Reading Moroccan fiction in the digital age: Abdelouahed Stittou's novel Zohra Liza as a case study

Though extensive literature exists on Moroccan women in the public sphere, simultaneously less research explores the ways in which men 'do domesticity'. This paper will examine the ways urban Moroccan middle-class men interact within the private spheres of life, why they do so and what this means for gendered subjectivities in Morocco. For some urban middle-class Moroccan men, being a good father means taking an active role in his children's lives and taking care of them with the help of his wife. This is not true for all urban middle-class men, but most said that they were more willing to help with cooking, cleaning and childcare than their father had been: showing a generational shift. Additionally, most participants said that doing housework does not lower the level of a man's masculinity. Despite this, every Moroccan woman that I talked to does most reproductive labour around the house. This paper explores the dynamic nature of Moroccan masculinity across the life cycle: from early marriage, to being a father and being retired. This generational shift is happening due to the confluence of structural changes in education, socioeconomic class and occupation in addition to individuals' desire to be active fathers and husbands. I place urban Moroccan middle-class masculinities in context with Moroccan femininities and highlight both male and female voices. These findings are based on 17 months of ethnographic fieldwork in Rabat, Morocco including 53 semi-structured interviews and extensive participant observation.