Abstract
This paper aims at rendering each race its due and stand in the in-between space, where both the East and the West are exposed to criticism without turning the scale of one over the other through analyzing Brahim Chkiri’s Moroccan movie, Road to Kabul (2012). This road-movie is an attempt to take the positionality of neutrality as it is expressed through representing both le bon côté of Westerners and Arabs and their pejorative sides as well. The movie’s perception is based on dismantling the ideology of “generalization” that squeezes the definition of nations under the same umbrella. In this sense, the movie has called for redefining Arab boundaries as a way of avoiding lumping all Arabs under the same heading of stereotypical discourse, which confines them inside the borders of uncivilization and terrorism. Road to Kabul tries to nullify other part of the Arab nation, like Morocco, from this ideology of generalization as it criticizes the dichotomies or rather the hypocrisy of some Muslim people when pretending to implicate the teachings of Islam simply by enunciating some Islamic appearances, whereas, they commit a heinous crime of terrorizing people. These images of terrorist acts represented in Road to Kabul are not simply meant to support the ideological inclination about the "Third World" as being disseminated in colonial discourses, but it is a deciphering message to draw a boundary within Muslim and Arab nations themselves. In other words, the movie’s intention is to refrain discourses from the “curse ofgeneralization” through employing the assailant as Muslim and the victim as Muslim as well. By doing so, the movie criticizes both American policies and Jihadi organizations to furnish the ground to a new mode of representation that shows more compassion for humanity rather than races.
Keywords: Moroccan Cinema, Terrorism, Extremism, Stereotypes, Humanity, Coexistence.
Bio-Data:
Mounir Sanhaji, PhD in Cultural Studies (English Department). English teacher (Lycée Descartes - Rabat).Research interests: Cultural, Media and Postcolonial Studies. Recent publications: 1) Sanhaji M (2015) "The Subject and the State’s Media Control." J Pol Sci Pub Aff. 2)Sanhaji M (2016) "Arab Road to Uncertain Democracy". J. Rom. R. Pol.
Sc.& Inter. R. 3) Sanhaji M (2017) "Popular Culture and the Industrialization of Everyday Life." (Book Chapter - Cultural Perspectives). 4) Sanhaji M (2017) Contemporary Anglo-American Literature (BOOK). Participated in a conference in Fes about "Moroccan Image between Western Production and Arab Consumption”
