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Djamila Boupacha (born 9 February 1938 in
Bologhine Bologhine is a suburb of the city of Algiers in northern Algeria ) , image_map = Algeria (centered orthographic projection).svg , map_caption = , image_map2 = , capital = Algiers , coo ...
, a suburb of Algiers) is a former militant from the
Algerian National Liberation Front The National Liberation Front ( ar, جبهة التحرير الوطني ''Jabhatu l-Taḥrīri l-Waṭanī''; french: Front de libération nationale, FLN) is a nationalist political party in Algeria. It was the principal nationalist movement du ...
. She was arrested in 1960 for attempting to bomb a cafe in Algiers. Her confession, which was obtained by means of torture and rape, and her subsequent trial affected French public opinion about the methods used by the French army in
Algeria ) , image_map = Algeria (centered orthographic projection).svg , map_caption = , image_map2 = , capital = Algiers , coordinates = , largest_city = capital , relig ...
after publicity by Simone de Beauvoir and Gisèle Halimi. Boupacha was sentenced to death on June 29, 1961, but was given amnesty under the
Evian Accords Evian ( , ; , stylized as evian) is a French company that bottles and commercialises mineral water from several sources near Évian-les-Bains, on the south shore of Lake Geneva. It produces over 2 billion plastic bottles per year. Today, Evia ...
and later freed on 21 April 1962.


Early life

Djamila Boupacha was born on February 9, 1938 in Saint-Eugène (today
Bologhine Bologhine is a suburb of the city of Algiers in northern Algeria ) , image_map = Algeria (centered orthographic projection).svg , map_caption = , image_map2 = , capital = Algiers , coo ...
) to an uneducated but French-speaking father (Abdelaziz Boupacha) and a mother (Zoubida Amarouche) who did not speak French. She joined Democratic Union of the Algerian Manifesto (UDMA) of Ferhat Abbas in 1953, at the age of 15, and later the National Liberation Front (FLN) in 19551. During the Algerian war, she used the ''nom de guerre'' Khelida.


FLN work, arrest, and torture

Early in the Algerian War, Boupacha worked as a trainee at
Béni Messous Beni Messous ( ar, بني مسوس) is a commune in Algiers Province and suburb of the city of Algiers in northern Algeria ) , image_map = Algeria (centered orthographic projection).svg , map_caption = , image_map2 ...
Hospital but was prevented from taking a certificate in training because of her race and religion. This setback played a role in Boupacha's initial rejection of the French colonial system in Algeria. On 10 February 1960, French troops raided Boupacha's household and arrested her, her father and her brother-in-law. She was accused of having planted a bomb - defused by army deminers - at the ''Brasserie des faculties'' on September 27, 1959 in Algiers. The arrestees were taken to a military barracks at El Biar where they were beaten and interrogated. Boupacha was later transferred and tortured at the prison of Hussein Dey. The torture included brutal sexual violence, including the burning of her breasts and legs with cigarettes as well as vaginal rape with an empty beer bottle, as reported by Simone de Beauvoir.Simone de Beauvoir and Gisèle Halimi, ''Djamila Boupacha: The Story of the Torture of a Young Algerian Girl Which Shocked Liberal French Opinion'' (London: André Deutsch, Weidenfeld, and Nicolson, 1962). Under torture, Boupacha confessed to planting a bomb at a University restaurant on 27 September 1959. Torture was a common experience for women who were arrested in this conflict, and rape was systematically used to terrorize and shame the Algerian community. The importance of Boupacha's case lies in her decision to bring a suit against her torturers. Though she did not deny her affiliation with the FLN and her commitment to Algerian independence, she did argue that a confession achieved under torture should not be admissible before the military tribunal that was to try her.


