By Georgia Jackson, College of Arts and Sciences
When Heide Castañeda, a professor of anthropology at the University of South Florida, travels to Morocco — a destination she frequents up to six times each year — it isn’t to visit Africa’s largest mosque or one of the historical kasbahs. Castañeda, a migration scholar, is there to study and understand the experience of the indigenous Amazigh people — the focal point of her new book, forthcoming from New York University Press.
Heide Castañeda
"Usually when we talk about indigenous groups, they’re minority groups. And in this case, in Morocco, they’re actually the majority population,” Castañeda said. “Depending on the estimates, up to 70 percent of Moroccans may have Amazigh heritage.”
Despite that fact, less than half of the 38 million people who live in Morocco speak Tamazight, the language indigenous to the Amazigh. Even fewer use Tamazight to read and write.
“Their language has been marginalized over time,” said Castañeda, who estimates around 45 percent of Moroccans speak Tamazight. “It makes for a unique case because they are actually not a minority.”
This relationship — between heritage and language — is something Castañeda pays close attention to when she’s back home in the U.S., too, where a significant number of Amazigh immigrants live in cities like New York, Boston, Chicago and Orlando.
“We see indigeneity becoming an important feature of migration,” Castañeda said. “But there are no statistics about indigenous Amazigh people in the U.S., since government sources don’t ask that question.”
Castañeda's findings — on everything from contemporary Amazigh music to gender and religion — will appear in a forthcoming book that, according to Castañeda, offers new spin on familiar migrant narratives and new insights on the immigrant experience in the U.S.
“They don’t fit neatly into preexisting racial, ethnic and immigrant categories in the U.S.,” said Castañeda. "They are African, but do not adhere to dominant assumptions about Blackness in America. They are predominantly Muslim and speak Arabic, but are not Arab.
“It’s a unique circumstance that they navigate on a daily basis.”
Dr. Heide Castañeda is a professor of anthropology at the University of South Florida. Her research areas include critical border studies, political and legal anthropology, medical anthropology, migration, migrant health and citizenship. Her book on Amazigh in the U.S. and how indigeneity is remade in the diaspora will be available next year from New York University Press.