, photographer, educator), as Deutsche Bank's Artist of the Year 2011.  Yto, who was interviewed the other day on Tangier's international radio "Médi 1," was modest about her achievement, but passionate about her devotion to cinema and the visual arts.

I knew we were fortunate to have the Cinémathèque, which shows classics, new releases, and documentaries, a 5-minute walk from the Legation.  What I didn't know was what a rare institution this is on the south side of the Med.  We are very happy for Yto, and see this prize as just recognition of her talents.

Tangier rules!

(Strait of Gibraltar image: NASA)

Gerald Loftus

A Ghanaian's Black Friday On the Tip of Africa

"Ghana's Fairytale Ends..." was how the Reuters dispatch from Accra described the letdown ("the silence of the vuvuzelas") of Ghana's defeat last night at the hands of (or is it at the feet of?) Uruguay.  The Moroccan waiters at the Tangier restaurant were rooting for their fellow Africans, just like the Algerians were last week when Ghana eliminated the U.S. team.

But there was at least one Ghanaian in Tangier whose worries extended beyond his team's letdown.

Yesterday I was at one of many stops in the process of getting registered here as a resident, and it took me to the central police station's Office for Foreigners.  At some point, sitting on a bench, I realized that the man sitting next to me was a fellow Anglophone.  He was a Ghanaian, and he wasn't there to register to stay in Morocco.

It took me a few seconds to realize that he was in handcuffs, and through misty eyes, he told me that he had lost his passport, and here he was, a prisoner instead of getting assistance.  Well, it's hard to say if he was legit or not: thousands of sub-Saharan Africans trek across the desert to try their luck with the last 14 kilometers, the distance that separates this tip of Africa from the Promised Land - Spain and the European Union beyond.  Passports are often discarded to avoid identification, so that they can try and claim special hardship as asylum seekers from some war-torn country.  Spanish director Gerardo Olivares covered the subject with great humanity in his film 14 Kilómetros.

I'll never know what became of my bench mate.  In the film, Africans risk life, limb, and life's savings crisscrossing the closed Algerian-Moroccan land border, not to speak of the risks of Sahara and Mediterranean, both of which can and do end the journey for many in an anonymous grave, far from home.  With luck, the Ghanaian will simply be deported, to try his luck again.  Dedicated economic migrants rarely give up.

Gerald Loftus

Ghanaian Eliminated from European Dream

"Ghana's Fairytale Ends..." was how the Reuters dispatch from Accra described the letdown ("the silence of the vuvuzelas") of Ghana's defeat last night at the hands of (or is it at the feet of?) Uruguay.  The Moroccan waiters at the Tangier restaurant were rooting for their fellow Africans, just like the Algerians were last week when Ghana eliminated the U.S. team.

But there was at least one Ghanaian in Tangier whose worries extended beyond his team's letdown.

Yesterday I was at one of many stops in the process of getting registered here as a resident, and it took me to the central police station's Office for Foreigners.  At some point, sitting on a bench, I realized that the man sitting next to me was a fellow Anglophone.  He was a Ghanaian, and he wasn't there to register to stay in Morocco.

It took me a few seconds to realize that he was in handcuffs, and through misty eyes, he told me that he had lost his passport, and here he was, a prisoner instead of getting assistance.  Well, it's hard to say if he was legit or not: thousands of sub-Saharan Africans trek across the desert to try their luck with the last 14 kilometers, the distance that separates this tip of Africa from the Promised Land - Spain and the European Union beyond.  Passports are often discarded to avoid identification, so that they can try and claim special hardship as asylum seekers from some war-torn country.  Spanish director Gerardo Olivares covered the subject with great humanity in his film 14 Kilómetros.

I'll never know what became of my bench mate.  In the film, Africans risk life, limb, and life's savings crisscrossing the closed Algerian-Moroccan land border, not to speak of the risks of Sahara and Mediterranean, both of which can and do end the journey for many in an anonymous grave, far from home.  With luck, the Ghanaian will simply be deported, to try his luck again.  Dedicated economic migrants rarely give up.

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This post first appeared in TALIMblog.

Diego Garcia: Freedom's Footprint, or Enduring Injustice?

Note: This article appears in the "Speaking Out" column of the June issue of the Foreign Service Journal, "The magazine for foreign affairs professionals" published by the American Foreign Service Association (AFSA).  I have wanted to write it ever since visiting Diego Garcia in 1989.

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In the last decades of the previous century, two isolated archipelagos continued to fly the Union Jack thousands of miles from the mother country, outposts for a handful of British citizens.  Located near strategic territory, these repositories for precious resources remained prized possessions even as the sun was setting on the rest of the empire.

In one of the archipelagos, the Falkland Islands, Britain went to war to eject enemy forces that claimed the territory.  In the other, the Chagos Islands, it welcomed friendly foreign troops, but exiled the islands’ inhabitants.

One can take the analogy between Diego Garcia (the principal island in the chain) and the Falklands too far, of course.  The foreign troops in the latter location only became the enemy in 1982, when a dictatorship sent them to grab the Malvinas, as Argentina still calls the Falklands.  And in the case of Diego Garcia, the United Kingdom was a full partner in making its territory available to the forces of its closest ally, the United States.

But the analogy, which has been made in the British press and courts, contains one very disturbing kernel of truth.  In the Falklands, the inhabitants are white, with implicit rights to protection as British citizens -- while the inhabitants of the Chagos Islands, descendants of African slaves, were black, and weren’t even told that they were British citizens when they were summarily removed from the islands.  And why were they evicted?  Because the United States wanted all the islands depopulated.

A Lie Comes to Life

We think of Diego Garcia – if we think of this remote mid-Indian Ocean outpost at all – as a reassuring sandy aircraft carrier of an archipelago, ready to launch planes on missions to the Middle East or to Southwest Asia.  That role was conceived in the 1960s, when London agreed to lease Diego Garcia to Washington.  And if both parties are amenable to a renewal of the lease prior to 2016, Diego Garcia might well continue to serve its strategic role for the rest of the 21st century.

But the original agreement was based on a lie that wrecked the lives of the families who had been living on the islands for generations: that the islands were uninhabited.  To make this fiction a reality, the inhabitants of Diego Garcia and the other Chagos Islands – known as Chagossians or Ilois  – within the British Indian Ocean Territory had to go.