Performing the Pied-Noir Family: Constructing Narratives of Settler Memory and Identity in Literature and On-Screen (After the Empire: The Francophone World and Postcolonial France)

The impact of the Algerian War (1954-1962) continues to resonate in France, where the subject was long repressed in the collective psyche. This book sheds new light on a memory community at the heart of the conflict: the million European settlers known as the pieds-noirs, who migrated to France as the war reached its bloody end. Aoife Connolly draws on theories of performativity to explore autobiographical and fictional narratives by the settlers in over 30 canonical and non-canonical works of literature and film produced from the colony’s imminent demise up to the present day. Connolly focuses on renewed attachment to the family in exile in a comprehensive analysis of settler masculinity, femininity, childhood, and adolescence that uncovers neglected representations, including homosexual and Jewish voices. Findings on the construction of a post-independence identity and collective memory have broader implications for communities affected by colonization and migration. Scholars of French Studies, Postcolonial Studies, Cultural Studies, Gender and Identity Studies, Memory Studies and Migration Studies will find this book particularly useful. Read more