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Abstract

This article offers an academic discussion of Ṭayyib Biyāḍ’s al-Šakhṣiyya al-Maġribiyya: Taʾṣīl wa-Taʾwīl (Tīṭwān, Editions Bāb al-Ḥikma, 2024), arguing that the book reframes a highly politicized identity question into a historical problem open to critical inquiry. The discussion highlights three main analytical operators: (1) space (al-insān wa-al-maǧāl) as a key to understanding circulation, borders, and social recomposition; (2) the longue durée as a safeguard against essentializing “personality”; and (3) the use of historical thresholds—baṣmat al-islām (the imprint of Islam) and ṣadmat al-ḥadāṯa (the shock of modernity)—together with the notion of al-izdiwāǧiyya (duality) to interpret contemporary tensions. In dialogue with classic methodological landmarks (Bloch, Braudel) on historical time and explanation, the article shows how Biad’s framework invites further empirical operationalization—through archives, social history, political economy, and language policy—so that “identity” can be treated not as an assertion but as a testable historical configuration.

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