Draft:Malek Alloula's The Colonial Harem (1986)

In The Colonial Harem, (translated by Myrna Godzich and Wlad Godzich) author Malek Alloula reads Algerian postcards through a post-colonial, feminist lens. The book consists of ten chapters, each focusing and examining a different cliche of the postcard and how it brings the metaphor of the harem to life. Instead of using texts as evidence, Alloula analyzes the formal qualities of the postcards as evidence of the way France systematically devalued Algerian society in order to justify their colonial involvement. Alloula’s criticism of the photographer, a more general idea rather than a specific person, and his studio offers a different perspective to the systematic French colonization of Algeria.

French Algeria
French Algeria describes the period of time, starting in 1830, where Algeria was under French colonial rule. It was fully annexed as a part of France, and therefore became a common destination for European colonists.

Postcards
The postcards featured in The Colonial Harem fall within the Golden Age of Postcards which spans from 1890 to 1915. This time period aligned with the colonial presence of multiple European powers in Africa. Colonial officials, missionaries, and professional photographers were the main producers of postcard images of African colonies. Since postcards, as a medium, work to form visual identities of locations for an outsider audience, colonial postcards functioned as propaganda crafted by colonizers to justify their presence and involvement in foreign nations.

Book synopsis
=== Introduction === The introduction is written by Barbara Harlow. She contextualizes the relationship between France and Algeria through depictions of women in the 1966 film The Battle of Algiers. She explains that the postcards collected and examined by Malek Alloula illustrate the colonial oppression and fetishization of Algerian women in the over century-long occupation leading up to the Algerian War for Independence.

=== Chapter 1: The Orient as Stereotype and Phantasm === Alloula positions the postcard as a form of photography which is rooted in colonialism. This is because the postcard has the ability to spread an image and identity of a place which is catered to the tourists, soldiers, and colonial powers. He states that his goal with this book is to turn the photographic gaze of the colonizers back onto themselves.

=== Chapter 2: Women from the Outside: Obstacle and Transparency === Alongside postcards of veiled Algerian women, Alloula posits that these women have a similar gaze to that of a camera or photographer because all of their body is obscured aside from their eyes. He suggests that photographers' obsession with capturing veiled women in colonial postcards is in part due to their desire to impose power over these women who deny photographer’s entitlement to a voyeuristic gaze.

=== Chapter 3: Women’s Prisons === This chapter deals with the motif of women photographed with iron bars which imply the prison of the harem. Alloula makes clear that these women are models and these locations are sets, both of which work to construct an image of Algeria that caters to western fantasies and voyeurism.

=== Chapter 4: Women’s Quarters === Alloula argues that postcards differ from other forms of photography because they are meant to be interpreted as a reflection of reality, not an artistic or constructed image. However, he points out that the genre of Algerian women within their “quarters” is an exception to this claim of realism, because these photographs are so staged that the viewer is forced to consider the photographer’s position in the space.

=== Chapter 5: Couples === Attention is brought to the motif of couples within these colonial postcards. Alloula explains that these pairs are not at all representative of Algerian conceptions of family units at the time, and are instead formulated to illustrate justifications for colonialism in a visual language familiar to the French audience. In these completely staged photographs, western family units are constructed with young models burdened with children in order to imply a level of instability which positions the Algerian people as deserving of colonial occupation.

=== Chapter 6: The Figures of the Harem: Dress and Jewelry === In this chapter, Alloula writes about how the women in the postcards were styled. The jewelry and clothes themselves are accurate separately, but the combination of them is where the photographer gets it wrong. By attempting to convey wealth, the photographer reveals the falsity of his postcard. Alloula also highlights who the audience is in this chapter, pointing to tourists, military persons, and colonizers.

=== Chapter 7: Inside the Harem: The Rituals === Alloula examines the fictional harem that the photographer creates in this chapter. As a woman-only space, the photographer must replicate the harem in his studio or harem-resembling area, which is a form of deception. The subsequent postcards tell the audience that the photographer has been let in, infiltrating the Algerian woman’s space as a participant. There are three motifs that are common in these postcards: the coffee ceremony (kaoua), the hookah, and the odalisque.

=== Chapter 8: Song and Dance: Almehs and Bayaderes === Building off of the previous chapter, Chapter 8 also examines rituals within the harem. Alloula writes about how the figures perform for the photographer in this series, rather than an audience. The figures in the images are mimicking dance, but the slow shutter speed of cameras at the time reveal how they are standing frozen rather than caught in motion. This series highlights the hierarchy of colonization and how aspects of Algerian life were eroticized in postcards. Alloula once again points to the postcard’s staged nature and how its image is a reduced representation of real life.

=== Chapter 9: Oriental Sapphism === In this chapter, Alloula looks at sapphic imagery and why it was a common trope in postcards. The photographer’s idea of the harem includes the fact that it is a woman-only space and that this leads to sexual frustration, therefore sapphism is a theme he must include in his postcards. The production of these images was purely for the audience and its implied eroticism is easy to read. The overall image contributes to the generalization of Algerian women.

=== Chapter 10: The Colonial Harem: Images of a Suberoticism === Chapter 10 focuses on breasts in the colonial postcard. Alloula describes three different portrayals the photographer uses. First, the “artistic variant,”where sheer fabric covers the breasts. Second is the “roguish distraction,” in which one breast or both are uncovered but the model is still clothed. Third is the “display,” where all clothing is removed and there are few accessories. The positioning of the photo is also intentional, often taken from the waist or hips up to keep the focus on the breasts. Moving to a broader examination, Alloula labels the postcard as an artistic means of expressing violence under colonization. Tying back into themes from Chapter 1, this last chapter reiterates the idea that the postcards are a form of compensation for the photographer and that they welcome colonists into Algerian society through their staged imagery.

Publication details
Original French version, Le Harem Colonial: Images d’un sous érotisme, published in 1981 by Editions Slatkine, Genève-Paris.