Summary (Opinions and attitudes of the Abidjan population to vaccination against Covid-19)

Abstract (A Neo-slave Narrative Reading of Colson Whitehead's The Underground Railroad (2016))

Kpatcha Essobozou Awesso^§

Abstract: Colson Whitehead's TheUndergroundRailroad (2016) is a narrative that carries the reader to the historical context of the abolitionist movement of the nineteenth century United States of America. More than two (2) centuries after, Whitehead re-imagines this episode of African American history in a skillful readership that deserves critical attention. Why does Whitehead retell the history of the abolitionist movement known as the Underground Railroad in fiction? Why does he choose a twelve year girl, Cora as the central character? Is the theme of slavery still relevant in today's social discourses? These are some questions that call on a literary analysis of this masterpiece. The paper relies on the Neo-slave Narrative approach to analyze the rationale behind this historical novel.

Keywords: Neo-slave narrative, the Underground Railroad, Abolition, Slavery, Neo-Slave Narrative Approach.

Summary: Colson Whitehead'sThe Underground Railroad (2016) is a narrative that transports the reader into the historical context of the 19th-century abolitionist movement in the United States of America. More than two (2) centuries later, Whitehead re-imagines this episode in African-American history in a deft read that deserves critical attention. Why does Whitehead recount the history of the abolitionist movement known as the Underground Railroad in fiction? Why does he choose a twelve-year-old girl, Cora, as his central character? Is the theme of slavery still relevant in today's social discourse? All these questions call for a literary analysis of this masterpiece. This article uses the neo-slavery narrative approach to analyze the logic of this historical novel.

Keywords: Neo-slavery narrative, the Underground Railroad, abolition, slavery, neo-slavery narrative approach.

Introduction

Reimagining the past in contemporary literary creation is not new, especially if the whirling effects of this past have lasted throughout the time. For instance, in the American context, black slavery and its consequences much fueled literary imagination known as the Slave Narrative genre. This literary genre accounts for the evils of bondage, written either by former slaves or scholars outside the slavery system. Ruth Miller and Peter. J. Katopes write about Slave Narratives that, they:

have their roots in Puritan writings, particularly in journals, diaries, autobiographies, and narrations, all designed to record the Puritan experience of the "walk with God." Slave narratives use a similar form to record the flight to freedom; they are chronological in structure, episodic, and provide little, if any, transition. Events are drawn from common experience; incidents that dismay or horrify or repel are frequently recounted with a lack of passion usually associated with literature designed to demonstrate the truth. There are auction blocks, lashings, escapes, and recaptures; there are tears and prayers and exhortations; there are special providences recorded, coincidences, suspenseful moments in flight, tricks to outwit captors, all of this presented in a tone that is pervasively sober. If there is a preponderance of gloom, there is also optimism; despair mingles with joy. And the overriding purpose of the narrative is to activate the will of the reader to abolish first the slave trade and finally slavery. (21)

Miller and Katopes provide a comprehensive definition of the Slave Narrative literary genre, which emerged at the post-Civil War America as a medium of slaves' accounts of their lives in bondage. Many decades after slavery, writers still frisk in the memories of the antebellum South to bring out some untold stories with contemporary expectations. The imagination of slaves' accounts to make them relevant in contemporary context is what is known as Neo-slave Narrative, and Colson Whitehead's The Underground Railroad (2016) is an example. Ashraf H. Rushdy in his book Neo-slave Narratives: Studies in the Social Logic of a Literary Form declares that "Neo-slave narratives are modern or contemporary fictional works substantially concerned with depicting the experience or the effect of new world slavery" (533). Rushdy argues that the contemporary world exhibits some forms of enslavement typical to the historical black slavery in the Americas, and creative writers address such issues by using the slave narrative tradition. These slave narratives in contemporary literature are qualified as neo-slave narratives, since they carry the traditional slave narrative features, but have contemporary implications. Marta Frątczak opines that ''.... saving from oblivion the memory of the dispossessed, and conveying their historical experience through fiction, has always necessitated finding the way to reconcile undocumented histories with the practical demands of novelistic narration''(33). According to Frątczak, the necessity to retell slave narratives today resides in the writers' commitment to keep the slaves' memory alive and exhume untold stories in order to heal the black people's bitter past. Colson Whitehead released TheUndergroundRailroad in 2016, and Michael Szczechowski argues that:

Whitehead uses the simple premise of a slave girl's odyssey through a hellish, early^19th century southern United States and conveys his thoughts and concerns for modern-day America, specifically of the lingering effects that slavery and racism has had on Americans, and bravely paints an honest picture of the people we are.

Szczechowski is then suggesting a contemporary interpretation of Whitehead's fiction which addresses modern day societal concerns from a Slave Narrative perspective. Bernard W. Bell argues that Neo-slave Narratives "combine elements of fable, legend, and slave narrative to protest racism and justify the deeds, struggles, migrations, and spirit of black people" (289). Bell's definition takes into account black people's frustrations born from the antebellum South tradition, and that justifies their behavior among other ethnic groups in America. Bell seems to argue that, in a Neo-slave Narrative, there are some ashes of the past brought in the present to understand the behavior of the descendants of slaves in contemporary America. Angelyn Mitchell refers to the genre as "liberatory narratives", since they mostly focus ''on the enslaved protagonist's attainment of freedom" (4). Mitchell's assertion is much complex when she uses the term ''liberatory narratives.'' She seems to refer to stories, in which the protagonist forcibly attains freedom, softening by then the atrocities and inhuman conditions he had to face before reaching freedom. The reading of Whitehead's historical novel goesads me to venture on the field of Neo-slave Narrative. From the preceding critics' views, my work argues that, Colson Whitehead's creative work not only refreshes slaves' conditions of the antebellum South, but also seems much allegorically to address contemporary social injustices and how to cope with them. The paper focuses on the contemporary meaning that Whitehead's novel carries and which makes it a Neo-slave Narrative. The interest of this analysis resides in the novelist's choice of plantation Slave Narrative tradition to address contemporary racial issues in the United States. If black people still fight for freedom up to this twenty first century, it means that the ghost of slavery still haunts them and they should get rid of it. Obviously, the study is conducted from a Neo-slave Narrative perspective, which deals with contemporary creation of Slave Narratives. The Neo-slave Narrative theory helps in this context draw a contemporary meaning and relevance of Whitehead's antebellum South narrative. Apart from Whitehead's novel which is the primary source of this work, additional information will be drawn from articles, books, and other relevant materials to strengthen the point being made. The work first overviews the Neo-slave Narrative genre with reference to Whitehead's novel by discussing the meaning of the title, the thematic approach and the characterization. Further, the paper analyses the relevance of reimagining Slave Narratives in the twenty first century as a form of resistance.     

