Racialised Voices of Maghrebi-French Women in Films
Making Race (in)Visible and (in)Audible
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1558/jld.18490Keywords:
media discourse, racialised performance, covert racialisation, discrimination to social accents and race, intersectionality, Maghrebi-French women in filmsAbstract
Performances in the media (Bell and Gibson 2011; Bucholtz and Lopez 2011) are rich multimodal resources, which enable the analyst to look into the social practice of language ideologies and highlight discursive strategies that contribute to unequal power relations in society. This article examines the overt and covert racialisation of Maghrebi-French female voices in French films. After analysing the discursive patterns associated with migrant women of first and second generations (mothers and daughters), it brings to the forefront the processes by which their voices are marked, arguing that they perpetuate discriminatory discourses of gender and race. It finally considers the dynamics between the erasure/racialisation of ethnic voices in films and politics of recognition in society (Fraser 2001).
References
Aguilar, C. (2016) Losing her voice: in Philippe Faucon’s poignant Fatima, an immigrant faces cultural difference even within family. MovieMaker. https://www.moviemaker.com/archives/interviews/philippe-faucon-cultural-difference-family-fatima
Alim, H. S., Rickford, J. R. and Ball, A. F. (2016) Raciolinguistics: How Language Shapes Our Ideas About Race. New York: Oxford University Press. https://doi.org/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780190625696.001.0001
Al-Malki, A., Kaufer, D., Ishizaki, S. and Dreher, K. (2012) Arab Women in Arab News: Old Stereotypes and New Media. London, New York: Bloomsbury.
Audigier, A. (2017) L’émotion d’Houda Benyamina dans Boomerang. France Inter. https://www.franceinter.fr/culture/l-emotion-d-oulaya-amamra-dans-boomerang
Balle, C. (2018) ‘Shéhérazade’: Dylan Robert et Kenza Fortas, ces minots qui crèvent l’écran. Le Parisien, 5 September. http://www.leparisien.fr/culture-loisirs/cinema/sheherazade-dylan-robert-et-kenza-fortas-ces-minots-qui-crevent-l-ecran-05-09-2018-7876797.php
Bell, A. and Gibson, A. (2011) Staging language: an introduction to the sociolinguistics of performance. Journal of Sociolinguistics 15(5): 555–72. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9841.2011.00517.x
Beney, C. (2015) Pour interpréter FATIMA, il n’y avait pas d’actrice en France. Accréds. https://www.accreds.fr/2015/05/21/pour-interpreter-fatima-il-ny-avait-pasdactrice-en-france.html
Bilge, S. (2009) Théorisations féministes de l’intersectionnalité. Diogène 225(1): 70–88. https://doi.org/10.3917/dio.225.0070
Binisti, N. and Gasquet-Cyrus, M. (2003) Les accents de Marseille. Cahiers du Français contemporain 8: 107–29. https://doi.org/10.3917/csl.0301.0129
Blanchard, P. (2000) Le zoo humain, une longue tradition française. Hommes et Migrations (L’héritage colonial, un trou de mémoire) 1228: 44–50.
Bonilla-Silva, E. (2006) Racism without Racists. Color-blind Racism and the Persistence of Racial Inequality in the United States. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield.
Boudaoud, N. (2008) ‘Prière à la lune’: au nom de toutes les ‘Fatima’. Babelmed. http://www.babelmed.net/article/2272-priere-a-la-lune-au-nom-de-toutes-les-fatima
Bourdieu, P. (1991) Language and Symbolic Power. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Bucholtz, M. and Lopez, Q. (2011) Performing blackness, forming whiteness: linguistic minstrelsy in Hollywood film. Journal of Sociolinguistics 15(5): 680–706. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9841.2011.00513.x
Candea, M. (2017) La notion d’«accent de banlieue» à l’épreuve du terrain. In M. Auzanneau, P. Lambert, N. Maillard (eds) Parole de jeunesse – la part langagière des différenciations sociales, Glottopol, 29: 13–26.
Célestin, R., DalMolin, E. and Hargreaves, A. G. (2004) Introduction. Contemporary French and Francophone Studies 8(1): 3–8. https://doi.org/10.1080/10260210310001635450
Chéronnet, H. (2018) Fatima, migrer au risque de trahir. Les Cahiers Dynamiques 74: 57–65. https://doi.org/10.3917/lcd.074.0057
Cheshire, J. and Gardner-Chloros, P. (eds) (2018) Multicultural youth vernaculars in Paris and urban France (special issue). Journal of French Language Studies 28(2). https://doi.org/10.1017/S0959269518000182
Condon, S. and Régnard, C. (2016) Les pratiques linguistiques: langues apportées et langues transmises. In C. Beauchemin, C. Hamel and P. Simon (eds) Trajectoires et origines: enquête sur la diversité des populations en France. Paris: INED Grandes Enquêtes.
Crenshaw, K. (1989) Demarginalizing the Intersection of Race and Sex: A Black Feminist Critique of Antidiscrimination Doctrine, Feminist Theory and Antiracist Politics 139–67. Chicago: University of Chicago Legal Forum.
