Zaâma d'Banlieue was a female-led collective for immigrant youth in the suburbs of Lyon, France which existed between 1979 and 1984. The four founding leaders were Djida Tazdaït (born in 1957), Tim (born in 1959), Nadia (born in 1960) et Farida (born in 1954), and were all either of Algerian origin or nationality and lived in Lyon's suburbs. Zaâma d'Banlieue became officially registered under the acronym the "Youth Expression Association" (Association expression jeunes immigrés) on 19 October 1982.Nasri, Foued. 2011. "Zaâma D'banlieue (1979-1984): Les Pérégrinations D'un Collectif Féminin Au Sein Des Luttes De L'Immigration". Engagements, Rébellions Et Genre Dans Les Quartiers Populaires (1968-2005), 65-78
Zaâma d'Banlieue denounced police abuse and violence and was engaged in feminism within the family and social circles. Zaâma d'Banlieue aimed to spark self-organization among youth within Lyon's suburbs.L'Association de la Nouvelle Génération Immigrée. 1984. "Les Cahiers de la Nouvelle Génération". édition 1. http://odysseo.generiques.org/ark:/naan/a011378300762gvqt5c/0e77531e5e
The collective was dissolved during the 'National Conferences of Youth Associations of Immigrant Origins' (Assises nationales des associations de jeunes issus de l'immigration) between 9 and 11 June 1984 in Villeurbanne and Vaulx-en-Velin.Nasri, Foued. 2011. "Zaâma D'banlieue (1979-1984): Les Pérégrinations D'un Collectif Féminin Au Sein Des Luttes De L'Immigration". Engagements, Rébellions Et Genre Dans Les Quartiers Populaires (1968-2005), 65-78
Origins
National context The experience of North Africans in France during the late 1970s and 1980s was characterized by racism and extreme violence. Recurrent issues during these decades were racial killings committed by both civilians and police.Cohen, Kfir. 2013. "Loubards: 1980S French-Algerian Activism And The Conceptual Limits Of Beur Scholarship". French Cultural Studies 24 (1): 116–128. doi:10.1177/0957155812464152
Launch Growing up in the backdrop of the aftermath of the Algerian war, the future founders of Zaâma d'Banlieue experienced strong discrimination in their childhoods.Nasri, Foued. 2011. "Zaâma D'banlieue (1979-1984): Les Pérégrinations D'un Collectif Féminin Au Sein Des Luttes De L'Immigration". Engagements, Rébellions Et Genre Dans Les Quartiers Populaires (1968-2005), 65-78 While females with a Maghreb immigration background were at the time not with many in French secondary education, the collective's leaders pioneered in high school where they familiarised themselves with the political extreme left, anarchism, and liberalism.Nasri, Foued. 2011. "Zaâma D'banlieue (1979-1984): Les Pérégrinations D'un Collectif Féminin Au Sein Des Luttes De L'Immigration". Engagements, Rébellions Et Genre Dans Les Quartiers Populaires (1968-2005), 65-78
Djida Tazdaït, Tim, Nadia, and Farida were all of Algerian origin or nationality and lived in Lyon's suburbs in the 1980s. The women knew each other before setting up the collective, as they were active and present within similar cultural and activist circles in the Croix-Rousse district and together attended rock concerts in Lyon.Nasri, Foued. 2011. "Zaâma D'banlieue (1979-1984): Les Pérégrinations D'un Collectif Féminin Au Sein Des Luttes De L'Immigration". Engagements, Rébellions Et Genre Dans Les Quartiers Populaires (1968-2005), 65-78Informations Rassemblées à Lyon. 1981. Journal D'expressions Libertaires, no. 40: 5-7 Nadia in 2009 stated to have met the other founders through mutual friends when arriving in Lyon between 1980 and 1981. Djida Tazdaït referred to their initial encounters having taken place during a series of meetings with Informations Rassemblées à Lyon (I.R.L., at the time an anti-expulsion committee) which are estimated to have taken place in 1979 on 13 rue Pierre-Blanc.Nasri, Foued. 2011. "Zaâma D'banlieue (1979-1984): Les Pérégrinations D'un Collectif Féminin Au Sein Des Luttes De L'Immigration". Engagements, Rébellions Et Genre Dans Les Quartiers Populaires (1968-2005), 65-78Informations Rassemblées à Lyon. 1981. Journal D'expressions Libertaires, no. 40: 5-7