1. The Underground Railroad: A Neo-Slave Narrative

Colson Whitehead's novel is published in 2016, when the Black Lives Matter movement was already rallying thousands of people to the cause of innocent and defenseless black male victims of white police murderers. Nikita Carney writes:

The BLM movement began in 2012 when George Zimmerman was acquitted after shooting and killing 17-year-old Trayvon Martin in Florida. Three Black women activists, Alicia Garza, Patrisse Cullors, and Opal Tometi, started the movement that subsequently engaged many, including many youth of color, in social justice activism across the country (181).

The movement evolved as an outcry for justice to the innocent victims of police harassment. It is quite arguable that Whitehead's novel finds a fertile ground for debate, since it is all about a struggle for freedom, just like the contemporary Black Lives Matter movement. Whitehead's novel opens with the account of Ajarry, the grandmother of Cora, the protagonist. Ajarry is arrested and sold to slave traders at the port of Ouidah, and eventually shipped to the New World^[1] where she was sold many times to different plantation owners. Cora was resentful to escape slavery when Caesar brought the idea for the first time, (TUR 9) but when she remembered Mabel, her mother, she decided to flee. The story evolves through Cora and Caesar's hard journey northwards, stopping times to times at railroad stations, where some secret agents helped them with food and accommodation until they reached north. Ridgeway, a slave catcher was to bring Cora back to Georgia, but was ultimately defeated in a fight against Cora in a railroad station on Valentine. The Underground Railroad, though published in the twenty first century tells the story of a runaway slave girl, bringing the reader centuries back in the South American slavery tradition. Bringing back fugitive slaves' narratives in the twenty first century is Colson Whitehead's concern in The Underground Railroad, and he must have strong motives to refresh the old slavery tradition in a contemporary American society where the descendants of the former slaves are still oppressed. Colson's novel which is classified as a Neo-slave Narrative genre is part of many fictional works produced by non former slaves and out of the context of slavery, but which vividly depict the lives of black slaves on the southern plantations.

The debate around this literary genre has gained interest since its rise in the second half of the twentieth century, and according to Ashraf H. Rushdy, the Neo-slave Narrative genre is about the "contemporary narrativity of slavery" concerning "contemporary novels that assume the form, adopt the conventions, and take on the first-person voice of the antebellum slave narrative" (3). Rushdy refers to writers, who never experienced slavery, but deal with the plantation narrative style, of course with a specific purpose in mind. Valerie Smith observes that, the Neo-slave Narrative genre mostly refers to:

texts set during the period of slavery as well as those set afterwards, at any time from the era of Reconstruction until the present. They approach slavery from a myriad perspective [...] from realist novels grounded in historical research to speculative fiction, postmodern experiments, satire and works that combine these diverse methods (168).

Smith contends that, the Neo-slave Narrative genre is a writing style that alerts on the still rampant residues of bondage and injustices in America. The Neo-slave Narrative is a genre that links the past slavery pains to contemporary ones and Saidiya Hartman argues "If the ghost of slavery still haunts our present, it is because we are still looking for an exit from the prison" (133). Bridging past slavery traumas to the present forms of injustices (especially done to black people) is not only an outcry to end social injustices, but an opportunity to reveal some untold stories about slavery, and make them fit the modern social calamities. This is an alternative reception of slave narratives which were supposed to end with the last survivors of slavery. Timothy A. Spaulding observes in his work Re-forming the Past: History, the Fantastic, and the Postmodern Slave Narrative that, modern narratives on slavery ''create an alternative and fictional historiography based on a subjective, fantastic, and anti-realist representation of slavery" (2). Conclusively, a Neo-slave Narrative is the blending of Slave Narrative genre storyline with contemporary paradigms that serve as clues to draw meaning. Colson Whitehead's The Underground Railroad better fits the Neo-slave Narrative genre from its third person narrative point of view, where the reader is well informed about characters challenges and their inner thoughts. The traditional narratives by former slaves have mostly involved adults struggling to free themselves from the grids of bondage, but Whitehead's novel spots a fifteen years old Cora, a defenseless girl who is fighting alone against the whole slavery structure. Whitehead's choice of a vulnerable character foreshadows the degree of hardship ahead on the journey of freedom. Ridgeway, the villain is defeated in a close fight with the young Cora, and this implies that, the oppressed must stop running away from the evil, but he must definitely fight and cancel it from his existence. The contemporary meaning of the Slave Narrative genre is its still recurrent theme of injustice done to the most vulnerable people of the society, and which requires their own investment for total liberation, in the image of Cora.         

2. The Underground Railroad: Struggle against Institutionalized Injustice

Colson Whitehead may have enough reasons to name his fictional work after the historical anti-slavery movement known as the Underground Railroad. Junior Ranger in his article ''Discovering the Underground Railroad'' writes:

The "Underground Railroad" is not actually a train operating along hidden railroad tracks. Instead, it refers to an idea. The Underground Railroad refers to the efforts of enslaved African Americans to gain their freedom through escape and flight-and the assistance of people who opposed slavery and willingly chose to help them to escape-through the end of the U.S. Civil War.

This anti-slavery movement was according to slave holders an illegal movement and this is in response to their assumptions that the title is given to the novel, to keep a close watch on social injustices and fight them. In this perspective, it is arguable that the title of Whitehead's novel is to remind the readers that, in contemporary societies, there are still many forms of human subjugations, and philanthropists must rally with victims in their search for liberation as was the case of abolitionists. The title of Whitehead's novel is to be understood beyond the context of African Americans' bondage, which in fact provides much of the meaning to the narrative. Addressing to the Underground Railroad in the twenty first century may suggest that, there are new tales about the movement (the untold ones or the new interpretation the former ones embody today). There are hidden forms of injustices which politics fails to notice, and even when the victims raise alert, they are repressed by laws that seem too old to contemporary realities.

Colson Whitehead's novel finds place in contemporary discourse because of the continuous subjugation of the masses by a handful of powerful people. Though the institutionalized black slavery is legally abolished, it had left much stain on the victims' psyche. Their past trauma still springs whenever justice is twisted. In this part of my analysis, I consider the struggle for freedom, which is the main idea of Whitehead's novel as a relevant topic in contemporary discourse. In her research work titled Modern Representations of the Underground Railroad in Philadelphia Eldra D. Walker investigates what remains of the antislavery movement in Philadelphia and comes to the conclusion that, for the sake of memory and what it represents today, it must be preserved.

