Sister Madeleine Allain and her passion for the study of language Kabyle
Sister Madeleine Allain She was a friend of Algeria who left there after having given much to the culture, especially the Berber language. She not only studied the language, but developed a Kabyle-French dictionary which was published in1982 by the SELAF Editions in Paris. The study of language Kabyle Sister Madeleine Allain arrived in 1939 in Algeria as a “White Sister” with her religious name: Sister Louis de Vincennes. From that date, she began with passion and method to study the Kabyle language in Ain El Hammam (Michelet) and Tizi-Ouzou. In 1953 she founded in Tizi-Ouzou a house of studies for young sisters (Center for Feminine Berber studies). The center later moved to Larbâa Nath Iraten (Fort National). In 1946 she helped found the FDB (Berber documentation file) that was set up with Fathers Dallet and Lanfry to collect Berber texts. In 1947 Sister Madeleine obtained…