Disability in Moroccan Literature: Nabil in Au Pays, Tahar Ben Jelloun

Abstract

The present paper is an attempt to explore the representations of disability and People with Disabilities (PWD) in the Moroccan novel Au Pays by focusing on one character, Nabil, a trisomic child, and exploring how he is seen through the lens of his society. Sometimes seen as a gift from God and other times as a burden, Nabil epitomizes other people with disabilities who live in societies as outcasts. The analysis showed that the exclusion of PWD is the result of the continuous association of disability with abnormality and the inability to understand and thus accept difference. This association eventually yields disabled societies, which further constribute the systematic exclusion of PWD.