ABSTRACT
Historically in the Arab countries only a small minority needed to have access to reading and writing: scholars, clerics, lawyers or solicitors. In Morocco, Darija (Moroccan Arabic) has gained a new role, reaching the public space and acquiring an unprecedented part in the Moroccan linguistic market. Darija had been confined to illiteracy, backwardness and incompatibility with education or modernity in people's mentalities. The chapter shows that nowadays we are past the stage of mere communication and we are entering the era of actual writing of long prose texts in Darija–mostly on the internet, be it on blogs, on long Facebook posts or in spoken word. The Arab world was composed of civilisations with oral traditions wielding different languages, but with great respect for the written which was linked to the monotheistic religions practiced by their inhabitants: Islam, Christianity and Judaism.