Devilla, L. and Trimaille, C. (2010) Variantes palatalisées/affriquées en français hexagonal: quel(s) statut(s) sociolinguistique(s) pour quel destin? In M. Iliescu, H. SillerRunggaldier and P. Danler (eds) Actes du XXVe Congrès International de Linguistique et de Philologie Romanes, Volume 4 99–108. September 2007, Innsbruck. Berlin, New York: De Gruyter. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110231922.4-99
Dick, H. P. and Wirtz, K. (2011) Introduction: racializing discourse. Journal of Linguistic Anthropology 21(1): 2–10. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1548-1395.2011.01094.x
Durmelat, S. and Swamy, V. (eds) (2011) Screening Integration: Recasting Maghrebi Immigration in Contemporary France. Lincoln, London: University of Nebraska Press. https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctt1df4gr4
Elayoubi, F. (2006) Prière à la lune. Paris: Éditions Bachari.
Elayoubi, F. (2011) Enfin, je peux marcher seule (trans. L. Joly). Paris: Éditions Bachari.
Fairclough, N. (1989) Language and Power. Harlow, London, New York: Longman.
Fairclough, N. (1995a) Media Discourse. London, New York: Edward Arnold.
Fairclough, N. (1995b) Critical Discourse Analysis: The Critical Study of Language. London: Longman.
Fassin, D. and Fassin, É. (2006) De la question sociale à la question raciale: représenter la société française. Paris: La Découverte.
Flowerdew, J., Li, D. and Tran, S. (2002) Discriminatory news discourse: some Hong Kong data. Discourse & Society 13: 319–45. https://doi.org/10.1177/0957926502013003052
Fraser, N. (2001) Recognition without ethics? Theory, Culture & Society 18(2–3): 21–42. https://doi.org/10.1177/02632760122051760
Frelin, M. (2018) Film mutilingue et traduction: Fatima de Philippe Faucon. Université Populaire des Images. https://upopi.ciclic.fr/transmettre/parcours-pedagogiques/le-choix-de-la-vost-pour-le-jeune-public/annexe-1-film-mutilingue-et-traductionfatima-de-philippe-faucon
Gadet F. (2013) Collecting a new corpus in the Paris area: intertwining methodological and sociolinguistic reflections. In D. Hornsby and M. Jones (eds) Language and Social Structure in Urban France 162–71. Oxford: Legenda. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315092058-14
Gal, S. (2012) Sociolinguistic regimes and the management of diversity. In A. Duchêne and M. Heller (eds) Language in Late Capitalism: Pride and Profit 22–42. London, New York: Routledge.
Gal, S. and Irvine, J. (1995) The boundaries of languages and disciplines: how ideologies construct difference. Social Research 62(4): 967–1001.
Galy-Ramounot, M. (2016) Houda Benyamina: ‘J’ai montré la cité comme je la vois, pas comme elle est fantasmée’. LeFigaro.fr Madame. http://madame.lefigaro.fr/celebrites/divines-houda-benyamina-jai-montre-la-cite-comme-je-la-vois-290816-116058
Geesey, P. (2011) A space of their own? Women in Maghrebi-French filmmaking. In S. Durmelat and V. Swamy (eds) Screening Integration: Recasting Maghrebi Immigration in Contemporary France 161–77. Lincoln, London: University of Nebraska Press. https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctt1df4gr4.14
Gester, J. (2015) Philippe Faucon: ‘Je voulais mettre en avant des figures absentes à l’écran’. Libération, 6 October.
Guénif-Souilamas, N. (2000) Des ‘beurettes’ aux descendantes d’immigrants nord-africains. Paris: Grasset.
Hall, S. (1997) Race, The Floating Signifier (video). Northampton, MA: Media Education Foundation.
Hargreaves, A. G. (1995) Immigration, ‘Race’ and Ethnicity in Contemporary France. London: Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203430187
Hargreaves, A. (2007) Multi-Ethnic France: Immigration, Politics, Culture and Society. London: Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203962794
Herman, L. and Herman, M. S. (1997) Foreign Dialects: A Manual for Actors, Directors, and Writers. New York, London: Routledge.
Hodges, A. (2015) Ideologies of language and race in US media discourse about the Trayvon Martin shooting. Language in Society 44(3): 401–23. https://doi.org/10.1017/S004740451500024X
hooks, b. (1992) Black Looks: Race and Representation. Boston, MA: South End Press.
Hughes, A. and Reader, K. (1998) Encyclopedia of Contemporary French Culture.
London, New York: Routledge.
Kaganski, S. (2001) ‘Amélie’ pas jolie. Les Inrockuptibles, 31 mai 2001.
KB (2014) ‘Bande de filles’ ou la folie niafou. Festival International Génération Court. https://www.generationcourt.com/2016/03/07/bande-de-filles-ou-la-folie-niafou
Kealhofer-Kemp, L. (2015a) Muslim Women in French Cinema: Voices of Maghrebi Migrants in France. Liverpool: Liverpool University Press. https://doi.org/10.5949/liverpool/9781781381984.001.0001
Kealhofer-Kemp, L. (2015b) Leïla Bekhti, Rachida Brakni, and the new place of Maghrebi-French actresses in French cinema. Contemporary French Civilization 40(1): 49–70. https://doi.org/10.3828/cfc.2015.3
Keaton, T. D. (2006) Muslim Girls and the Other France: Race, Identity Politics, and Social Exclusion. Bloomington, Indianapolis: Indiana University Press.