Trial and book publication


Publication and political implications

Working with French Tunisian lawyer Gisèle Halimi, Boupacha brought her torture case to trial, causing a scandal in France and Algeria and gaining wide public attention. Halimi and Simone de Beauvoir wrote a book entitled ''Djamila Boupacha'', with the subtitle ''The Story of the Torture of a Young Algerian Girl which Shocked Liberal French Opinion'' as part of a broader plan to “rally public opinion and to put the government on trial for violating Article 344 of the French Penal Code.” Simone de Beauvoir wrote the preface for the book pleading the Boupacha's case: Throughout the trial, Boupacha also gained the support of prominent artists and intellectuals such as
Henri Alleg Henri Alleg (20 July 1921 – 17 July 2013), born as Harry John Salem, was a French-Algerian journalist, director of the '' Alger républicain'' newspaper, and a member of the French Communist Party. After Editions de Minuit, a French publish ...
,
André Philip André Philip (28 June 1902 – 5 July 1970) was a SFIO member who served in 1942 as Interior Minister under the Free French provisional government of General Charles de Gaulle. He also served as a finance minister in 1946 and part of 1947 in the ...
, and
Pablo Picasso Pablo Ruiz Picasso (25 October 1881 – 8 April 1973) was a Spanish painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist and Scenic design, theatre designer who spent most of his adult life in France. One of the most influential artists of the 20th ce ...
. Publicizing the French use of torture was particularly damning given that “France had signed three international documents condemning torture” and, consequently, “De Gaulle repeatedly denied that torture was still used in Algeria.” Julien S. Murphy writes that the book, along with a 1960 article by Beauvoir in ''Le Monde'', sought to spread the knowledge of the French government’s unlawful torture during the Algerian War. Boupacha's violated virginity and her physical and metaphorical purity came under intense scrutiny in the court case as well as in the media. The army's practices of sexual humiliation were already known to the public, but Boupacha's case shed light on how far the army would go to protect her torturers from prosecution. Despite being asked by ''Le Monde'' to remove the statement that Boupacha had been a virgin prior to her capture, Beauvoir kept it in her article, causing Judith Surkish to explain that although “Beauvoir denounced the fetishization of virginity as the product of paternalistic ethics, here she nonetheless mobilised that figure for the sake of political argument.” Consequently, Natalya Vince claims that Boupacha and other female FLN fighters had their “bodies and sexualities…on display for public consumption.” Murphy further explains that “in her memoir, Beauvoir minimized the political content and impact” of her 1960 writing, portraying it as simply Djamila’s story, whereas it “was actually a scathing indictment of the Army." In addition to the facts of the case, Beauvoir interrogated the notion of “French Algeria,”—asking what the phrase would mean if the laws of France were set aside by the army” The article also questioned government control of the army, saying “Such an abdication of responsibility would be a betrayal of France as a whole, of you, of me, of each and every one of us.” Beauvoir further implicated all citizens in the torture of Algerians such as Boupacha, writing that “every citizen thereby becomes a member of a collectively criminal nation.” Boupacha thus became a figure at the center of “political engagement” and “public opinion.” French officials in Algeria also hindered Boupacha's access to legal representation, denying Halimi's visas to Algeria for Boupacha's court dates. Through the book, Boupacha and her supporters attempted to publicize these actions and garner support to delay the trial in order to allow her more time for preparation and visas. In an act of retaliation and silencing, the government “seized and destroyed” copies of the issue of Le Monde containing Beauvoir’s article in Algiers. The book itself, published in 1962, not only describes Boupacha’s story yet also serves as a “historical record” and Beauvoir’s “most explicit act of support for decolonization of Algeria.” The book insisted “that revulsion at Boupacha’s torture must lead to political action.” More generally speaking, scholars like Maria Vendetti argue that the text ''Djamila Boupacha'' “brings the act of torture into public discourse…despite the strong preference for denial and inattention.” However, the
Evian Accords Evian ( , ; , stylized as evian) is a French company that bottles and commercialises mineral water from several sources near Évian-les-Bains, on the south shore of Lake Geneva. It produces over 2 billion plastic bottles per year. Today, Evia ...
ended the War for Independence, freed Boupacha, and provided the Army with immunity. Thus, despite all the efforts of Boupacha, Halimi, and Beauvoir, the Evian Accords meant that her torturers ultimately could not be prosecuted.


