Reflections on Fieldwork in Morocco

“[…] I was forcing my way into the village through my official connections.”

Rabinow questions his assumption that Sidi Lahcen Lyussi residents should allow him to work there. Initially there is resistance to his work, but his connections through Ali eventually gain him entry. He feels like he is not welcome at first, though, since he “forced” his way in.

“[…] now that I was in the field, everything was fieldwork.”

As soon as Rabinow arrives in Sefrou, he wonders what doing fieldwork will actually entail. Although he has been promised it will be life changing, there is no specific guidance for what counts as fieldwork and what doesn’t.

“Colonialism was dying, and neocolonialism was taking its place.”

The end of colonial government in Morocco had come 10 years before Rabinow’s work. But that doesn’t mean colonialism had ended; it simply took another form, as seen in the descriptions of the entitled French teachers in Sefrou.

“Ibrahim had turned his position as an intermediary between the European and Moroccan communities into a profession.”

Possibly more than any other character, Ibrahim has perfected the art of shifting between Moroccan and French culture. This ability helps when he begins to show Rabinow around Sefrou, but his professionalism is a drawback in some regards. He has a packaged version of Morocco to present to a European audience, and Rabinow has difficulty discussing anything more deeply with him.

“I had gone into anthropology in search of Otherness. Meeting it on an experiential level was a shock which caused me to begin fundamental reconceptualization about social and cultural categories.”

Rabinow left for Morocco with the intellectual knowledge that he would be experiencing a different culture and that the Other was something to seek out in anthropology. He is still surprised when he actually begins to feel like the Other, especially in everyday, non-ritual life.

“One assumes in everyday life, when it goes smoothly, that people share what has been called a life-world—certain primary assumptions about the nature of the social world, about social personae, and about how events occur and more or less what they imply.”

Once Rabinow experiences firsthand how different Moroccan culture is from what he is familiar with, he realizes how much certain social norms are ingrained in his mind. Moroccans, even those exposed extensively to Western culture, occupy a different life-world than Rabinow. This doesn’t just mean they have different traditions or rituals; even basic facts of life are conceptualized differently than Rabinow is accustomed to.

“The fact that Ali was a descendant of a saint who spent a good part of his career opposing brotherhoods such as the Aissawa was not seen as a paradox.”

Ali is a descendant of Sidi Lahcen, but his religious and personal life do not align with the expectations of a standard member of the saintly lineage. To the American, his involvement as a healer in a mystical form of Islam opposed by Sidi Lahcen should be a conflict of interest. In Moroccan culture the paradox simply doesn’t exist; Ali’s heritage only furthers his abilities as a healer.

“Ritual certainly has its complexities, but they are of a different order from those more scattered, fragmentary, and partial orderings which give coherence to social life.”

When Rabinow attends the Aissawa night, he encounters ritualistic practices that are completely foreign to him. However, these practices are packaged into a distinct performance, whereas the unfamiliar experiences Rabinow has in everyday life in Morocco are harder to anticipate. Rituals can be defined and interpreted more easily that minor cultural differences.

“There is a sharp and clear differentiation made in Morocco between wives, who are to cook, have babies, and preserve the family honor, and women of pleasure.”

One of the first surprising things Rabinow encounters in Morocco is the acceptance of prostitution. Most men visit sex workers before getting married, and there is little viewed to be wrong with women working in the industry. However, once women leave sex work and get married, they are expected to transform into dutiful, honorable wives.

“My gestures were wrong, my language was off, my questions were strange, and interpersonal malaise was all too frequently the dominant mood, even after many months when some of the grossest differences had been bridged by repetition and habit.”

Although Rabinow and the villagers eventually get used to each other, Rabinow is still an outsider. Even as his Arabic improves, he is never able to fully bridge the divide and gain a full mutual understanding with the Moroccans. He will always be the Other.

