Images, Memory, History

The book "Image, Memory, History: Iconographic Representations in Algeria and the Maghreb", coordinated by Hassan Remaoun and Mohamed Bensalah, compiles the proceedings of the international conference organized by the CRASC in Oran in 2004. The volume offers an interdisciplinary reflection on the role of images in the construction of collective memory and historical representations in the Maghreb, particularly during the colonial period and the Algerian War of Independence. The authors demonstrate that images - photographs, posters, postcards, engravings, films, paintings, and audiovisual documents - do not merely serve as simple illustrations of history, but function as genuine historical sources carrying political, ideological, and cultural meanings. The work emphasizes that colonial iconography extensively contributed to disseminating and legitimizing the colonial imaginary in France and Europe through stereotyped representations of Maghrebi societies. In particular, the book analyzes how colonial powers used the image as an instrument of propaganda. Posters, ethnographic postcards, colonial cinema, and anthropological photographs served to produce an exotic, hierarchized, and often distorted vision of colonized populations. The various contributions highlight the manufacturing mechanisms behind these representations as well as their lasting impact on contemporary perceptions of Algeria, the Maghreb, and Maghrebi immigration.