There are many ways to preserve the UGRR. One way of preserving the story of the UGRR is to preserve the documented 'stations' where fugitives sought aid. Another method is re-telling the stories of those fugitives who escaped bondage. In recent years, Congress has created laws to determine if the story of the UGRR can be preserved and how to honor the story of the UGRR. However, to truly commemorate and interpret the story of the UGRR, it must be reframed with the preservation of the stories of slavery, antislavery, and other forms of resistance (24).

In the center of Walker's argument stands the imperious need to retell or reframe the stories of those who were involved in this philanthropic system. In Whitehead's fictional context, the scenes of atrocities inflicted on black slaves meet the sympathy of Sam, one of the white conductors of the Underground Railroad. Sam's job is to feed and host fugitive slaves, and upon Cora's and Caesar's arrival at the station, he declared: "This is my job,"... "You wait here until they come and fetch you"... "You made it,"... "You're really here".... "You're a long way from Georgia,"... "South Carolina has a much more enlightened attitude toward colored advancement than the rest of the south. You'll be safe here until we can arrange the next leg of your trip. It might take time" (TUR 73, 74). Still in the hands of the conductors of the Underground Railroad, Cora and Caesar are not safe and this accurately shapes the novel's vibrant quest for freedom. Conclusively, Lander, one of the slave catchers remarks on the Valentine farm that, "Here's one delusion: that we can escape slavery. We can't. Its scars will never fade" (TUR 217). The novel finds its contemporary relevance in Lander's words, which much bend on the psychological everlasting scars of slavery, that still exist in twenty first century under various forms, and much exercised against the descendants of black slaves. The Underground Railroad is a readership that serves as a reminder of the right of all human beings, regardless any difference in the pursuit of happiness, as stipulated in the preamble of the Declaration of Independence. It is because the handful of people on power position marginalizes the right of the masses that protests and discomforts of all sorts are regularly expressed in modern societies. Whitehead displays the constant search for freedom in modern societies through the repetitive advertisements of reward (that begin some of the chapters of the narrative) for he who brings back a runaway slave to his holder (TUR 15, 68, 112, 155, 183). These advertisements are the very insidious facet of the unconstitutionally institutionalized black slavery, since runaway slaves are never safe, even once in antislavery territories. Cora, the heroine of the narrative did never rest, she was always held in motion, most of the time hiding from Ridgeway, the slave catcher and his crew. Her endless run much illustrates the unsafe human conditions, which need to be permanently improved regarding the new contexts.

The plight of the black characters in the novel is visible through the author's use of some paradigms embodying contemporary interpretation: the Griffin Building which is twelve stories high and the hob, which represents a modern psychiatric asylum or a ghetto. The Griffin Building is the highest building of the town and it hosts many businesses, among which Mr. Anderson's office of contracts in cotton (TUR 69-70). The Griffin Building with its high-tech features and the businesses its hosts represent modernity and the American capitalism, which has much developed from slaves' labor. By purposely inserting modern symbols in a story that is supposed to occur in a far remote time, the author is foreseeing the endless black slavery in the context of modern progress. The hob on Randall plantation is the cabin of the outcast women slaves (TUR 33-34), and it quietly fits a psychiatric asylum of modern times. This also helps understand how social ostracism worked on black people at the post-Civil War reduced them into psychologically disabled people overcrowded into ghettos and slums.    

3. The Underground Railroad: Empowering Women

Colson Whitehead gathers appropriate and efficient materials in the hands of his heroine for her project of running for freedom. Cora is described as a fragile and a strong female character, much lucky enough to overcome all the adversities on her way to freedom. The narrator recalls that Cora has inherited the capacity to cope with difficulties from her grandmother Ajarry and resistance from Mabel, her mother (TUR 18). Cora's odyssey from the Randall plantation in Georgia to her encounter with Ollie the last conductor of the Underground Railroad heading to California (TUR 232) is much like a fairytale. It seems that all the gods are with her and assist her whenever trouble comes. Cora represents all these social disinherited and unprivileged who struggle to achieve an average living in the midst of social challenges. Cora's young age, contrasted with the enormous challenges she faces quietly determines the strong moral character that hosts her innermost. Cora has to be empowered in one way or the other in order to endure the brutalities of plantation life and the dangers of the flight. Depicted from the image of Harriet Tubman, the well-known female figure of the historical Underground Railroad movement, Cora's omniscient thoughts guide her along her journey. She temporally lived in South Carolina under a fake identity: ''BESSIE Carpenter was the name on the papers Sam gave her at the Station'' (TUR 72). Sam is one of the white agents operating on the Underground Railroad, and his assistance allows Cora to temporally enjoy freedom before her hunter Ridgeway erupted in the city. Cora's permanent flight from one station to another well illustrates the unrest state of the contemporary marginalized, who demonstrate from various forms to have their requests heard and satisfied. She is a modern emblem of protest as she embodies many social representations like gender, race, age etc. Visibly, by choosing Cora as the protagonist, Whitehead enhances the discourse of struggle for freedom, which has formerly involved adults and much more male characters. Current protests around the world are much rallied on social networks platforms where the youth stand as key actors. Commenting on the central role played by the youth in contemporary social movements discourse, Nikita Carney observes in ''All Lives Matter, but so Does Race: Black Lives Matter and the Evolving Role of Social Media'' that, ''While the public sphere is not universally accessible, the rise of social media appears to be increasing accessibility to national discourse, particularly for youth who are coming of age with the rise of this technology'' (184). The rapid control of the internet by the youth, who ask for much freedom and justice all across the world, may have weighted on the Whitehead's choice of Cora as the central freedom fighter. Cora's early awareness about the unconstitutional aspect of slavery from now on strengthens and fuels her behavior:

The whites came to this land for a fresh start and to escape the tyranny of their masters, just as the freemen had fled theirs. But the ideals they held up for themselves, they denied others. Cora had heard Michael recite the Declaration of Independence back on the Randall plantation many times, his voice drifting through the village like an angry phantom. She didn't understand the words, most of them at any rate, but created equal was not lost on her. The white men who wrote it didn't understand it either, if all men did not truly mean all men..... Stolen bodies working stolen land. It was an engine that did not stop, its hungry boiler fed with blood (TUR 91).

