Colonialism and the silent plea to be heard.

This essay seeks to investigate the evolution of colonialism, and its underlying persistence in the modern world. To better comprehend the impact of colonialism on modern society, this paper aims to provide a discussion of Mathieu Kassovitz’s film La Haine aired in 1995; depicting life in France that same year, utilizing the ideas and concepts discussed by theorists Jacques Rancière and Antonio Gramsci.

Firstly, let us provide some indispensable context to understand and situate the arguments presented in this essay. During the fall of 1995, soon after the election of president Jacques Chirac, his prime minister Alain Juppe put forward a financial reform plan that resulted in an augmentation in unemployment for the working class, which constituted around one quarter of French population at the time. The riots in the film La Haine were related to that event.

The film follows three young immigrant men of different ethnicities and religions-Vinz (Jewish), Said (north-African Muslim) and Hubert (Afro-french)-for a day, depicting their daily lives filled with racial discrimination and violence in the Parisian banlieue. The movie circles around the hospitalization and eventual death of a friend who had participated in a riot and was shot by a law enforcement agent. The film touches on numerous socioeconomic issues as well as racism and sexism.

This paper will aim to explain the impact of colonialism on modern societies by discussing the lives of three immigrants in the Parisian banlieue, utilizing Jacques Rancière’s concepts of “part of those who have no part” (Rancière 2008, 9) or the “miscounted” and “isonomy” (Rancière 2008, 61), as well as his rewriting of the plebians standing up against patricians and claiming their right to speech and recognition, but also Antonio Gramsci’s concept of “hegemony” or more precisely cultural/religious and intellectual hegemony.

Rancière’s concept of police identifies an interesting viewpoint on the undermining of the “part of those who have no part” (Rancière 2008, 9) individuals in the film. In fact, La Haine touches on a few rather explicit examples of “miscount” (Rancière 2008, 10).

First, there is a clear contrast between what Rancière would call phonic animals and “logical animals” (Rancière 2008, 21), aka the immigrants and french people respectively. Ironically, Vinz mentions seeing a cow on the streets of the cité, which he gets reprimanded for by Said whom accuses him of drug consumption.

In many instances Vinz, Said and Hubert speak up against the police and its unequal ordering of society yet get silenced immediately; their speech considered as mere noise. This evidence backs up Rancière’s claim that “at the heart of politics lies a double wrong, a fundamental conflict […] over the relationship between the capacity of the speaking being who is without qualification and political capacity” (Rancière 1999, 22) and focuses the light on the marginalization and silencing of immigrants in France at the time the movie was made.

As Rancière might argue, the act of opposition to the oppression is precisely when politics happen; he defines politics as an “extremely determined activity antagonistic to policing”. More importantly, according to Jacques Rancière, the miscounting of minority groups highlights the terrible lack of one of the fundamentals of radical democracy; isonomy.

Isonomy stands for equality of all citizens in their status before the law, as well as their right to participate in its formulation, which is effectively shown to be lacking in 1995 Paris and its surrounding banlieue.

From the scene where Said and Hubert get detained by plainclothes policemen and tortured both physically and mentally, to the unfounded pseudo-arrest of Vinz at the very end of the film which result in his death from accidental gunshot, there is irrefutable proof that immigrants were massively misunderstood and silenced by a system that should have been protecting them instead.

Backing the lack of isonomy discussed earlier emerges the notion of hegemony. Gramsci defines hegemony as “the function […] which the dominant group exercises throughout society” (Gramsci 1999, 145) or more precisely the rule over a group of individuals backed by values assuring less questioning in the political state of affairs. Hegemony is efficiently demonstrated in its multiple forms throughout La Haine; the most obvious one being cultural/religious hegemony. It is consistently present throughout the entire duration of the film, and manifests in the immigrants’ acceptance of their living situation. As much as the three protagonists stand up for themselves, they remain stuck in a perpetual cycle of injustice that somewhat becomes their reality. In fact, when Vinz mentions that his school burned down he does not seem phased by it, as if it is common occurrence for people like him to be deprived of their right to education. Moreover, the grandmother automatically assumes that Vinz was the one who set the school on fire as the idea of young delinquency among immigrants has become ingrained in their societal expectations and is almost guaranteed to occur. The idea that the social norms of that group of people are what they should be and that they are not allowed to expect any better in deeply rooted into their understanding of life, and therefore assures that they do not question them.

Another form of hegemony present in the film is intellectual hegemony. In the scene where the three protagonists take shelter at the art exhibit, they attempt to have a conversation with two young women which soon reject them because of their inability to maintain “intelligent” conversation and their display of misogyny and sexism. All men might be intellectuals, as Gramsci argues, but the lack of education or training in any domain puts the three young men at the bottom of the intellectual food chain, and makes them more susceptible to be manipulated or-like in this case-rejected by society.

