Marriage and Personal Life
The legal age for marriage is eighteen for women, twenty-one for men. Many Algerian women are getting married and starting families at much older ages than they did under French Rule. Education, work commitment and changing social attitudes are the reasons for the change.
In 2010, the total fertility rate was 1.76 children born/woman. This is a drop from 2.41 in 2009 and 7.12 in the 1970s just after the Algerian War of Independence from France.
French colonizers actively opposed veiling because they viewed it as a symbol of national and religious values and beliefs that they sought systematically to undermine. In reaction to French pressure, Algerians stubbornly clung to the practice and after independence actually increased its use. Paradoxically, however, this development also resulted from the increased freedom enjoyed by women.
Read more about this topic: Women In Algeria
Famous quotes containing the words marriage, personal and/or life:
“Only one marriage I regret. I remember after I got that marriage license I went across from the license bureau to a bar for a drink. The bartender said, “What will you have, sir?” And I said, “A glass of hemlock.””
—Ernest Hemingway (1899–1961)
“The personal appropriation of clichés is a condition for the spread of cultural tourism.”
—Serge Daney (1944–1992)
““Maman”, said Annaïse, her voice strangely weak. “Here is the water.”
A thin blade of silver came forward in the plain and the peasants ran alongside it, crying and singing.
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“Oh, Manuel, Manuel, why are you dead?” moaned Délira.
“No”, said Annaïse, and she smiled through her tears, “no, he is not dead”.
She took the old woman’s hand and pressed gently against her belly where new life stirred.”
—Jacques Roumain (1907–1945)