About Berber Sources Argan Organics

Berber Sources began right after 9/11 as a way of showcasing the positive aspects of Arab and Berber culture through hand-crafted furnishings, jewelry, home accessories, and Judaica. It was testimony to the richness of another set of artistic traditions at a time when fear determined what we saw and how we saw it.

Jill-Elyse Grossvogel, a native New Yorker, graphic designer, and Cornell University Ph.D., has curated exhibitions in French and American museums, most recently writing on questions of authenticity in art. Her critical eye and connoisseurship assure a discriminating selection of objects from the Moroccan culture in which she feels at home.

Jill is currently serving as a member of the Casablanca-Chicago Sister Cities Program. She is devoted to promoting self-sufficiency among impoverished women living in remote Berber villages.

What really are the Berber Sources?

Although Berbers were Morocco's first inhabitants and 60% of its population, they faced widespread discrimination and only now is the language required to be taught in public school. The University of Ibn Zohr offers degrees in Amazigh, an umbrella term for the three Berber dialects.

Speakers of the previously oral-only language witnessed the creation of a Royal Institute of Amazigh language and culture that has established an alphabet based partly on the mystical signs and symbols of the Tuareg found inscribed on tombs and monuments.

This written form is expected to have a unifying effect on the groups previously isolated in different mountain ranges. It is possible that the government would like to provide an alternative model to the radical Wahabi form of Islam and the danger of the country being taken over by fundamentalism. The Amazigh culture offers more liberal identity for many Moroccans.