Category Archives: Thuram

Lilian Thuram, activiste anti-raciste

Cette semaine, nous commençons notre lecture de l’autobiographie de Lilian Thuram, 8 juillet 1998. Dans la première partie du livre, Thuram raconte ses expériences en tant que jeune immigré guadeloupéen en France. Il décrit la cité des Fougères, une banlieue française dans laquelle il a grandi à partir de l’âge de 9 ans. Il la… Read More »

Deux Perceptions en concurrence de l’immigration en France

J’ai bien apprécié l’autobiographie de Lilian Thuram que les étudiants francophones ont lu la semaine dernière, et je veux ici élaborer sur mon commentaire du 7 novembre. L’autobiographie est un texte d’espoir, un texte qui démontre la possibilité illimitée qui existe en France. Sans doute, Thuram reconnaît qu’il existe certains problèmes et tensions qui tourmentent… Read More »

Lilian Thuram’s Autobiography

Published in 2004 in France — and not yet translated into English — Lilian Thuram’s autobiography 9 Juillet 1998 is a fascinating portrait of contemporary France and of the world of football. In it, he describes his childhood in Guadeloupe and his family migration to the suburbs of Paris, where he grew up in a… Read More »

The Blood of the Impure

This Post was originally published at Football is a Country. My thanks to them for permission to cross-post. The French national anthem, La Marseillaise, is, if you think about it, a pretty nasty song. It dreams, in one of its more memorable verses, that the “blood of the impure” will “irrigate our fields.” It’s a… Read More »

What Would Thuram Do?

In 1996, after France narrowly defeating Bulgaria to move on from the group stages of the European Cup competition, the French defender Marcel Desailly made a striking accusation during a press conference. Hristo Stoichkov, the star Bulgarian striker, had racially abused him during the game. “Hey Desailly, do you know that little kids are dying… Read More »

Thuram, Blanc, Zidane

With a rapidity uncharacteristic of the French state, the FFF racism scandal has already run it’s predictable course: from outrage to self-exoneration. Yesterday, the French minister of sport Chantal Jouanno announced that no laws had been broken and therefore no specific legal or administrative action needed to take place. The argument was that, while the… Read More »