Influenced by two distinct events, the four women decided to create the collective. Firstly, the death of Lahouri, a 17-year old teenager who was assassinated by a policeman during an identity control, sparked outrage within the women's local networks.Informations Rassemblées à Lyon. 1981. Journal D'expressions Libertaires, no. 40: 5-7 Second, familiarising themselves with Rock Against Police (a group of young immigrants advocating for a degree of autonomy in the struggle in the suburbs of Paris) further confirmed and encouraged the leaders' desire to advocate in the suburbs of Lyon."Ressource «Rock Against Police (RAP) (Collection Numérisée De Périodiques)". 2019. Odysseo. Accessed April 22. http://odysseo.generiques.org/ark:/naan/a0113783006874x9z50 Informations Rassemblées à Lyon. 1981. Journal D'expressions Libertaires, no. 40: 5-7
Because there was no specific meeting or event that marked off the official launch of the collective, the exact date of Zaâma d'Banlieue's birth is unclear. The commencement of the collective's activities and the leaders' meetings are in various accounts suggested to have taken place between 1979 and 1983.Nasri, Foued. 2011. "Zaâma D'banlieue (1979-1984): Les Pérégrinations D'un Collectif Féminin Au Sein Des Luttes De L'Immigration". Engagements, Rébellions Et Genre Dans Les Quartiers Populaires (1968-2005), 65-78 Formerly involved activists, for instance, associate the collective's coming-into-being with their involvement in a hunger strike against the Imbert Decree in early 1980, while others refer to 19 November 1980 when a wave of arrests took place in the neighborhood of Place Gabriel-Péri.Nasri, Foued. 2011. "Zaâma D'banlieue (1979-1984): Les Pérégrinations D'un Collectif Féminin Au Sein Des Luttes De L'Immigration". Engagements, Rébellions Et Genre Dans Les Quartiers Populaires (1968-2005), 65-78
In an interview in 1981, Djida emphasized that with respect to the initiations of youth mobilizations in the suburbs, Lyon was different from Paris and Marseille because in Lyon there was not a singular event that served acted as a 'trigger' for activist movements. Informations Rassemblées à Lyon. 1981. Journal D'expressions Libertaires, no. 40:6
Initial character With initially approximate twenty members, Zaâma d'Banlieue activists viewed themselves as members of a network rather than of an official organization.Nasri, Foued. 2011. "Zaâma D'banlieue (1979-1984): Les Pérégrinations D'un Collectif Féminin Au Sein Des Luttes De L'Immigration". Engagements, Rébellions Et Genre Dans Les Quartiers Populaires (1968-2005), 65-78 Zaâma d'Banlieue viewed the collectivity of more institutionalized local organizations to be at the cost of the individual members' freedoms of expression and to not be able to account for specific problems of people with Maghreb immigration roots.Nasri, Foued. 2011. "Zaâma D'banlieue (1979-1984): Les Pérégrinations D'un Collectif Féminin Au Sein Des Luttes De L'Immigration". Engagements, Rébellions Et Genre Dans Les Quartiers Populaires (1968-2005), 65-78 The collective thus enjoyed a more direct character as well as a more spontaneous one compared to other organizations, which was reflected in the way its activists were mobilized. Activists were reached directly through close social ties between individuals, for instance through friends and family networks. Further, the organized actions and modes of operation were also mainly organized through random operation.L'Association de la Nouvelle Génération Immigrée. 1984. "Les Cahiers de la Nouvelle Génération". édition 1.
