Freedom in the Metropole: Najat El Hachmi’s Intertextual Dialogue with Erich Fromm in La hija extranjera

Abstract: Contemporary Amazigh-Catalan author Najat El Hachmi uses intertextual dialogue with the non-literary texts of sociologist and psychoanalyst Erich Fromm to challenge Western articulations of freedom as a universal. El Hachmi uses Fromm’s theories, particularly those in Escape from Freedom , to structure the psychological development of the protagonist in her novel, La hija extranjera (2015). This essay addresses El Hachmi’s intertextual dialogue with Fromm’s texts and how it draws parallels in the novel between historical, internal Western struggles and the author’s own pluricultural experience. Creating these parallels empowers El Hachmi to assert alternative articulations of freedom for young immigrants. Anthropologist Anna Tsing’s theory of friction provides a productive lens for analyzing El Hachmi’s exploration of the limitations of Western notions of freedom. Although El Hachmi generally applies Fromm’s theory faithfully, the novel’s central conflict calls into question his critique of urbanization: the very anonymity Fromm criticizes as a source of isolation in modern cities holds the key to the pluricultural protagonist’s quest for self-realization. El Hachmi posits an alternative articulation of freedom as it relates to hybrid identities. Ultimately, reconciliation with the multiple facets of one’s identity can lead to self-realization through what Fromm terms productive work . In the case of El Hachmi’s protagonist and the author herself, this creative work consists of giving voice to the subaltern.