Fatima Sadiqi

Senior Humanities Research Fellow

Affiliation: NYU Abu Dhabi
Education: MA, Essex University; PhD, Essex University

fs2946@nyu.edu

Research Areas: Linguistics, feminism, gender studies, Maghreb, Amazigh

Download Fatima Sadiqi’s CV

 

About Fatima

Fatima Sadiqi is a professor of Linguistics and Gender Studies. She taught at Sidi Mohamed Ben Abdellah University (Fes, Morocco), Harvard University, Oldenburg University (Germany), Pomona University (USA), University of Zurich (Switzerland), and Hamad Bin Khalifa University (Qatar). She is a linguist and women’s studies scholar specializing in ancient and modern Amazigh language and culture in the Maghreb. Her research has focused on the cultural history of the Amazigh people, gender, indigeneity, orality, and the intersections between extremism, migration, political economy, and current transformations in the Maghrebi women’s rights.

Her latest book, Women and the Codification of the Amazigh Language (Lexington Books, 2024) traces back the origin of the Amazigh alphabet Tifinagh to the prehistoric ancient signs that women wove on rugs. This book examines ways of re-imagining the history of North Africa and the role of women in it. This book shows the importance of investigating Amazigh women’s weaving not only as art but also as a source of knowledge production. Her upcoming book, Daesh Ideology and Women Rights in the Maghreb (Edinburgh University Press, 2025) examines Daesh ideology as a collective response to a homegrown modernity in the Maghreb. Focusing on the disillusionment and uncertainty that accompanied progress in women’s legal rights and male unemployment, the book theorizes Daesh ideology as typically gender-based in the sense that women’s physical presence is a sine canon condition for the existence of Daesh as a global ‘pure’ state/Ummah (Islamic nation), which would ensure the ‘purity’ (pure Muslims), sacralize ‘motherhood’ (for the grooming of ‘pure Muslims’), sustain male guardianship (for social control), and suppress any legal reforms or rights (seen as ‘Western pollution’). Centering gender as the sine canon foundation of Daesh ideology and highlighting the Maghreb as a case study constitute the main contributions of this book. Most of book’s insights are drawn from a combination of life history narratives and ethnographic observations.

Dr Sadiqi also published Grammaire du berbère (L’Harmattan, 1997), considered the first grammar of the Amazigh language written by a native speaker, Women, Gender and Language in Morocco (Brill, 2003), considered the first book on language and gender in North Africa. Other books written by Dr Sadiqi include Women Writing Africa. The Northern Region (The Feminist Press, 2009), Women and the Production of Knowledge in the Mediterranean (Routledge 2013), and Moroccan Feminist Discourses (Palgrave Macmillan, 2014). While orality and the Amazigh dimension constitute a central part of the 2009 anthology, the 2014 book highlights the absence of the Amazigh voice in the mainstream feminist discourses in Morocco, a task she undertook while a full year Fulbright-in-Residence scholar (2013-14) at the department of Ethnic and Women’s Studies, California State University of Pomona.

Dr Sadiqi’s work has been supported by numerous prestigious awards and fellowships from Harvard University, The Woodrow Wilson Center, the Rockefeller Foundation, and Fulbright.

 

Select Publications

Single-authored Books

Sadiqi, Fatima. Women and the Codification of the Amazigh Studies. Lexington Books. 2024.

Sadiqi, Fatima. Moroccan Feminist Discourses. Palgrave Macmillan, 2014.

Sadiqi, Fatima. Women, Gender, and Language in Morocco. Brill, 2003.

Sadiqi, Fatima. Grammaire du Berbère. L’Harmattan, 1997.

Edited Books

Sadiqi, Fatima. Sociology of Language. Arabic and Amazigh Studies. Languages and Linguistics. International Journal of Linguistics and Society, 2019.

Sadiqi, Fatima. Women’s Movements in the Post-‘Arab Spring’ North Africa. Palgrave Macmillan, 2016.

Sadiqi, Fatima. Women and Knowledge in the Mediterranean.  Routledge, 2013.

Sadiqi, Fatima. Femmes Marocaines et Leurs Droits en Islam. Mohammédia: Fédala.

Sadiqi, Fatima. Feminist Movements: Origins and Orientations. Sidi Mohamed Ben Abdellah University Publications, 2000. 

Co-Edited Books

Sadiqi, Fatima. Oxford Encyclopedia of African Women’s History, Oxford University Press, 2022.