Thematic focus
Police and injustice Zaâma d'Banlieue initially took a stance against inappropriate and unjust policing and denounced "abusive identity checks, bullying, humiliation and diverse instances of police violence".Nasri, Foued. 2011. "Zaâma D'banlieue (1979-1984): Les Pérégrinations D'un Collectif Féminin Au Sein Des Luttes De L'Immigration". Engagements, Rébellions Et Genre Dans Les Quartiers Populaires (1968-2005), 65Informations Rassemblées à Lyon. 1981. Journal D'expressions Libertaires, no. 40:5-7 Grievance was particularly on the harsh punishments of petty crime conducted by youth in the suburbs, which greatly contrasted against perceived laxity in the sentencing of individuals suspected of homicide on teenagers with a Maghreb immigration background.Nasri, Foued. 2011. "Zaâma D'banlieue (1979-1984): Les Pérégrinations D'un Collectif Féminin Au Sein Des Luttes De L'Immigration". Engagements, Rébellions Et Genre Dans Les Quartiers Populaires (1968-2005), 65 The demands of Zaâma d'Banlieue also concerned expulsions of young foreigners sentenced for delinquent acts. Zaâma d'Banlieue defended the legitimacy of such delinquencies conducted by the youth.Nasri, Foued. 2011. "Zaâma D'banlieue (1979-1984): Les Pérégrinations D'un Collectif Féminin Au Sein Des Luttes De L'Immigration". Engagements, Rébellions Et Genre Dans Les Quartiers Populaires (1968-2005)
Feminism and teenaged girls with immigration backgrounds Zaâma d'Banlieue further focused on the situation of girls with Maghreb origins within their family space and surrounding society in France. The collective's feminism-related discourse combined criticism on the family with a general critique on the conditions of existence of women at large. Girls' difficulties within families were viewed to reflect the difficulties of confirming oneself at the level of society. Zaâma d'Banlieue considered gendered societal and familial issues as one and hereby actively prevented any discourse particularly directed against Muslim male figures within families individually. Female activists emphasized the need to avoid any stigmatization of brothers and fathers in the feminist discourse.Nasri, Foued. 2011. "Zaâma D'banlieue (1979-1984): Les Pérégrinations D'un Collectif Féminin Au Sein Des Luttes De L'Immigration". Engagements, Rébellions Et Genre Dans Les Quartiers Populaires (1968-2005)
The positioning of female activists of the collective in relation to feminism translated into awareness-raising activities and participation in mobilizations relating to abortion. Depending on the context, femininity was central in the collective's discourse and was sometimes used as a resource of mobilization.Nasri, Foued. 2011. "Zaâma D'banlieue (1979-1984): Les Pérégrinations D'un Collectif Féminin Au Sein Des Luttes De L'Immigration". Engagements, Rébellions Et Genre Dans Les Quartiers Populaires (1968-2005), 65-78 In "Tim a dit je veux" ("Tim said I want"), for instance, the collective's co-founder Tim focused on gender issues within social and family relations, in which she called for a revolt within relations with parents and family and for claiming the right to speak within these families as well as in the overarching social world.Nasri, Foued. 2011. "Zaâma D'banlieue (1979-1984): Les Pérégrinations D'un Collectif Féminin Au Sein Des Luttes De L'Immigration". Engagements, Rébellions Et Genre Dans Les Quartiers Populaires (1968-2005), 65-78
At other times, the collective used neutral discourse to for instance mobilize younger people in surrounding districts, with a stronger emphasis on the larger community of experiences rather than individual ones.Nasri, Foued. 2011. "Zaâma D'banlieue (1979-1984): Les Pérégrinations D'un Collectif Féminin Au Sein Des Luttes De L'Immigration". Engagements, Rébellions Et Genre Dans Les Quartiers Populaires (1968-2005), 65-78
Main activities
Main activity modes