Melanine

Strike in the French West Indies

@Alfred, Alfred — 2009-02-21T16:40:14Z

It happens so rarely that it might just be a dream: the West Indies are on the front pages of all major French newspapers, several days in a row? What the hell is happening? It is a revolt. No; a revolution. Looking beyond usual official bullshit about strikes and riots and the like, one can only notice that the Antillean movement is a bold gesture against the plague of the liberal capitalist economic system. You read that right. Read on for historical contextualization and internet (...)

- A matter of class / Antilles-Guyane- Réunion, Violences sociales, États-Unis d'Amérique du Nord, Martinique

Thugs, Punks, or Wise?

@Alfred, Nico Melanine — 2008-01-03T20:11:15Z

The recent crisis in the French projects of Villiers-le-Bel revealed once more how mainstream groupthink never learns. It recycles its own mediocrity in order to spread the same old class scorn: an ideology we should reject and fight.

- A matter of class

Nicolas Sarkozy: his nation in danger

@Alfred — 2007-05-18T14:09:25Z

Oh, the sweet irony of the May 10th photo-op in the Luxembourg gardens in Paris... It was the second national day of commemoration of the abolition of slavery in France. This nice pretext was all but erased by the occasion, a historical occasion, we learned on conservative French channel TF1: Jacques Chirac and Nicolas Sarkozy were there, together, one on the outs, one coming in! History in the making! And for Sarkozy, this was about presenting a certain idea of the nation. His nation. Not ours.

- Je dis ca...je dis rien

Maroon Slaves and Black Flags

@Alfred, Soopa Seb — 2007-01-13T05:44:55Z

During slavery's reign of horror, solidarities were struck between human groups everything should have kept apart: white sailors, maroon slaves, black freedmen, white indentured servants joined in common, pre-revolutionary struggles. A thing to ponder in times of communautarist discourse, when some of our politicians fuel with xenophobic discourse the skewed debate over the “cultural” and “ethnic” divisions that allegedly characterize the populace.

- A matter of class

Eyes Wide Shut: of politics in French cinema, and more specifically in Michael Haneke's Hidden

@Alfred, Nico Melanine — 2006-02-22T18:21:18Z

A few months after it came out in France, Michael Haneke's Hidden is coming out in England. A good opportunity to watch it and possibly make up my own mind on Haneke's cinema. A good opportunity to digress on the connections between art and politics and assert that no, what the anglo-saxon world calls “Postcolonial Studies” has no equivalent in France.

- Reviews

"Every sperm is sacred": Le Temps qui reste (Time to leave), or the reactionary portrait of a bobo queer

@Alfred, Polo — 2006-01-25T19:04:44Z

In his acclaimed new movie Le temps qui reste, French director Francois Ozon expresses a bourgeois, moralistic view on homosexuality, peppered with machismo and self-hatred. For the director, salvation for homosexuals goes through a complete reframing of one's self and post-mortem redemption. Work, family, homeland: the media raves about a movie that promotes the status quo.

- Reviews / Cinema, Homosexualities, Normativity (Middle Class), Stereotypes

Exterminate all the brutes!

@Alfred, Alfred — 2005-11-19T19:12:48Z

There we have it: the state of emergency has been prolonged for three months in France. I know, I saw it on american TV. Distance always provides the opportunity to see situations differently. And from these shores I can see one thing clearly: the UMP (right-wing party in power) is barely acknowledging an old fact: France still has colonies, but they're called banlieues.

- Je dis ca...je dis rien

Scum of the French ghettoes, unite!

@Alfred, Soopa Seb — 2005-11-15T21:44:29Z

The youth uprisings in Seine St Denis (French department 93, North of Paris) do not only tell of their discontent with the disproportionate police operation ordered by government. They also epitomize 30 years of social revendications facing off with conservative attacks. Will we listen this time?

- Je dis ca...je dis rien

Culture and neocolonialism

@Alfred, M. Gabuzomeu — 2005-07-17T20:11:01Z

What is culture ? The reification of art brought to its ultimate degree ? Indeed. But it is also a precious tool for France in explaining its colonialist policies, without the least trace of remorse, thanks to its broad cultural network abroad. What is at stake, and what it implies.

- Like elephants and monkeys

1945-2005: Commemorating oblivion

@Alfred, Soopa Seb — 2005-06-03T00:03:37Z

From Africa to the Americas and from the Americas to Europe, slaves weren't the only ones to cross the ocean : the laws and techniques of segregation did too. And they survived World War Two...

- Like elephants and monkeys