Sadiqi, Fatima and Moha Ennaji. Women in the Middle East and North Africa: Agents of Change. Routledge, 2010.

Sadiqi, Fatima, Amira Nouaira, Azza El Khouly, and Moha Ennaji.Women Writing Africa. The Northern Region. The Feminist Press, 2009. (This anthology was translated into French as Des Femmes Ecrivent L’Afrique and published by Karthala, 2013.)

Sadiqi, Fatima, Margot Badran and Linda Rachidi. Language and Gender in the Arab World. Languages and Linguistics. Imprimerie Fédala, 2002.

Peer-Reviewed Journal Articles

Sadiqi, Fatima. “Language and Gender in North Africa: Contextualizing an Emerging Discipline.” Gender and Language Journal 15, no. 4 (2021): 591–602.

Sadiqi, Fatima. “Women’s Perceptions of Islam in Today’s Morocco.” Journal of Feminist Scholarship 11 (Fall 2016).

Sadiqi, Fatima. “Emerging Amazigh Feminist Non-governmental NGOs.” Journal of Middle East Women’s Studies 12, no. 1 (2016): 122-125.

Sadiqi, Fatima. “Language and Gender in Morocco.” Journal of the African Language Teachers Association 9 (Spring 2007): 113-142.

Sadiqi, Fatima. “Gender in Arabic.” 2006. The Brill Encyclopedia of linguistics.

Sadiqi, Fatima. “Women and Linguistic Space in Morocco.” Women and Language XXVI, no. 1 (Spring 2003): 35-43.

Sadiqi, Fatima. “The Place of Berber in Morocco.” International Journal of the Sociology of Language 123 (1997): 7-21.

Book Chapters

Sadiqi, Fatima. “The Gender Debate in Modern Morocco.” 2025. In Mohammed Hashas (ed), Contemporary Moroccan Thought: On Philosophy, Theology, Society, and Culture. Leiden: Brill.

Sadiqi, Fatima. “Amazigh Women’s Carpet Designs: An Archive that Continues to Grow” (Under Review).

Sadiqi, Fatima. “Constructing North Africa: The Role of Berber Women.” 2022. In Nabil Boudraa and Joseph Krausse (eds.), Women and Resistance in the Maghreb. London: Routledge.

Sadiqi, Fatima. “Women and the Codification and Stabilization of the Arabic Language.” 2020. In Helena Sanson and Wendy Ayres-Bennet (eds). Women in the History of Linguistics. Distant and Neglected Voices. London: Oxford University Press.

Sadiqi, Fatima. “The Genesis of Gender Studies in Morocco”. 2020. In Rita Stephan and Mounira Charrad (eds). Women Rising. In and Beyond the Arab Spring. New York: New York University Press.

Sadiqi, Fatima. “The Big Absent in the Moroccan Feminist Movements: The Berber Dimension.” In Anna Maria Di Tolla and Ersilia Francesca (eds.), Emerging Actors in Post-Revolutionary North Africa. Berber Movements: Identity, New Issues and New Challenges. STUDI MAGREBINI, N. S. Vol. XV, tomo II, 2016-2017, Università di Napoli “L’Orientale”, Napoli, 2017.   

Sadiqi, Fatima. “The Center: A New Post-Arab Spring Space for Women’s Rights.” In Fatima Sadiqi (ed.), Women’s Movements in the Post- “Arab Spring” North Africa. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2016.

Sadiqi, Fatima. “Berber and Language Politics in the Moroccan Educational System.” In Moha Ennaji (ed.), Multiculturalism and Democracy in North Africa. London: Routledge, 2014.

Sadiqi, Fatima. “Oral Knowledge in Berber Women’s Expressions of the Sacred.” In Mukoma Wa Ngugi (ed.), Journal of Contemporary Thought. Global South Cultural Dialogue Project. Denton: Forum on Contemporary Theory and Louisiana State University, 2012.

Sadiqi, Fatima. “Language, Religion, and Power in Morocco.” 2009. In Hanna Herzog and Ann Braude (eds.), Untangling Modernities: Gendering Religion and Politics. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 259275.

Sadiqi, Fatima. “The Gendered Use of Arabic and Other Languages in Morocco.” 2007. In Elabbas Benmamoun (ed.), Perspectives on Arabic Linguistics XIX. Amsterdam: John Benjamins, 277-299.