Trajectories of mixed couples in Morocco: a meaningful discursive space for mixedness

Abstract

This article is based on the premise that the theoretical framework used by social sciences to describe mixed couples’ experiences is no longer adapted to contemporary situations of mobility. Most theories that have been developed to describe this experience use concepts that are not adapted to the present. By focusing on the paths taken by mixed couples in the context of Morocco, the thesis which is the subject of this article contributes to the development of a conceptual framework reflecting the phenomenon as it exists today. Furthermore, the originality of this project lies mainly in the fact that it offers a habitus discursif valorisant for mixed unions. Based on ethnographic field work that puts narratives of experience at the heart of its research methodology, this thesis also offers an ethnographic portrait of mixed couples in Morocco, a subject that has received little attention from social sciences. Mixed couples have been studied in the framework of this thesis from the angle of Fernandez’s (2002) prolonged travel metaphor, which has contributed to revitalizing the theoretical framework for looking at mixed couples. In the background of this thesis there is a reflection around the concept of ‘home’ whereby the self-creation of contemporary individuals negotiating their daily lives at the crossroads of different cultural references (as is the case for the participants of this research) is not necessarily synonymous with uprooting and fragmentation but rather incorporates ideas of attachment and personal continuity.