Khan, R. (2018) Sans entendre aucun bruit. In A. Maïga (ed.) Noire n’est pas mon metier 43–55. Paris: Éditions du Seuil.
Kozloff, S. (2000) Overhearing Film Dialogue. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.
Léonard, M. des N. (2014) Census and racial categorization in France: invisible categories and color-blind politics. Humanity & Society 38(1): 67–88. https://doi.org/10.1177/0160597613519233
Lo, A. (2016) The linguistic racialization of Asian Americans. In S. Alim, J. R. Rickford and A. F. Ball (eds) Raciolinguistics. New York: Oxford University Press.
Maïga, A. (ed.) (2018) Noire n’est pas mon métier. Paris: Éditions du Seuil.
McGonagle, J. (2017) Representing Ethnicity in Contemporary French Visual Culture. Manchester: Manchester University Press. https://doi.org/10.7228/manchester/9780719079559.001.0001
Morice, J. (2007) Rencontre avec Abdellatif Kechiche, réalisateur de ‘La Graine et le mulet’. Télérama, 14 December.
Nga, M.-P. (2018) Des Mamas en boubou. In A Maïga (ed.) Noire n’est pas mon metier 71–5. Paris: Éditions du Seuil.
Noiriel, G. (1992) Population, immigration et identité nationale en France, XIXe–XXe siècle. Paris: Hachette.
Perriard-Abdoh, A. (n.d.) Veiled cinema: representations of Muslim women in modern French cinema. MA thesis, Simon Fraser University, Vancouver, Canada.
Planchenault, G. (2010) Displacement and plurilingualism in Inch’Allah Dimanche: appropriating the other’s language in order to find one’s place. In V. Berger and M. Komori (eds) Polyglot Cinema: Migration and Transcultural Narration in France, Italy, Portugal and Spain 99–111. Berlin: Lit Verlag.
Planchenault, G. (2012) Accented French in films: performing and evaluating in-group stylisations. Multilingua 31: 253–75. https://doi.org/10.1515/multi-2012-0012
Planchenault, G. (2015) Voices in the Media: Performing French Linguistic Otherness. London: Bloomsbury.
Planchenault, G. (2017) Doing dialects in dialogues: regional, social and ethnic variation in fiction. In A. H. Jucker and Miriam A. Locher (eds) Pragmatics of Fiction (Handbooks of Pragmatics Series, Volume 12) 265–96. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110431094-009
Reyes, A. and Lo, A. (eds) (2009) Beyond Yellow English: Toward a Linguistic Anthropology of Asian Pacific America. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Rose, S. (2016) Divines director Houda Benyamina: ‘It’s better to make a film than a bomb’. Guardian, 10 November. https://www.theguardian.com/film/2016/nov/10/divines-director-houda-benyamina-its-better-to-make-a-film-than-a-bomb
Silverstein, M. (1979) Language structure and linguistic ideology. In P. Clyne, W. Hanks and C. Hofbauer (eds) The Elements 193–248. Chicago: Chicago Linguistic Society.
Silverstein, M. (2003) Indexical order and the dialectics of sociolinguistic life. Language & Communication 23: 193–229. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0271-5309(03)00013-2
Spini, M. and Trimaille, C. (2017) Les significations sociales de la palatalisation/affrication à Marseille: processus ségrégatifs et changement linguistique. In J.-M. Géa and M Gasquet-Cyrus (eds) Marseille. Entre gentrification et ségrégation langagière. Langage & Société 162: 53–78. https://doi.org/10.3917/ls.162.0053
Spivak, G. (2010) Can the subaltern speak? Revised edition, from the ‘History’ chapter of Critique of Postcolonial Reason. In R. Morris (ed.) Can the Subaltern Speak? Reflections on the History of an Idea 21–78. New York: Columbia University Press. First appeared in C. Nelson and L. Grossberg (eds) (1988) Marxism and the Interpretation of Culture 271–313. Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press.
Tarr, C. (2015) French cinema and the integration of young women actors of Maghrebi heritage. Nottingham French Studies 54(3): 297–311. https://doi.org/10.3366/nfs.2015.0128
Taylor, C. (1994) The politics of recognition. In A. Gutmann and C. Taylor (eds) Multiculturalism: Examining the Politics of Recognition 25–73. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
van Dijk, T. A. (1993) Principles of Critical Discourse Analysis. Discourse & Society 4(2): 249–83. https://doi.org/10.1177/0957926593004002006
van Dijk, T. A. (2000) New(s) racism. A discourse analytical approach. In S. Cottle (ed.) Ethnic Minorities and the Media 33–49. Milton Keynes, UK: Open University Press.
Wacquant, L. (2007) Parias urbains. Ghetto, banlieues, État. Une sociologie comparée de la marginalité sociale. Paris: La Découverte.