Albert Memmi 1920 – 2020
Albert Memmi (1920 – 2020) was a Tunisian-French philosopher of the Contemporary era, associated with Postcolonial Philosophy.
Albert Memmi was a Tunisian-French Jewish philosopher, novelist, and essayist whose The Colonizer and the Colonized became one of the founding texts of postcolonial thought, with a preface by Jean-Paul Sartre. Drawing on his own experience as a Tunisian Jew educated in French institutions, he reconstructed the colonial relation as a deformation of both the colonizer, who must accept privileges he cannot justify, and the colonized, whose self-image is shaped by the gaze of the master. His later Portrait of a Jew, The Liberation of the Jew, and Decolonization and the Decolonized extended his analysis to antisemitism, Jewish identity, and the difficult condition of postcolonial states.
Key facts
- Nationality
- Tunisian-French
- Era
- Contemporary
- Movements
- Postcolonial Philosophy
Selected quotes
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Attributed to Albert Memmi:
“The colonizer cannot stop himself from being a colonizer; the colonized cannot easily stop himself from being colonized.”
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Attributed to Albert Memmi:
“Privilege is a deformation of the privileged.”
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Attributed to Albert Memmi:
“Decolonization is not the end of the colonial relation; it is the beginning of its long working out.”
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Attributed to Albert Memmi:
“The Jew is the object of the gaze of others; that gaze must be answered, not avoided.”
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Attributed to Albert Memmi:
“Liberation is achieved twice, once in the world and once in the self.”
Frequently asked about Albert Memmi
- When did Albert Memmi live?
- Albert Memmi was born in 1920 and died in 2020.
- Where was Albert Memmi from?
- Albert Memmi was a Tunisian-French philosopher of the Contemporary era.
- What philosophical movements is Albert Memmi associated with?
- Albert Memmi was associated with Postcolonial Philosophy.
- What was Albert Memmi known for?
- Albert Memmi was a Tunisian-French Jewish philosopher, novelist, and essayist whose The Colonizer and the Colonized became one of the founding texts of postcolonial thought, with a preface by Jean-Paul Sartre.
- How many quotes are attributed to Albert Memmi?
- There are 15 attributed quotations from Albert Memmi in the 1001Philosophers collection, organized by topic.