Abstract
This chapter discusses situations in which assertions are made about the integration of Algerian immigrants and their descendants with the French working class. Identification with this class is often accompanied by antagonism towards the bourgeoisie, understood as the second, wealthier, section of French society. The upward social mobility of French of Algerian origin may be treated not only as a socioeconomic move away from their parents, but also as an acquisition of new French cultural competencies characteristic of the bourgeoisie. Situations are indicated in which social advancement often requires a rejection of certain characteristics associated with Algerian identification. The context of downward social mobility is also discussed, where the appearance of certain pathological behaviours may be interpreted, as in the case of advancement, as an acceptance of certain characteristics deemed French, and not Algerian. At the end of the chapter, situations are presented in which a class identification (‘I am not bourgeois’) appears along with two others: with the suburbs and with immigrants, where these are interpreted as being a particular hindrance to the acquisition of certain French characteristics.
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Notes
- 1.
Among FAOs who have completed their education, 23 per cent completed higher education (including 9 per cent engineering studies), 20 per cent completed high school, 27 per cent technical school, and 10 per cent collège (the equivalent of middle school), while 20 per cent have no certificate or diploma at all. Comparing these results with those of French citizens whose parents were not immigrants, the numbers of people holding all diplomas are similar, except for those at the highest level (33 per cent completed higher education, which is 10 percentage points more than the FAO population) and the lowest level (13 per cent have no diploma at all, which is 7 percentage points less than the FAO population) (Collet and Santelli 2012, 323). Unemployment among FAOs is 19 per cent, and the percentage of persons professionally inactive is 9 per cent. Among the remaining 72 per cent of FAOs, 63 per cent work and 9 per cent are studying. Among professionally active male FAOs, the largest number work in positions that can be defined as workers (41 per cent, ouvriers) or bottom-level employees (17 per cent). Just over one-quarter (27 per cent) of FAOs work in middle-level positions, and just over one-tenth (11 per cent) in managerial positions (cadres) or intellectual professions, while one in twenty (5 per cent) are artisans, traders, or run their own business. In respect of female French of Algerian origin who are active professionally, the results of the same studies indicate certain differences between the sexes. The majority of women work as low-level employees (57 per cent), while a smaller percentage than among the men consists of women working in jobs that categorise them as workers (9 per cent) or who are self-employed. A similar percentage of women are employed in managerial or intellectual jobs (9 per cent) or in middle-level positions (Collet and Santelli 2012, 324–326).
- 2.
One indicator of class can be the legal and economic relationship to the apartment in which one lives. The majority of French aged 18–50 who are descendants of Algerian immigrants live in rented accommodation (68 per cent), while only 28 per cent own their home. Among the French of French origin, more than half (56 per cent) own their own home, while only 36 per cent rent. This disproportion between French of Algerian origin and French of non-immigrant origin is also visible in the issue of private or public housing, in which residence is subsidised by the state (known in France as HLM, une habitation à loyer modéré). Two-thirds (67 per cent) of FAOs live in a HLM, in comparison with about a third among French of French origin (Collet and Santelli 2012, 335–336).
- 3.
In the opinion of Attias-Donfut and Wolff (2009, 216–218), who examined statistics on the level of education and careers of second- and third-generation Algerian immigrants, it is not difficult to notice that the majority do achieve educational successes. While the descendants of immigrants from various countries, seen against the population as a whole, have fewer good results in education, if we take account of the socio-occupational status of their parents (workers and low-level employees), the social advancement of their children is indisputable. When we compare the children of immigrant workers with the children of non-immigrant workers, it turns out that second- and third-generation immigrants study longer, and among the most disadvantaged categories at least as long as their peers. The children of Algerians hold a particular place here (Dewitte 2003, 1); their parents clearly expect them to gain a good education that will enable them—in their parents’ opinion—to achieve social recognition in France (cf. Okba 2012, 2–3 and 6–7). And, on the basis of his research, Zehraoui (1999, 27 et seq.) claims, that relationships parents have with educational institutions equate immigrant families in this respect with French working-class families: acknowledging their lack of competence, parents withdraw from issues concerning what is taught at school, but firmly retain their prerogatives concerning the area of values. Yet there is an important difference: immigrant families are characterised by less fatalism and passivity, and for them school is an important place on which they pin their hopes for their children’s advancement (in French families, such faith is lacking). Parents encourage their children to study, pointing out that a good education is crucial to success, but at the same time admitting that they are not competent to help their children with their homework (Zehraoui 1999, 188–189).
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Kubera, J. (2020). Class Identification. In: Identifications of French People of Algerian Origin . Palgrave Politics of Identity and Citizenship Series. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-35836-5_7
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