At the outset of his 1983 book Maghreb pluriel, the Moroccan philosopher and novelist Abdelkebir Khatibi asks of his readers from the Maghreb, “who, among us – groups or individuals –, has undertaken the work essentially decolonizing in its global and deconstitutive import, with relation to the image that we hold of our exogeneous and endogenous domination?” [“Mais qui, parmi nous – groupes et individus –, a pris en charge le travail effectivement décolonisateur dans sa portée globale et déconstitutive de l'image que nous faisons de notre domination, exogène et endogène?”] (16–17). He breaks the ground for this essential work of decolonization in Maghreb pluriel, where he theorizes a literature, written in the language of the adversary, that will answer in that same language the aspirations and cultural specificity of the North African writer of French.

Khatibi proposes the creation of what he calls a pensée-autre, an “other-thought,” that will revolutionize and renew Maghrebian culture. That “other-thought,” set apart from the political discourses of our time, will seek to bring to light the misunderstanding existing between Europe and the Arab world (16).