For Cora, the Declaration of Independence rightly stipulates that: ''We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness'' (XLV). Cora better understood the controversy of the institutionalization of slavery after reading the above passage, and started searching for ways to readjust it. Being endowed with such great ingenuity, Cora is able to play her card through the manacles of the system, but still she is hunted by Ridgeway, the unrest slave catcher and his crew, who symbolize modern structures of hindrance to human fulfillment. Cora's final encounter with Ridgeway is a close fight in which the slave catcher is severely wounded, watching helplessly Cora run away. The scene of their fight is recalled as follows:

Tonight I will hold him close, as if in a slow dance... She waited until the slave catcher was on the third step. She spun and locked her arms around him like a chain of iron. The candle dropped. He attempted to keep his footing with her weight on him, reaching out for leverage against the wall, but she held him close like a lover and the pair tumbled down the stone steps into the darkness. They fought and grappled in the violence of their fall...Cora untwined herself from Ridgeway and crawled toward the handcar, left leg in agony. The slave catcher didn't make a sound. The big bone in the man's thigh stuck out of his trousers and his other leg bent in a gruesome arrangement (TUR 229).

Obviously, Cora could not stand her hunters' assails and Whitehead has to get her miraculously out of danger. Her victory over Ridgeway and his men makes her a heroine of black protest, and furthermore an emblem of universal freedom fighter. Nihad M. Farooq argues that ''Ridgeway hunts Cora with a particular vengeance because he had lost track of her mother, Mabel, who ran from Randall six years earlier'' (88) and this explains his ferocious assails on Cora. She has to be more than an ordinary character, doubly assisted by the Providence and the sympathy of strangers she met on her northward journey to freedom. 

4. The Underground Railroad: Reimagining the Slave Narrative Genre in the Twenty First Century

The reader may be inquisitive about the relevance of Whitehead's The Underground Railroad in the twenty first century beside the emergence of new trends in creative literature. I hold it that, reimagining a Slave Narrative genre in the contemporary context may imply an articulation of resistance against modern forms of injustices. The then plantation slavery that subjugated black people is translated into modern context of injustice, ranging from the fight for human rights to the engagement into ecological causes. Exhuming the Slave Narrative genre today in creative literature is to relight the flame of hope among desperate people, because it is a story of hard struggle to remain alive and afterward free in a country where minorities struggle to make a safer place for themselves and their descendants. Especially, for black people, a Slave Narrative genre in the twenty first century is a reminiscence of their endless journey to freedom. In Whitehead's novel, slavery is not to be solely considered as the historical Trans-Atlantic trade and servitude of Africans in the Americas, but all hindrances (mostly man made) to human fulfillment. The contemporary context of violation in human rights suggests to think of slavery beyond the historical enslavement of Africans on the American soil. It would be much incoherent if Colson Whitehead had told the story from a stereotype black slave point of view, without inserting contemporary paradigms (the high tech Griffin Building, the women hob, the clinical tests on black people) to make it meaningful for his readership. In other words, Whitehead's novel displays some features "which were not typically reflected in the slave narratives of the nineteenth century" (Von Rönn 17). If the Slave Narrative genre is still meaningful today, it is because of the various shapes slavery has taken according to Saidiya Hartman who argues that:

If slavery persists as an issue in the political life of black America, it is not because of an antiquarian obsession with bygone days or the burden of a too-long memory, but because black lives are still imperiled and devalued by a racial calculus and a political arithmetic that were entrenched centuries ago. This is the afterlife of slavery-skewed life chances, limited access to health and education, premature death, incarceration, and impoverishment (6).

These are in Hartman's words the new forms of subjugation which refresh the dark memories of the nineteenth century black enslavement, and harboring towards equal rights for all, will help cure the psychological wounds of the past trauma and turn a new page to write the common history. The American country that claims itself democratic and an example in matter of human rights enforcement is contrastively the field of many injustices toward non-whites from the colonization to the recent demonstrations of the Black Lives Matter movement. The black people's plight started when the illegal slavery system was institutionalized as a compromise to the southern states' request to save the Union. Royal, one of the free black characters operating on the Underground Railroad in the novel remarks: "And America, too, is a delusion, the grandest one of all. The white race believes-believes with all its heart-that it is their right to take the land. To kill Indians. Make war. Enslave their brothers. This nation shouldn't exist, if there is any justice in the world, for its foundations are murder, theft, and cruelty. Yet here we are'' (TUR 217). Royal then captures the illegal way used by the nation to dominate and oppress it own people and much more other countries on the international level. As long as African Americans and other minorities are forced on the margins of the American Dream, the Neo-slave Narrative genre will continue growing as a contemporary great literary form of resistance. The genre, then, becomes the cornerstone of the fight against racism, discrimination, and other forms of oppression exercised on the most vulnerable social groups by some people holding power.

Conclusion

This paper has investigated some characteristics of the Neo-slave Narrative literary genre in Colson Whitehead's novel The Underground Railroad. The argumentation stems from this question: how relevant is an antebellum Slave Narrative in the twenty first century? At the end, the analysis has revealed that Whitehead's historical novel, though released in 2016 tells the story of Cora, a fugitive slave girl. The Slave Narrative genre, which emerged at the post-Civil War era, did not fade because of its central issue which is the slaves' struggle to survive and make their stories known to their descendants. The genre has evolved with the writers' reference to modern paradigms in their works and it became a Neo-slave Narrative genre, but did not lose its plantation tradition aspect. Fundamentally, this work has argued that, Whitehead's The Underground Railroad departs from the Slave Narrative tradition to address contemporary forms of injustice that prevent African Americans and other minorities to achieve the American Dream. It is quite illusory to ignore that, though the historical slavery is abolished, other forms of enslavement and alienation are well marshaled by the hegemonic white dominant voice to keep the rest under control. The historical slavery in the novel is symbolic to any obstacle (usually man made) that threatens human happiness. The storyline that channels the ghost of slavery from Ajarry to her granddaughter Cora well illustrates the endless inhuman treatments faced by African Americans, and which are currently expressed through the demonstrations of the Black Lives Matter movement and other forms of protest. The novel is relevant in the contemporary context where human rights are being rudely violated under the conspiracy of some heartless decision makers. The paper has also argued that, Whitehead incisively attacks injustice through Ridgeway's brutality on the young and defenseless Cora. The Slave Narrative genre (which deals with the protagonist's endeavor to achieve freedom) finds its relevance in contemporary context because it addresses the same issue of freedom, but under other forms, and with other actors, which not forcibly black people. This is to say that, no one is spared from the social oppression, and even the most vulnerable must stand up like Cora and fight, if they aspire to survival. Moreover, the study has argued that, by reimagining the slaves' hard struggle to freedom in the context of current challenges, Whitehead simply reminds us that slavery still exists, but under various shapes, and Cora's fight must incite optimism in people who have lost faith in the possible attainment of the American Dream.

