The Halqa

Abstract

Although our emphasis so far has been upon the contributions of the storyteller as a key manifestation of a complex and interwoven performance culture in the Maghreb long before the advent of modern colonialism and its introduction of Western forms, we need now to turn our attention to a closely related phenomenon, the space in which the public storytellers performed. This traditional space, most commonly called al-halqa (the circle) is as central to the non-Western performance tradition as the storyteller himself, and similarly layered with cultural echoes and references. We have already mentioned the appropriation of such public spaces as markets and streets for their performances by both the Islamic and Tamazight storytellers. Joachim Fiebach, a pioneer scholar in the modern study of theatre in Africa, has noted the close connection between the performance and how it utilizes these appropriated spaces:

In oral societies, full-fledged theatre occurs when a single body’s facial expressions, gestures, and movements perform storytelling or praise singing, demarcating and creating a particular space and a specific physical relationship with onlookers; the creative cooperation of several bodies is at the core of more complex theatre forms.¹