French Imperialism In North Africa Essay

Women in North Africa faced many pre-existing challenges because of their gender but their hardships were amplified as a result of French imperialism. France took over three North African countries, Algeria, Tunisia, and Morocco. The struggle began in 1830 with France’s invasion of Algeria (which eventually also led to the conquest of Tunisia ad Morocco) and lasted over fifty years until their liberation in 1956 and 1962. North African men often saw women in these countries as inferior, thus the French took advantage of their perspective to break down women’s roles and add to their harsh treatment. French colonization further defined Women’s subservient position in society by prohibiting them to have a real education and this prevented women

This illustrates that the actual learning that women did in school dealt with small things such as household skills instead of core academic concepts. The French felt it was more useful for women to learn how to embroider, and this set in the ideal that women were confined to the house and only good for small, meaningless tasks. The source goes on to talk about how the French continued to inhibit Women’s opportunities.
Instead of encouraging education for Arab girls in Algeria, the French administration has closed the schools that existed prior to the [1830] conquest, allowed conservative Muslim men to shut down those schools for girls that were established after the conquest, and thus the capital of Algeria has not had a single [academic] school for native girls for thirty-five years. When the rector of the Academy of Algiers, Monsieur Jeanmarie, opened a class where young Arab girls could receive education, these girls proved so prodigiously intelligent that the French became alarmed. The French said that these young girls when they graduate from school would no longer want to stay at home in