The Semantic and Aesthetic Dimensions of Heritage in the Algerian Novel: A Study in Cultural Consciousness and the Aesthetics of Narrative Formation

Abstract

Heritage is considered one of the most important cultural components that have shaped Arab collective consciousness. In the Algerian context in particular, it carries meanings that go beyond the historical dimension to become a foundational element in both identity and writing. The Algerian novel found itself, since its emergence, facing a double challenge: building a modern narrative discourse capable of expressing reality, and at the same time restoring what had been confiscated from the collective memory during French colonialism. Thus, the return to heritage became both a cultural and aesthetic act through which the novel seeks to reconstruct the collective self and interrogate the past in order to illuminate the present.
The presence of heritage in the Algerian novel is not merely decorative or nostalgic; rather, it is—most often—a representation of a historical and aesthetic consciousness that reinterprets inherited traditions in light of modern questions about identity, belonging, modernity, and the Other. In this framework, the novels of Tahar Wattar, Waciny Laredj, Ahlam Mosteghanemi, Bashir Mufti, and others fall within a narrative project that seeks to restore memory through invoking religious, popular, Sufi, and historical heritage.
This article aims to reveal the semantic and aesthetic dimensions of heritage in the Algerian novel by analyzing the ways in which inherited traditions are employed in narrative discourse and clarifying their relationship with identity and modernity, relying on an approach that combines semiotic, cultural, and aesthetic analysis.