Can the Health Lockdown Help Ease the Siege on the Amazigh Language?

During a phone conversation, Dr. Hassan Banhakeia suggested to me that the health lockdown was benefiting certain parties, noting that he viewed the Amazigh language as one of the beneficiaries of the state of health emergency. I immediately grasped the essence of his idea, which I at once connected to an article he had previously published titled “Long Live Illiteracy.” This hypothesis struck me as deserving in-depth analysis and discussion, which is the focus of this commentary.

To understand the hypothetical causal link between the health lockdown and the potential gains for the Amazigh language, one must remember that this language had endured a very different kind of confinement long before Morocco was forced to impose COVID-19 restrictions in March 2020. Since independence, the Amazigh language has lived under a regime of confinement that restricted its freedom and movement, resulting in its systematic exclusion from schools, public administration, courts, and mosques. Barred from circulating freely within state institutions and public spaces, it was forced into a form of “social distancing” from public life and forced to wear a metaphorical “mask” to prevent it from expressing itself. Consequently, its everyday use declined as its scope of expression was curtailed and choked by this enforced lockdown and marginalizing distance that kept it away from the public sphere.

While the Arabic language received state authorization to enter schools, public administrations, courts, and mosques—along with unconditional access to state institutions—in contrast to the confinement, masking, and distancing imposed on the Amazigh language, these privileges do not make Arabic the true cause of the decline in Amazigh usage. One might assume that Arabic supplanted the Amazigh language by occupying the spaces where the latter was once active, but that is entirely mistaken. Why? Because ever since its introduction to Morocco, Arabic has operated within its own distinct domain: written text, rather than oral communication and daily conversation. Arabic lost its function as a language of everyday exchange long ago. Consequently, it did not expand its scope at the expense of the Amazigh language—whose field narrowed under enforced confinement—nor did it cause a massive shift among Moroccans from Amazigh to Arabic. Such a shift never occurred and never will, because no Moroccan—nor any native Arabic speaker elsewhere—uses Standard Arabic for spontaneous daily conversation. Thus, the linguistic Arabization driven by school-taught Arabic has absolutely no connection to the Arabization of Moroccans’ native mother tongue.

This linguistic Arabization of Amazigh speakers is therefore the work not of Standard Arabic, as I noted, but of Darija. The reality is clear: Darija was produced by the Amazigh people themselves as a way to abandon their original identity and adopt a substitute, under the mistaken belief that this vernacular was the Arabic that would make them Arabs. It reflects an identity shift from an authentic Amazigh heritage to a manufactured, assumed Arab identity. This resulted in a direct correlation between the spread of Darija and the decline of the Amazigh language. Following independence, the confinement imposed on the Amazigh language—its exclusion from schools, administration, judiciary, and mosques—allowed Darija to monopolize these public spheres. De facto, and without any constitutional or legislative mandate, Darija became the official oral language of the state, while the official status of Standard Arabic remained confined to the written domain. This dynamic fueled the rapid spread of Darija, forcing Amazigh speakers to abandon their language for this substitute. Even those who did not speak Darija were forced to learn it out of sheer necessity, as it became the sole language of oral communication in public institutions and spaces. It is precisely this mechanism that drove the progressive, ongoing erosion of the Amazigh linguistic domain.

State institutions, public services, government offices, and shared public spaces have thus served as effective mechanisms for restricting the Amazigh language, effectively “imposing” Darija as the state’s official spoken language, as I have noted. This reality is corroborated by comparing the 2004 and 2014 general population census figures, which show that the number of Amazigh speakers dropped by 440,027 between those two dates. Had the proportion of speakers remained stable relative to 2004, this group would still have been counted among Amazigh language users in 2014. Naturally, the 440,027 speakers lost by Amazigh were gained by Darija, which saw its user base increase by the exact same number (see “Statistical Proof That Darija Speakers Are Amazigh” in On Arabic, Darija, and Identity Gender Transition). Now suppose that government offices, schools, courts, mosques, and all public institutions, along with public spaces—everything that serves as an active hub for spreading Darija and transmitting its “contagion” to Amazigh speakers—were closed, travel was banned, and rural migration was halted due to a health lockdown, as occurred for three full months starting in March 2020. What would the result be? Darija would no longer enjoy the same opportunities to expand and spread at the expense of Amazigh. The lockdown would also bar Darija from entering schools, courts, public administrations, mosques, or any other public institution due to the suspension of administrative and economic activity. Yet, as I mentioned, Darija monopolizes these spaces as the official spoken language, while Amazigh is excluded. Although a decrease in Darija-based exchanges during lockdown would not necessarily cause Amazigh to grow or spread, it would at least stabilize the number of daily speakers within the family setting, preventing further decline. This stands in sharp contrast to normal circumstances, when Darija is used heavily as the official spoken language outside of lockdown. Under those normal conditions, Amazigh speakers are forced to use Darija to such an extent that many eventually adopt it within their own households and with their children, as is common among civil servants and teachers. Over time, this trend reduces the number of speakers even within families that previously spoke only Amazigh. Conversely, a health lockdown intensifies communication within Amazigh-speaking households: keeping everyone at home—parents and children alike—encourages the use of the mother tongue among family members who would otherwise rarely cross paths. For them, leaving home to work or study means, linguistically, stepping out of Amazigh and into Darija.