Boupacha Committee

The Djamila Boupacha Committee was a continuation of Beauvoir and Halimi’s efforts and instrumental in drumming up public outrage. The Committee campaigned to remove the case from Algerian jurisdiction; this campaign was successful, and the case was transferred to France in December 1960. More generally, the Committee worked to free Boupacha and pressure “the government to publicly punish Boupacha’s torturers, an ambitious goal since corruption and abuse regarding the practices of torturing prisoners by the French was abetted at the highest levels.”


Contents of book

''Djamila Boupacha'' includes an introduction by Beauvoir followed by a section by Halimi focusing on Boupacha’s biography and the legal case, and finally statements by “engaged intellectuals” such as Henri Alleg, Jules Roy, and Françoise Sagan. In 1958 Henri Alleg authored a text entitled
La Question ''La Question'' (French for "The question") is a book by Henri Alleg, published in 1958. It is famous for precisely describing the methods of torture used by French paratroopers during the Algerian War from the point of view of a victim. ''La Que ...
, thereby connecting Boupacha to the other, male torture victims in Algeria and corroborating and legitimizing her statement further. Following Alleg’s and others’ reactions, the book contains Boupacha’s own testimony, the 1960 ''Le Monde'' article, Boupacha’s father’s statement, and several family photographs.


Boupacha’s reaction

Boupacha originally said that she had “never been able to read” the book titled with her own name. However, in a 2005 interview she explained that she decided to read it before an interview about fifteen years previously in order to remind herself of the dates of various events so she “‘wouldn’t say anything silly.’ Yet in doing so, she ‘felt like I was being strangled.’”


Later life and legacy


Post-war activities

After the Evian Accords, the end of the War, and the resulting Algerian independence from France, Boupacha worked in the Office for Women’s Employment. In discussing her work during this period, she mentions that she tried to lead illiterate women into trade jobs such as becoming a seamstress rather than returning to an “old colonial role for ‘indigenous women’” of being domestic cleaners. As for more educated women, she explains that she helped them “into accounting, into secretarial roles.”


Political involvement, status as national symbol

In post-independence Algeria, Boupacha remained important as an icon. The FLN used Boupacha as a symbol to support their claim to legitimacy as a one-party state. Boupacha thus became an “official envoy” for the post-independence Algerian government, acting alongside other women in the FLN as “living symbols of the fusion between forward-looking youthful courageousness and historical integrity, the harmonious coming together of pan-Arabism and socialism.” For example, in March 1963, Boupacha was one of only four individuals in the “first official delegation to Britain since Algerian independence, the guests of Queen Elizabeth.” At the time, ''Alger républicain'' wrote that Boupacha was “particularly interested in women’s organisations, whilst the men participating in this delegation have expressed a particular interest in visiting the different industrial sectors in Britain.” However, in 2005 Boupacha told an interviewer that she was selected for this delegation only because “they needed a woman,” more to improve Algeria’s public image and “fulfill a gendered role” than to engage in serious politics. She participated, though, because “she felt that she had a responsibility to serve,” the same reason why she acquiesced more generally to being a “symbol of Algeria as part of her contribution to the nationalist struggle,” despite her discomfort with this fame, preferring anonymity. Boupacha also cited the countless other women who worked towards independence but were not recognized for their efforts, saying “there are many other women who suffered more than we did and we don’t know them.” Boupacha served more as a symbol than a real person for Simone de Beauvoir as well, at least according to Halimi, who “complained that Beauvoir was more concerned about the cause than she was about Boupacha herself.” In Algiers in 1963, Boupacha visited the new Fatma N’Soumer Centre for Daughters of Shuhada with Nasser, contributing to an image that positioned the women who fought with the FLN guerillas during the war as “direct descendants of the anti-colonial struggle which had begun in the nineteenth century” and portraying “the young girls in the orphanage as representing the future of the struggle for freedom, equality and pan-Arab unity.” Historian Natalya Vince describes this as “a neat narrative of who we are, where we come from and where we are going.” Boupacha also frequently speaks to schoolchildren, generally preferring to emphasize “civic responsibility.” The Museum of the Army in Algiers contains official commemorative oil paintings of Boupacha and other female FLN members, painted from photographs approximately from the war period. In the 2000s, Boupacha also inspired a song called "Djamila" that was composed by Bernard Joyet and sung by
Francesca Solleville Francesca Solleville (born 2 March 1932, Périgueux) is a French singer. She lives in Malakoff ( Hauts-de-Seine). She is the granddaughter of the founder of the . She is married to the painter Louis . Biography Francesca Solleville was born in ...
. Her legacy also lives on in popular culture through Picasso's artwork inspired by her. Composer
Luigi Nono Luigi Nono (; 29 January 1924 – 8 May 1990) was an Italian avant-garde composer of classical music. Biography Early years Nono, born in Venice, was a member of a wealthy artistic family; his grandfather was a notable painter. Nono beg ...
wrote "Djamila Boupachà" in 1962, part of his Canti di vita e d'amore.