Works Cited

Bell, Bernard. W. The Afro-American Novel and its Traditions. USA: The University of Massachusetts Press, 1987.

Carney, Nikita. ''All Lives Matter, but so Does Race: Black Lives Matter and the Evolving Role of Social Media.'' Humanity & Society, Vol. 40. 2, 2016, pp. 180-199.

Farooq, Nihad. M. "A Useful Delusion: Valentine Farm and the Flight for Freedom.'' Utopian Studies, Vol. 30, No. 1, 2019, pp. 87-110.

Frątczak, Martha, "History as Now: Allegorical (Re)visions of the Slave Experience in Caryl Phillips's Crossing the River (1993)." Commonwealth Essays and Studies 40.1. 2017, pp 33-43.

Hartman, Saidiya. Lose Your Mother: A Journey Along the Atlantic Slave Route. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2007.

Miller, Ruth. and Peter, J. Katopes. ''Slave Narratives'' in Thomas M. Inge, Maurice Duke and Jackson R. Bryer (eds) Black American Writers. Palgrave Macmillan, London. 1987, pp 21-46.

Mitchell, Angelyn. The Freedom to Remember: Narrative, Slavery and Gender in Contemporary Black Women's Fiction. London: Rutgers University Press, 2002.

Ranger, J. Discovering the Underground Railroad https://www.nps.gov/common/uploads/teachers/lessonplans/UGRR-Junior-Ranger-Activity-Booklet.pdf. Accessed: 04/04/2022.

Rushdy, Ashraf. H. Neo-slave Narratives: Studies in the Social Logic of a Literary Form. New York: Oxford UP, 1999.

Smith, Valerie. ''Neo-slave Narratives'' in Audrey Fisch (Ed.), The Cambridge Companion to the African American Slave Narrative. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2007, pp. 168 - 185.

Spaulding, Timothy. A. Re-forming the Past: History, the Fantastic, and the Postmodern Slave Narrative. Columbus: Ohio State University Press, 2005.

Szczechowski, Michael. '21, on The Underground Railroad. From https://sites.udel.edu/honors/michael-szczechowski-21-on-the-underground-railroad/ Accessed 30/03/2022.

The Declaration of Independence 1776: https://uscode.house.gov/download/annualhistoricalarchives/pdf/OrganicLaws2006/decind.pdf Accessed: 04/04/2022.

Von Rönn, Stephanie. The Re-creation of History: Narrative Constructions in the African- American Neo-slave Narrative. Saarbrücken: Verlag, 2008.

Walker, Eldra. D. Modern Representations of the Underground Railroad in Philadelphia. A Thesis in Historic Preservation Presented to the Faculties of the University of Pennsylvania in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Master of Science in Historic Preservation, 2007.

Whitehead, Colson. The Underground Railroad. New York: Doubleday, 2016.

How to cite this article:

MLA: Awesso, Kpatcha Essobozou. "A Neo-slave Narrative Reading of Colson Whitehead's The Underground Railroad (2016)". Uirtus 2.1. (April 2022): 265-280.

§ University of Kara, Togo / [email protected]

[1] Colson Whitehead. The Underground Railroad(New York: Doubleday, 2016), 9 Subsequent quotations from this edition will be marked (TUR) followed by the page number.

Summary (The identity of the transcultural character in Rachid Boudjedra's La Répudiation and Printemps)

Alexis N'Dui-Yabela^§

§ University of Bangui / [email protected]

Summary: The encounters between the various characters in Rachid Boudjedra's texts often set the scene for a complex, conflicted world. Analysis reveals that the character-foreigner is always perceived by the character-narrator as an Other, and therefore likely to be a danger. This situation creates a permanent tension that is perceptible both in the discourse produced by the protagonists and in their interactional attitudes. Thus, in this corpus of novels by Rachid Boudjedra, the characters follow a fairly identical path in three stages: a situation of conflict between the protagonist characters, then a rapprochement of different identities, and finally an overcoming of differences, creating an identity of difference. Our aim is to show that the construction of the transcultural character in Boudjedra's texts bears witness to the aestheticization of a style of writing inclined to cultural dialogue. We will also show that the transcultural character is itself the bearer of an essential problematic, that of identity.

Key words: Conflict, Alteration, Otherness, identity of difference, transcultural character.

Abstract: The encounter between the different characters in the texts of Rachid Boudjedra often depicts a complex and conflicting world. Upon analysis, we realize that the stranger-character is always perceived by the narrator-character as an Other and therefore likely to be a danger. This situation creates a permanent tension which is perceptible as much in the discourse produced by the protagonists as in their interactional attitudes. Thus, in this corpus of novels by Rachid Boudjedra, the characters experience a fairly identical path in three stages: a situation of conflict between the protagonist characters, then a rapprochement of different identities and finally an overcoming of differences thus creating an identity of difference. Our reflection consists in showing that the construction of the transcultural character in the texts of Boudjedra testifies to the aestheticization of a writing inclined to cultural dialogue. We will also indicate that the transcultural character carries within himself an essential issue, that of identity.

Keywords: Conflict, Alteration, Otherness, identity of difference, cross-cultural character.

Introduction 

In most of Rachid Boudjedra's texts, the interactive relationship between the protagonist characters is often quite complex and conflictual. In this balance of power, the foreign character constitutes a nodal point insofar as he or she is perceived by the narrator-character, who is often of Arab-Muslim culture, as an Other who carries a culture at odds with Arab-Muslim socio-cultural values. This foreign character is likely to be a danger to the narrator. This situation creates a permanent tension between the protagonists. In our corpus, the diegetic relationships between the characters often follow a fairly identical pattern, starting with a situation of conflict between the protagonists, such as the acquisition of traditional Arab-Muslim values, mistrust of the Other, and subversion of the excesses of one's own culture. This is followed by an alteration of identity, paving the way for a rapprochement with the Other, characterized by otherness and acceptance of the Other. Finally, at the end of the alteration stage, the character-narrator finds himself in a transcultural situation, having acquired other identities along the way. He becomes aware of his cultural contingency, but finds it difficult not only to identify the transferred elements, but also to separate himself from them. This situation explains the notion of the "identity of difference" (Bueno 7-22). What is this process of transcultural identity? To answer this question, we use the transcultural approach proposed by Hédi Bouraoui (2005) to discuss the various foundations of transcultural identity. We also use elements of the bibliographical approach to highlight the characteristics of transcultural identity in Boudjedra's characters.