A three-month lockdown, such as the one Morocco experienced between late March and late June 2020, does not allow for any positive impact on Amazigh to be observed, nor does it suffice to test the validity of this hypothesis. On the linguistic scale under consideration, the effects of such a lockdown cannot manifest after three months, or even after three years. Such a process requires a much longer timeframe—at least a decade. For example, had there been an uninterrupted ten-year health lockdown between 2004 and 2014, Amazigh would not have lost the 440,027 speakers identified in the general census who shifted from Amazigh to Darija. Thus, a health lockdown declared for a decade or more (as an explanatory hypothesis rather than a realistic scenario) would actually have a beneficial effect on the Amazigh language. It would help loosen, or even lift, the social and institutional “lockdown” imposed upon it, contributing to the preservation of its speaker base and halting the continuous decline that threatens Amazigh with complete extinction.

It is obvious that a health lockdown lasting ten years or more is pure fiction—unfeasible and unworkable, as I have noted. Nevertheless, this hypothesis demonstrates that the Amazigh language would benefit from such a virtual lockdown, given that it has suffered a perpetual lockdown of its own since independence. In contrast, Darija enjoys complete freedom of movement and circulation, without constraints or conditions, without the slightest physical distancing from state institutions and public spaces, and without any mask to hinder its free and fluid expression. Consequently, when a health lockdown is imposed, Darija loses its freedom of movement, presence, and use across public administrations, markets, and public places, as these spaces become off-limits under the state of health emergency. The Amazigh language thus preserves its position without falling further behind in the face of Darija’s monopoly over communication opportunities that Amazigh should have enjoyed, were it not for the linguistic lockdown imposed on it since independence.

The purpose of imagining this virtual—if not fictitious—health lockdown that benefits the Amazigh language is to highlight its tragic plight. To prevent the number of its speakers from declining, it would paradoxically be more advantageous to declare a widespread, indefinite health lockdown in order to put Darija—which would also suffer under such a lockdown—on an equal footing with Amazigh, hitherto the sole victim. This is, of course, an unworkable and imaginary solution, as I have stressed. Furthermore, it relies on a negative, restrictive logic, much like illiteracy. While illiteracy admittedly preserves the survival of Amazigh, it represents a negative solution based on the absence of learning, as Professor Hassan Banhakeia explained in his article “Long Live Illiteracy.”

What truly benefits the Amazigh language, therefore, are positive rather than negative solutions. A positive solution does not consist of restricting Darija’s freedom during a health lockdown to prevent it from enjoying what remains forbidden to Amazigh due to its permanent lockdown status. Instead, it lies in completely lifting the lockdown on Amazigh so that it can circulate freely within state administrations, schools, institutions, mosques, and public spaces. This means removing all linguistic distancing between the language and these domains, and ending the mandatory masking that prevents it from expressing itself freely and fluently. This liberation of Amazigh by lifting the lockdown applies to its spoken use. However, for the language to enjoy complete freedom of movement, the lockdown affecting its written use as an official state language must also be lifted. This requires the widespread implementation of mandatory and standardized Amazigh language instruction. While oral use is sufficient to preserve Darija for political reasons—namely, that it functions as the state’s de facto official spoken language, as I have previously explained—spoken Amazigh alone is insufficient to protect and safeguard it. This, too, stems from political reasons: its political confinement and exclusion from state administrations and institutions. Hence, mandatory and standardized Amazigh instruction for its written use is essential to safeguarding its oral use.

However, such instruction, along with the lifting of the lockdown it requires, remains contingent upon political will. Yet this political will is still lacking. This reveals that the Amazigh language suffers from a single, foundational, and fundamental issue: the absence of political will to foster its development. It is from this absence that all other secondary problems arise regarding language, culture, identity, history, as well as its integration into education, the media, the justice system, and public administration…

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