(80 min., 2014, in French with English subtitles)
Click on image to watch a clip
Directed by Fatima Sissani, Les Gracieuses is a group portrait of six young women in their late twenties. The daughters of immigrant parents, they were born in the same building in a poor housing project in the eastern suburbs of Paris and have developed a deep friendship and unbreakable solidarity. They joyfully narrate their experiences of work and spatial relegation; explore their class and race identities; and interrogate the contradictions of French Republican integration.
Followed by a roundtable discussion in English:
Non-white Feminism in Contemporary France
FATIMA SISSANI
Journalist, documentary filmmaker; director of La Langue de Zohra; Les Gracieuses
ZAHRA ALI
Sociologist, Rutgers University; co-founder of Une école pour tou-te-s/Contre les lois d’exclusion; co-editor of Féminismes islamiques
MICHELE MITCHELL
Historian, NYU; author of Righteous Propagation: African-Americans and the Politics of Racial Destiny After Reconstruction (2004)
SYLVIE TISSOT
Sociologist, Université de Vincennes-Saint-Denis-Paris 8; feminist activist; author of Good Neighbors: Gentrifying Diversity in Boston’s South End
Institute of French Studies Event