Reimagining Gender and Nation in Androman: Patriarchal Hegemony and Alternative Masculinities in Moroccan Cinema

Abstract

This article examines Androman: De sang et de charbon (2012), directed by Az El Arab Alaoui, as a critical intervention in Moroccan cinematic representations of gender, patriarchy, and national belonging. Set in a geographically and politically marginalized Amazigh village in the High Atlas Mountains, the film narrates the story of a young girl forced to live as a boy in order to survive within a rigid patriarchal system. Drawing on postcolonial theory, feminist and queer theory, masculinity studies, and spatial analysis, this study argues that Androman exposes the fragility of hegemonic masculinity and articulates alternative ethical forms of masculinity from the margins of the nation-state. Through close textual and visual analysis, the article positions the film as a postnational cinematic text that critiques domination while imagining new possibilities of gendered and national belonging within contemporary Moroccan cinema.