1. From H. Bouraoui's "identity of difference": questioning self-identity

The question of the difference of identities finds its implication in the adjectival term "transcultural", which seems more applicable to the level of identity and aesthetics. Semantically, there is an oppositional relationship between "identity" and "difference", but this oppositional relationship between the two terms refers to one and the same reality when we use the expression "identity of difference", which introduces a new perspective into the evaluation of diversity, while at the same time conferring an oxymoronic quality on it for reading and analyzing works that pose the problem of identity contradiction or plurality.

Thus, identity and difference remain two key concepts in Boudjedra's fiction, as the oppositional relationship between these two terms implies the character of all human identity, whose essential component is an unknown strangeness by which we are all foreign beings condemned to absolute strangeness (Bouraoui 14). The discovery of the other and of difference leads to an awareness of this strangeness that is inherent in all human beings, and the approach to the other is but one particular form of migration. And according to Boudjedra, writing is the perfect form of the migratory experience; and according to the Algerian author, a migrant is essentially a foreigner.

Boudjedra's transcultural perspective is seen as both a conscious participation in and tension between the cultures of the native and foreign characters. Often, these protagonists of the narrative see these exchanges as the manifestation of a dynamic of "loss and gain" in Tassinari's terms between the culture of origin and the host culture (Tassinari 23). The notion of evolution remains at root an anthropologically highly dynamic perspective, since according to (Lamore 43-48) the notion of transculturation is not linked to a moment or an isolated factor, but is indeed a secular, constant, permanent process. This permanence in the process of transcultural identity construction is both objective and necessary.

Played out entirely in terms of reconciling contrasts, the notion of an identity of difference proves to be an effective approach to the evolution of the conflict generated by culture shock, both in terms of individual identity and interaction. It is through this choice that the character, as an evolving subject in the diegetic universe, manages to transform the different identities acquired into an identity of difference.

 In La Répudiation ou Printemps, Boudjedra makes his characters adopt characters that reflect the identity of difference. He presents most of his characters-narrators as subjects lost in their own society, unknown to themselves, enigmatic and without a fixed identity. As such, these characters are the source of all societal ills: violent, transgressors, homosexuals, lesbians, sadomasochists, alcoholics, psychopaths and others. They are also the source of the conflicts that constantly pit them against the Islamist clan. In fact, this contingency status of subversive characters often has a link with history, since these characters remarkably base themselves on the history of their country's colonization, or decolonization, to either distrust the foreigner, or castigate all the Clan's accomplices, whom they see as another form of colonization.

Better still, Boudjedra describes the diegetic space of the characters-narrators as a space historically under Western domination, which engenders cultural and identity transformations in him, a phenomenon that would be at the origin of their identity transmutation.^[1] which explains why they oscillate between attraction to and rejection of theOther. This attitude is all the more evident in Rachid and Teldj, characters whom we consider to be essentially transcultural subjects. We should also mention that the transcultural subject is a transcendent subject.

The transcultural character Rachid's portrayal of his foreign lover Céline in La Répudiation takes a transcendental approach. The proof is that Boudjedra stages a fictitiously complex world, made up of two entities: on the one hand, Algeria, still attached to a patriarchal tradition represented by the fundamental unit that is the family, and on the other, the Stranger, France, symbol of aggressive modernity that forces openness. It should also be pointed out that the conflict between Rachid and Céline is a social-historical one, that of an Algeria in search of an identity after its tragic colonization by France, Céline's country of origin. And yet, there was something in common between these two characters from historically conflicting backgrounds. Nevertheless, Boudjedra uses cross-cultural strategies to create situations of reciprocity or confluence between Rachid and Céline. Clearly, Céline too has been repudiated by her native society, forcing her to immigrate in search of an identity, just like the narrator Rachid. This is how she resembled Rachid, in terms of identity: "Céline resembled me! I was double and so was she" (15).

So, from this point on, all the interactional relationships between Rachid and Céline change. Henceforth, the narrator refers to her as: mon double (15), ma congénère (16), mon amante (18). With the negotiation of identities complete, the narrator, who initially resisted narrating his account of a trashed childhood, regained his wits and adopted the normal disposition to begin his tale (19).

To succeed in such an exercise, which is both an outlet and a catharsis, Céline's presence is crucial, for without her, Rachid would never find the opportunity to recount his memories. Her function is to free the narrator to speak: "There's no need to chew over all that," she says, "tell me about your mother instead..." (14); "Tell me more about your mother." (16); "Raconte, disait-elle" (41). She is far from being consumed by curiosity, and gives the impression of living a tale without becoming involved in it, since she is not a speaking subject (Maingueneau 71), but a veritable clutch of Rachid's discourse with her injunctive phrase, which is fairly recurrent in the text: "parle-moi" ("speak to me").  

Rachid, aware of the cooperative power his words have on his lover, never stops talking. He enchants her with his eloquence, the better to hold her back: "I was left with this desire to make her suffer by enclosing her in a white veil where she would have wiggled like a tentacled octopus" (18).

Similarly, there is an almost congenital resemblance between Teldj and his Spanish lover Nieve, as the letter carrier informed him:

But one morning, the letter carrier rang Teldj's doorbell to ask him to sign a registered letter, and chatting away he said: "Did you know that your neighbor's name is Nieve? They say it means snow in Spanish. So she's named after you! You have the same first name! Isn't that funny? And she's Spanish! She's from Granada. That's funny too, isn't it? Granada, the land of our Andalusian ancestors" (...) (Teldj = Nieve (in Spanish) = Snow!) (Spring 140-141)

All these similarities between characters from different cultures are neither trivial nor gratuitous. They are nurtured by Boudjedra's deliberate cross-cultural pretexts. Reading Rachid Boudjedra's novels takes us into a world of disillusionment, intimately linked to the eternal confrontation of identities between European/African, Colonizer/Colonized, here/elsewhere, Self/Other, Native/foreign, male/female , etc. Thus, through his modern writing style, Boudjedra has succeeded in tracing a world of encounter and recognition of differences, even an identity of difference. He marks a turning point in the representation of the Other, an Other who is defined by the Self, through language as well as culture, notably values relating to history, politics and sexuality; in short, we accept the way in which the Other perceives the world and we undergo it. And all this is woven into a complex imaginary that translates transcultural identity.

