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Abstract
A closer reading of the 2005 suburban riots in France reveals a fundamental turning point in the history of French republicanism and in the relationship between young Beurs (French of North African origin) and mainstream French society. As the riots gained visibility, the Beurs found themselves caught in the middle of a controversial debate which often blamed them for exposing the limits of the French social model and starting a fearful political process in which taboo elements of the Anglo-Saxon multiculturalism such as affirmative action are debated and supported publicly. This paper uses interviews with the producers of Beur FM, a commercial ethnic radio station in Paris, and its reaction to the riots to analyse the larger implications of this social crisis.
Notes
1. The word “beur” was coined in the 1970s from Verlan, a backslang commonly spoken among some Parisian youngsters. Beur is derived from the French word “arabe”. As a neologism, it was coined both to counter the negative connotations of “arabe” and “musulman” in France, and to indicate the hybrid identity of the second generation, born or brought up in France.
2. SOS Racisme, a non-profit organisation set up in the 1980s to fight institutional discrimination, continues to receive thousands of complaints from minorities who cannot rent apartments, buy property or find jobs simply because of their names and their skin colour. It frequently tests discrimination claims in job applications by sending two identical resumes to employers: one with a French name, the other with an Arab name. On many occasions, those with the French name were called for an interview while the others rarely were.
3. There are no Beur representatives in the French Parliament and their participation in the visible political parties remains negligible. Former Prime Minister Raffarin had promised to include more Beurs under the UMP (Chirac's party) in the 2004 regional elections, but he failed to act on that promise (CitationTarr).
4. This popular view that the mission of the “republican school” has been mitigated by ethnic minorities is a reaction to increasing requests by Muslim communities to allow halal meat to be served to their children in the school canteens, to change the school's timetable to allow for Friday prayer and to modify the curriculum to allow for Islamic instruction. A 2004 report by the Ministry of Education warned that many of the schools in French suburbs are heavily segregated along religious lines and that their performance lies far behind that of other schools (CitationObin).
5. Streetwear brand: “P2B (produit de banlieue)” has become extremely popular not only in the banlieues but also amongst French youth in general. The story of a run-down suburban tower by a 19-year-old writer of Algerian parents became an instant hit novel selling more than 70,000 copies in a few months and available in 26 languages. Films like Banlieue 13 about life in a Parisian suburb was seen by 1 million and maintained a solid second position in the French box office for weeks in 2004. The banlieue is also home to a variety of dialects, including Verlan, which are often used in rap songs.
6. For a more detailed historical overview of the cultural, scientific and political meanings of the word métissage in France, see Jennifer Yee's “Métissage in France: A Postmodern Fantasy and its Forgotten Precedents”.
7. The coverage of a series of gang rape incidents in the banlieue graphically described the way in which young Beur women were punished by their older brothers when they failed to conform to the cultural norms of their communities. A group of young Beur women in the banlieues set up an association: Ni Putes, Ni Soumises (Neither Whores, Nor Submissive) to fight both banlieue male bullying and their marginalisation in French mainstream society.
8. It is not ironic that in French-dubbed American films, African American actors speak with a heavy suburban accent of Beurs and blacks.
9. Following the 1983 riots in les Minguettes, a suburb of Lyon where a number of North Africans were killed after they clashed with police forces, some Beur activists organised a peaceful march from Lyon to Paris in which a number of French intellectuals and politicians participated. The march started with a few hundred Beurs in Lyon and reached Paris with more than 100,000 participants.
10. Zebda in Arabic means “butter” or “beurre” in French, which sounds exactly like “beur”. Ironically, the play on words using a Parisian dialect, Verlan, has produced a term that appropriates a French republican quality of “melting down” or assimilating into the dominant culture.
11. In 2003 Chirac formed a commission to revise the state of secularism in France. Under the banner of “la laïcité (secularism) n'est pas negotiable” the commission, which was heavily criticised by Muslims in France because it included members who are too close to the conservative government, concluded secularism was in retreat in the country and recommended the ban of ostentatious religious signs as a strong message to reinvigorate “le contrat social” (CitationStasi). The commission came to its conclusions after having interviewed 120 people, including some veiled French-North African women, intellectuals, political leaders and human rights organisation representatives. State television channels reached record ratings when Jacque Chirac read the recommendation of the report.
12. The law was revoked in early 2006 by President Chirac after it had spawned heated debates about French collective amnesia with regard to colonialism, particularly in North Africa.
13. Nicolas Sarkozy, the French Minister of Internal Affairs and a presidential hopeful in the 2007 elections, was criticised for inflaming the violence by using unequivocal language to describe the rioters and the banlieues in general.