“There is one [Moroccan] cultural conviction on which I never found neither hesitation or disagreement: the world is divided into Muslims and non-Muslims.”

Although informants vary in their level of piousness, Muslim versus non-Muslim is the core categorization of humans in Moroccans’ mind. Ben Muhammed explains that this comes down to the Koran; if a believer actually lives by the holy book, they will have a perspective on life that is unrelatable to non-Muslims.

“It was absorbing work, free from anxiety because the tasks were defined and progress was measurable.”

Rabinow’s first months in Sidi Lahcen Lyussi renew his belief that fieldwork is useful. He is rapidly collecting factual information. He will later revisit this work through a different lens.

“Material motives are never in disrepute in Morocco.”

With almost every informant, Rabinow has at least one moment in which he realizes that a material transaction is occurring of which he was unaware. To a Westerner, these transactions may seem crass. To Moroccans, bargaining and trading goods and services is a fully accepted part of life.

“The Moroccans never really understood why anyone would want to take a walk by himself.”

After Rabinow takes the dying woman to Sefrou in his car, he is upset. Malik is baffled when Rabinow chooses to take a walk alone. He asks Rabinow if he is drunk because he can’t imagine a sober person making this choice.

“Poverty does not carry the stigma in Morocco which it does in America. It indicates only a lack of material goods at the present time, nothing more.”

Rabinow wants to outline the economic spectrum of Sidi Lahcen Lyussi, but the Moroccans define poverty differently than he is accustomed to. Lack of wealth is not seen as something that defines a family; families who are truly impoverished are those who do not have a solid spiritual life and those who do not have a son who will inherit their family property and lineage.

“Whenever an anthropologist enters a culture, he trains people to objectify their life-world for him.”

To take part in anthropological work, informants must be trained in the methods that the researcher is using. This means pushing them to view themselves from the outside. Rabinow believes that “good” informants are marginalized people who are already able to do this more easily that those fully integrated into their own culture.

“These men’s perceptions were accurate; their future was not bright.”

After the fall of the French Protectorate, Sidi Lahcen Lyussi missed out on being the site for new Moroccan infrastructure. Apart from its small olive industry, the village has very little hope for the future. Many villagers plaintively ask Rabinow if he can find them jobs in France, even though they know he has no power to do so.

“An inverse ratio began to develop between time invested in specific questions and the accessibility of a response.”

As he is finishing his work, Rabinow panics. He feels he does not really understand certain aspects of village life and history. This is when he encounters Ali in the village and circumvents the taboo, knowing Ali will talk about anything.

“Malik had been presenting me with a sort of official discourse. Once Ali violated the text, the very story of discord and strife which the villagers had been repressing was re-enacted in a minor key.”

After Ali reveals the truth about the sultan’s exile, the floodgates of new information open. Rabinow feels somewhat guilty as he has reignited old feuds in a small way. He determines that this was necessary for his work, though.

“To those who claim that some form of this symbolic violence was not part of their own field experience, I reply simply that I do not believe them.”

To examine any culture on a deep level, an anthropologist must find a way to access information that is hidden. Doing this, Rabinow says, is psychological violence. It is also essential for anthropology, as it is the only way to explore cultures beyond the surface level.

“The bitter irony of this heathen foreigner stimulating them to ask questions about their own spiritual heritage was not lost on them.”

Rabinow discovers that the descendants of Sidi Lahcen know very little about their famous ancestor. Many are ashamed that it took the presence of an anthropologist for them to begin to consider their own places in life.

“Culture is interpretation.”

This is the core thought around which this book exists. Culture is not static, and people cannot be assumed to act one way because of their culture. Interpreting a culture doesn’t just mean studying how the people live; it also means delving into how they interpret their own lives.

“There is no ‘primitive.’ There are other men, living other lives.”

All anthropological subjects are humans. All humans have internal life worlds that differ from others. The idea of a “primitive” culture inherently implies that the members of this culture do not have free will.