2. The different foundations of transcultural identity

2.1. Biographical and social foundations

Rachid Boudjedra's novels are a space where identities are produced; for the Algerian author, it's quite simply a breeding ground for identity encounters. The present analysis focuses on the social foundations of literary creation and, more specifically, on the influence of a writer's various socialization frameworks on the identity modalities of his literary practice. These frameworks reveal potential correlations between the aesthetic form of the text and the social contexts in which it is produced (Harchi). From this perspective, the case of the French-speaking Algerian writer Rachid Boudjedra is of particular interest. 

Investigating identities in Boudjedra's literary work thus leads us to consider intimate and collective history as the crossroads at which a series of transpositions, negotiations and readjustments take place, which, once brought to light, are likely to reveal "the mechanisms of the literary factory" (Lahire 67). Drawing on a corpus comprising biographical elements, novel texts and a set of comments made by Rachid Boudjedra, as well as critical discourses on his literary work, we will seek to understand the writer's various identity constructions. 

When we look at Rachid Boudjedra's social trajectory from a biographical point of view, we can see that he has built up a social identity over time, marked by a solid educational background. Born into a bourgeois family, his mother was a housewife, busy bringing up her three children, two boys and one girl, while his father was a wealthy merchant. Rachid Boudjedra grew up in Ain Beida, in the Aurès region of Algeria. Interviewed by Hafid Gafaïti, Rachid Boudjedra himself looks back on this early period of his life:

I first went to Koranic school at the age of four. Then French school from the age of six. Doubled by an Arabic curriculum. In other words, I went to Arabic school in the evenings, after leaving French school. That meant I spent around fifteen hours a day at school. It should be remembered that Arabic was not taught in schools during the French colonial period. There were private schools operating in the evenings, which were free but financed by donations from citizens and volunteers. This dual learning took place in Ain Beida, the village where I was born (Gafaïti 13).

 Boudjedra then began his studies in Constantine and continued them in Tunis at the Collège Sadiki, renowned at the time for its courses in literature, science and mathematics. Often described as modern, they were taught in Arabic as well as French. As the writer explains

Then my father sent me to high school in Tunis. I went to Collège Sadiki, just to study, where Arabic was taught alongside French. It was a bilingual and elitist education. All courses were doubled. For example, we studied maths in French and Arabic, natural sciences too, and so on. All subjects were taught in both languages (Gafaïti 13-14).

All these elements seem to be good indicators that Rachid Boudjedra belongs to an affluent social universe where capital, particularly economic capital, was deployed to help the young child acquire solid linguistic and intellectual skills. This parental and paternal investment in the son's education signals, on the one hand, an acute awareness of the opportunities for social advancement offered by schooling in an "elitist" establishment and, on the other, a strategic know-how likely to give concrete expression to the family's ambition. This seems to us all the more remarkable, and therefore significant, given that this ambition is part of a colonial context in which the education system is the privileged place for the exercise of symbolic domination, in that it "aims principally at the appropriate acculturation of the workforce destined for the colonists or for emigration, since the school dispenses both: knowledge and the ways of using it well" (Colonna 128).

  The family environment in which Rachid Boudjedra grew up was thus characterized by a singular ability to circumvent the social determinisms that the colonial system imposed on the vast majority of the Algerian population at the time. Thus, from a social (or family) identity in opposition to the colonial system, young Rachid, as a social product, constructed an individual identity, this time in opposition to his progenitor father and, through him, to the patriarchal system based on religion.

    This time, we'll be analyzing another identity that the Algerian author forged through his political commitment. At the turn of the 1960s, Rachid Boudjedra, then aged 19, chose to take part in the pro-independence struggle. His fight against the French presence in Algeria took the form of a particularly active Marxist militancy. It's all about identity politics. Here's how the writer talks about it:

I discovered Marxism when I was seventeen, and I immediately embraced this ideology because I was a rebellious child. Rebellious to a whole sociological context characterized essentially by the feudal relations that existed within my family. Hypocrisy, lies and exploitation reigned supreme. So, very early on, Marxism seemed to me to be a philosophy, a worldview that opposed this family feudalism. At first, of course, and in an almost sensitive, affective, sentimental way. There was a ground for me to become a Marxist. For example, my father employed hundreds of workers, and by working with them I became aware of exploitation and injustice. When I was very young, I was shocked by the fact that one of my father's workers slept in the stables with the horses, on the hay, winter and summer alike. Above all, I was struck by the situation of women within the family, by the contempt in which they were held, by their blind passivity, by their fear. At the same time, I realized that there was something rotten in the Algerian way of life in the early 1950's. (Gafaïti 25-26)

And he adds, a little further on:

The situation was conducive to understanding social injustice, in that my mother's family was very poor, whereas my father's was immensely wealthy. So, naturally, I was drawn to my maternal family and in particular to my grandfather, whom I didn't know very well. He died when I was barely ten years old. Living within this contradiction, I understood what political sociology was all about. Class. Exploitation. History. My maternal grandfather was a railway worker. My maternal uncle was also a worker. This opposition brought me to a certain awareness, and I think it was even decisive. But I was only at the sensitive stage. My maternal grandfather and uncle were Communists. They always fascinated me because they were very human, very concerned about others and very original. To be a Communist in the 1940s, in a village located in a very rich agricultural region where French colonists and Algerian feudalists ruled the roost, was no mean feat. And then, after this sentimental adhesion, came the conscious adhesion. At the age of twenty-two, I joined the P.C.A. I remained faithful to it for the rest of my life, since I'm still with it today, without interruption. (Gafaïti 28)

What we find particularly interesting here is the way in which Rachid Boudjedra subjectively defines his own political identity through the constitution of family history and Marxist commitment. Indeed, throughout his text, the writer makes little reference to the difficult political context in which Algeria found itself at the time, with the most violent war of liberation raging in the country from November 1954 to July 1962. Rachid Boudjedra uses the term "family" five times, and "colon" only once, to create a strong, direct link between his experience of social injustice within his own family and his political activism within the Algerian Communist Party. The writer's acute sensitivity to the issue of class conflict thus seems to have been formed very early on, in childhood. In this sense, his belief in the communist ideal does not seem to us to be so much a new and spontaneous stance on historical and colonial issues, but rather the reinforcement of an old attitude towards the theme of injustice.

After suffering a serious knee injury, Rachid Boudjedra became a representative of the Front de Libération Nationale. He then embarked on a period marked by numerous trips to Spain and Eastern Europe. As an Algerian, I was confronted with anti-colonialist resistance at a very early age. I saw the war at close quarters, and it made me realize the vital importance of history" (35), or: "I was involved and structured in the Algerian war at a very early age" (36).