References


Further reading

*Simone de Beauvoir and Gisèle Halimi, ''Djamila Boupacha : the story of the torture of a young Algerian girl which shocked liberal French opinion'' (London: André Deutsch, Weidenfeld, and Nicolson, 1962). * Zahia Smail Salhi, "Boubacha, Djamila," in ''Dictionary of African Biography'', vol. 1 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012), 498-500. * Rita Maran, ''Torture, The Role of Ideology in the French-Algerian War'' (New York: Praeger Publishers, 1989). * Philip Agee, "Torture as an Instrument of National Policy: France 1954—1962," ''Social Justice'' 17 no. 4 (1990): 131-138 * Page Whaley Eager, "The 'Wretched of the Earth' Rebel: Women and Wars of National Liberation," in ''From Freedom Fighters to'' ''Terrorists: Women and Political Violence'' (Burlington VT: Ashgate, 2008). * ''Pour Djamila'' (2011), film dir.
Caroline Huppert Caroline Huppert (born 28 October 1950) is a French film director and screenwriter. She is the sister of French actress Isabelle Huppert and has directed more than 30 films since 1977. Early life and career Huppert was born in the 16th arron ...
with
Marina Hands Marina Hands (born 10 January 1975) is a French stage and film actress. Hands is the daughter of British director Terry Hands and French actress Ludmila Mikaël, and the granddaughter of Ukrainian-Greek painter . She studied acting at the Cou ...
and
Hafsia Herzi Hafsia Herzi (born 25 January 1987) is a French actress and film director. She is best known for her debut role in the award-winning Franco-Tunisian feature '' The Secret of the Grain'' for which she won the award for most promising actress at the ...
. * ''
Ce soir (ou jamais !) ''Ce soir'' (English: Tonight), was a French daily newspaper founded by the French Communist Party and directed by Louis Aragon and Jean-Richard Bloch. History The newspaper was established on the initiative of the Communist Party general sec ...
'',
France 3 France 3 () is a French free-to-air public television channel and part of the France Télévisions group, which also includes France 2, France 4, France 5 and France Info. It is made up of a network of regional television services provi ...
, 20/03/2012, with Gisèle Halimi, Marina Hands, Hafsia Herzi and Sylvie Thénault

*Vince, Natalya. ''Our Fighting Sisters : Nation, Memory and Gender in Algeria, 1954-2012''. Manchester University Press, 2015. {{DEFAULTSORT:Boupacha, Djamila People of the Algerian War People imprisoned on charges of terrorism Torture victims 1938 births Living people African women in war Women in 20th-century warfare People from Bologhine Violence against women in Algeria