Book Reviews and Short Notices

The question of community, and specifically Algerian female communities, informs a number of Assia Djebar's texts, as well as constituting an underlying concern in much criticism of her work. Yet, in many cases, such analyses do not align Djebar's communitarian representations with wider thinking on forms of community in philosophical and sociohistorical terms. An exception is found in the work of Jane Hiddleston, who fruitfully places Djebar's literary project within the context of a contemporary consideration of community, drawing on Jean-Luc Nancy's conceptions of operative and inoperative communities. Hiddleston's comprehensive account of Djebar's literary work does not include the author's only feature length film, La Nouba des femmes du Mont Chenoua (1978), which will be my subject here. This article presents an examination of La Nouba in terms of community and communitarian narratives, turning to Judith Butler to consider whether a different model of shared humanity might shed further light on the issues of unity and difference in the film .