Paper short abstract:

Ghomara and Senhaja de Sraïr Berbers, located to the west of the Tarifit-speaking Rif, are similarly neglected when dealing with Berberophone areas in Morocco. Both are key sites in which to investigate the Spanish colonial practice regarding minority Berber languages.

Paper long abstract:

In present times, Ghomara Berber is spoken in an area of the north of Morocco near to the cities of Tetouan and Chefchaouen, while Senhaja de Sraïr Berber is spoken around the urban locality of Ketama, in the Rif. Both territories were under Spanish Protectorate until 1956.

Both languages, Ghomara and Senhaja de Sraïr, are frequently classified as endangered dialects of Berber. Interestingly, they are similarly neglected when dealing with the description and analysis of Berberophone rural areas in Morocco.

Ghomara and Senhaja de Sraïr are located to the west of the Tarifit-speaking Rif, in the predominantly Arabophone western part of the Rif chain. Most past and contemporary linguistic studies point out that Ghomara and Senhaja de Sraïr are very different from other Riffian Berber dialects. Thus, both can be considered key sites in which to investigate the Spanish colonial practice regarding minority Berber languages and cultures.

In this paper, I argue that there are some factors and features which are specific to the Spanish management of Berber-speaking populations in the territories under its rule. This paper turns to the understudied question of how Riffian Berberophone populations were represented in Spanish texts of the colonial period. It also analyses, through the cases presented, the processes of definition of linguistic, sociolinguistic and ethnic categories and their entanglement with the complex cultural milieu of the Moroccan Rif.