«Hospitable» space of the Sahara in French projects of the last third of the 19th century

Abstract

The article examines the concept of the Sahara Desert in the projects of engineers A. Duponschel (construction of the Trans-Saharan Railway) and F.-E. Roudaire (creation of an inland sea in Algeria and Tunisia). The Objective of the projects is to transform the space of the Sahara and include it in a single space of the French empire. The ideas about the Sahara of the French traveler Soleillet Paul, who supported both projects, will also be studied. This article attempts to find out how the image of the «new» Sahara was constructed in the studied texts? How did the Sahara «transform» from a hostile and mysterious space into a space that was hospitable and «ordinary»? The space of the empire in the context of the study of imperial discourse will be considered not just a scene where colonial events played out, but the central object in the analysis of the colonial situation and the territory of meanings. It is likely that the successful implementation of these projects would change the image of the Sahara in the public mind, and the texts of the above authors would serve as the basis for the formation of a new image.

Keywords

• imperial space
• imperial discourse
• trassahara railway project
• a. duponchel
• inland sea project
• f.-e. roudaire
• soleillet paul
• algeria
• tunisia
• image of the sahara
• french colonies