An In-Between Identity: Azouz Begag in Shantytown Kid

The main purpose of this study is to examine the double identity in Begag’s le Gone du Chaâba. Taken between two completely different cultures, the beur writer exploited the language to translate and transmit this duality. Le Gone du Chaâba is a 1986 novel by Azouz Begag, a French-born author of Algerian parentage, who offers an autobiographical glimpse of his childhood in and around Lyon. Set in the 1960’s, the novel presents Azouz navigating his experience between the slum where his family lives and the various French schools he attends. The text traces the issues of children of immigrants who essentially live between four language varieties: a cherished, formal Arabic, a version of Arabic or Berber spoken at home (rarely studied in written form), a “proper” French learned in school, and slang French spoken with friends. This study will explore the language issues as they appear in Begag’s le Gone du Chaâba, where they contribute to the process of identity formation for the child Azouz. In this novel the narrator presents himself as the voice of an individual who negotiates a place in an environment in the course of creation.

The motif of ‘crossings’ in selected works by Azouz Begag

The French writer of Algerian origin, Azouz Begag, has long been interested in the reception in France of those with immigrant origins. Their treatment often continues to be that reserved for the ‘visitor’, even several generations down the line. Yet these ‘outsiders’, who are not expected to ‘stay’, no longer identify with the country of their ancestors. Their life journeys become characterised by often delicate negotiations in order to be accepted. In the light of this situation, we examine three of Begag’s autofictional works. The first of these is Le Gone du Chaâba (1986), the text for which he gained celebrity. It explores the world of a young Algerian boy in France in the 1960s confronted with a Francocentric school system largely dismissive of the immigrant child. The second text, Le Marteau pique-cœur (2004) reveals an adult destabilised by the collapse of his marriage and the loss of his father, while the third, Salam Ouessant (2012), shows him on holiday with his two daughters and struggling with single status. All three texts share common concerns about reference points in life and all three are linked by numerous ‘crossings’ featuring various kinds of movement – physical, cultural, linguistic and transitional.

Competing Visions of Minority Authorship

This chapter examines two opposing viewpoints regarding minority authorship in France in the mid-1980s in the context of the aftermath of the Marche des Beurs period. In his interviews for his quasi-autobiographical novels Le gone du Chaâba (1986) and Béni ou le paradis privé (1988) Azouz Begag strongly promoted his special expertise as a representative of the beur population. He readily volunteered to educated his interviewers and viewers about life in France’s North African immigrant communities and rarely discussed his books in detail. Farida Belghoul, on the other hand, argued forcefully for an exclusively artistic reading of her novel Georgette! (1986). She attacked journalists who imposed an ethnic frame on her work and criticized other authors of North African descent of writing too simplistically. In the end Belghoul’s commentary did not attract television journalists and she only appeared on a few highly specialized radio shows. Begag’s arguments therefore reached a much wider audience and played a stronger role in contributing to how novels by authors from the beur population were read in the mid- to late-1980s.

La France n'a pas été au rendez-vous

En réfléchissant sur sa triple carrière de sociologue, écrivain et ancien ministre, Azouz Begag commente l'évolution de la France depuis la publication par Le Figaro magazine en 1985 d'un dossier sur l'immigration intitulé « Serons-nous encore français dans 30 ans? ». Il regrette que pendant cette période la sphère politique soit restée peu poreuse aux populations issues de l'immigration et que les discriminations à l'encontre de celles-ci aient été insuffisamment réprimées. La percée de jeunes sportifs et artistes d'origine immigrée a laissé largement intact le statu quo politique, et les recherches scientifiques ont pesé bien peu dans le débat électoral. Les espoirs nourris par Begag pour un meilleur effort en faveur d'une véritable égalité des chances pour tous les citoyens, quelle que soit la diversité de leurs origines, ont été mis à mal par les attentats djihadistes commis à Paris en 2015.