It is therefore evident that 1995 France was discriminating towards immigrants, but where did the idea that immigrants were inferior to french people originate?

Moreover, a parallel can be drawn between one of the scenes in the film and Rancière’s recounting of Livy’s tale of the secession of the Roman plebeians on Aventine Hill. The plebeians were the “part of those who have no part” (Rancière 2008, 9) in Rome at the time, who rose up and stood against the fundamental belief that “between the language of those who have a name [patricians] and the lowing of nameless beings [plebians], no situation of linguistic exchange can possibly be set up, no rules or code of discussion” (Rancière 2008, 24). Rancière tells the story to highlight the importance of both violence and representation in giving a voice to the plebeians and assuring that Rome would consider them a body with specific ideologies and negotiate with them. In result the plebeians got representation within the Roman political order in the form of the institution of tribunes, which reinforced the public status of the plebeians. The plea of the plebians to be heard and recognized by the Roman government happened throughout direct and explicit action and active renouncing of the identities imposed on them by the system. The film contains moments of strong resistance against imposed identities. However, a much more subtle act of resistance ought to be mentioned as well. As the protagonists walk the streets of Paris at night, Said stops in front of a poster that says “Le monde est à vous” (La Haine 2005) which translates to The world is yours. He messily covers up the letter “v” and replaces it with an “n”, which makes the scripture say “Le monde est à nous” (La Haine 2005); The world is ours. It’s a very subtle scene with deep underlying meaning; a silent cry for equality and justice. The simple change of a letter revokes the identity given to immigrants.

The imposing of identities can be spotted in the dialogue between Said and Hubert and the police in Paris. The policeman yells things like “on est pas dans la cité avec ses pôtes les casseurs” (La Haine 2005) (we aren’t in the cité with your friends the breakers) and “toi dans ton pays on ramasse avec les pieds” (La Haine 2005) (in your country you pick things up with your feet); respectively referring to the violent riots back in the banlieue and insulting Hubert’s origins. The two young men are tortured physically, but the mental torture is much more impactful as the idea that they are inferior is being aggressively forced onto them and even though they do occasionally speak up to the policemen, they are mostly defeated and by the end unfazed by their words.

A more active act of resistance happens when Said’s sister talks back to her brother, and stands her ground as he tells her to stay in her place and to act like a woman. It might seem like a minor event, yet its importance lays in the fact that she in north-African and Muslim.

Going back to the idea that immigrants are naturally inferior to french people and where that idea originates, it is inevitable to mention colonization.

Most immigrants in France come from Africa which was majorly colonized by Europe until the second half of the 20th century. Even though most countries have regained their independence, they are still living the consequences of decades of exploitation and loss of important bits of culture, as well as natural resources. Ideological colonialism is so deeply rooted into the cultures of previously colonized countries that it just might never fully disappear. The notion that a stronger country had control over a whole nation for decades leaves said nation with an ingrained feeling of powerlessness and inferiority that shows in the way the country looks up, almost religiously, to a country that did nothing more than step on it with a heavy boot. The concept of hegemony was in fact very present and essential in colonial power. For example in Morocco, the opening of “french mission” schools and other institutions allowed for the francophonisation of a big chunk of the country, which resulted in french being the second official language of Morocco up to this day. The french monopolized education, research, agriculture, etc. And made the whole of the country, including its King Mohammed V, whom they exiled on Madagascar for a few years, a “part of those who have no part” (Rancière 2008, 9).

Such oppression left scars in the culture of colonized countries, which made it that much easier to manipulate their people into submission when they immigrated to France. It is interesting to juxtapose the riots for independence in a colonized country and the riots of the immigrants in France shown in La Haine, as the conditions are frighteningly similar.

Of course, this essay does not by any means victimize individuals from previously colonized countries, but rather aims to explain the concept of systematic oppression they experience internationally.

In conclusion, the systematic hegemony and undermining of immigrants from third world countries can be explained by the oppression and exploitation they experienced during the imperial period. It is important to give deeper thought to this issue, as understanding systematic and historical miscounting of individuals and making active efforts to remedy to it can be a major factor in the fight towards ending discrimination against said peoples, but can also contribute in giving them a sense of self worth and allow them to flourish.

Bibliography

Gramsci, Antonio. Selections from the Prison Notebooks . London : The Electric Book Company Ltd, 1999.

La Haine. London: Universal Studios, 2005.

Rancière, Jacques. Dis-Agreement: Politics and Philosophy. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1999.

Rancière, Jacques. “Wrong: Politics and Police.” Essay. In Disagreement: Politics and Philosophy, 21–42. Minneapolis: Univ. of Minnesota Press, 2008.