In Rachid Boudjedra's retrospective discourse, we see associations between individual and collective identities, on the one hand between family realities and the colonial fact, and this through a form of personal and intimate knowledge forged to the rhythm of the ordeals encountered; and on the other, a deep interest in collective history. As with any creative process, all these biographical and socio-historical data would have implications for Boudjedra's novels.

2.2. The basis of conflict: the balance of power between characters

On reading the texts in the corpus, four characters distributed two by two in the novels in the corpus represent figures of subversion. They have all been revolted by the same situation and share the same vision: that of overturning taboos and breaking down fanaticism of any kind. We will focus on characters such as Rachid and Zahir in La Répudiation, and Teldj and Malika in Printemps.

• Rachid

Rachid is one of the narrator-characters in La Répudiation who has experienced enormous torment and hallucinations because his mother has been repudiated by Si Zoubir. From that moment on, Rachid will hate his father and all Islamic dignitaries, as well as the precepts of the Muslim religion. He decided to confront those he now considered his tormentors. His act of subversion focused on religion, politics and sexuality, desecrating religious dogma as an alienating, castrating system(19-21) "My parricidal pleasure was blissful. To kill the cat, all the cats" (139). He revolts against his father to avenge his mother. He fantasizes and sharpens his desire for parricide.

• Zahir

Zahir is a character in La Répudiation, Rachid's older brother. As such, he shares Rachid's conviction. When Zahir declares: "I'm a bad Muslim". Basically, the adjective "bad" says everything about Zahir's status or position vis-à-vis Islam. Moreover, in the statement " Zahir is a bad Muslim ", we deduce the negative phrase "Zahir is not a good Muslim". In this logic, it is suggested that he ignores the precepts of the Muslim religion, or simply that Zahir is "a bad practitioner": he transgresses the laws of the religion by indulging in alcohol, fornication, homosexuality, ataraxia, refusing to pray five times a day, and paradoxically considers Mecca a place of kleptomaniacs and hypocrites, and so on.

From all these analyses, we note that Zahir seems more subversive than his brother Rachid, since in the text, Zahir's revolt against his father and religion seems to be more pronounced, especially through his acts of desecration. This state of affairs has also led him to commit acts of fanaticism. Yet Boudjedra is determined to fight fanaticism at all costs. This may justify Zahir's death in the plot.

• Teldj  

The construction of the characters in the corpus is virtually identical. Teldj's revolt against the Islamists stems from the latter's beheading of her mother Selma. The reasons for this crime are based on one of the ideological-religious precepts that strictly prohibits abortion in all its forms. Teldj's mother had violated this prescription by performing abortions on women, as we read on pages 76 and 77 of Le Printemps: "Selma (...) performed abortions strictly forbidden by law, to help peasant women who were having too many children to please their husbands."

In Printemps, Teldj decides for herself about her sexuality, choosing not only to be a lesbian but also to practice it with a non-Muslim woman, May, a Chinese woman:

She [May] is naked and her body, now open, shows off the vagina's wound. "My mediocre vagina, then, which pisses daily urine and menstrual blood, where the male long ago decided to stick his penis and nose for eternity. And that's what females use for their coquetry and seduction, even though it's nothing more than an anatomical lizard, a physiological fistula, a cyclonic red eye that regulates the world! (...) May is very beautiful too (...) Back and forth. Her nimble hand pokes into her sex. May is a mischievous girl(Spring 14-15).

The homosexuality, lesbianism and other acts of sexual perversity practiced by Teldj and her friends characterize her as a subversive character in Printemps. Malika, the novel's other character-narrator, is also a victim of Islamist fanaticism.

• Malika

Malika's nymphomania is first triggered by her excision, a practice imposed on pubescent girls in traditional societies. Then, her rape by an old Arab man. These events provoke traumas that manifest themselves in violent hallucinations. She decides to take revenge with her sex, and therefore with her body. Boudjedra describes female circumcision, ritually performed with roosters, and male rape of young girls as crimes fueled by religious fanatics. So he animalizes one of these fanatics, the old Arab, whom he compares to a black rooster:

The black rooster (...) stuck his beak into the voluminous vagina, as if puffed up, as if swollen, and in everything he found in this space surrounded and limited by Malika's two spread legs, held upright or seated by two or three women, pecked happily into Malika's lump of flesh incised into two equal parts (...) the cats making a circle around the victim and ready to meow to catch the first drop of blood.(Printemps, 87-88)

After this rape, Malika loses her dignity and decides to lead a life of debauchery. She swindles the clan's bourgeoisie using her sex. Swindling and debauchery have become her daily life in the city. She doesn't hesitate to use black magic to better tame and despoil those she now calls the bastards of civilization, the Islamists. As was the case with Zahir in La Répudiation, Malika is a particularly subversive character who also meets a tragic fate. She is run over by a streetcar.

At the end of our analysis, we conclude that both the novels we have chosen feature subversive characters. In fact, the author offers symmetrical characters in terms of the similarity of their actions and fates. Zahir and Malika seem more subversive than Rachid and Teldj. This gives two visions of subversion: constructive subversion, which proposes a social ideal, and negative subversion, which leads subjects like Zahir and Malika to fatality and death. All these acts of vengeance give these characters subversive traits, since it is presumed that the pragmatic aim of these acts is to break social taboos by attacking everything considered sacred. This positioning of each of these subversive characters subsequently produces subversive discourses.

2.3. The foundation of otherness: the narrator-character's view of the stranger

• Rachid / Céline

            Rachid is a young Algerian who tells the story of his mother's repudiation. This repudiation is the starting point for the events and images of a traumatized childhood. The young Rachid grew up in the bosom of reclusive women, surrounded by the tenderness of a terribly lonely, illiterate mother who nonetheless bequeathed him a taste for Arab-Berber culture. In the empire and under the sway of a polygamous, feudal father, Si Zoubir, the young narrator suffers many wounds.

This brief presentation of the character already reveals two identities in Rachid the narrator. The first is social, linked to his community: he is Algerian and Muslim. The second is individual, born of the narrator'sinner self . He is in revolt against the father figure, the clan and the religion in the name of which his mother was repudiated. As such, he considers himself a stranger in his clan.

Céline, a female character in the novel, is French and has immigrated to Algeria. She, too, is an outsider on a quest to fill the identity void inside her. Despite socio-cultural differences, Céline, the Frenchwoman, is Rachid's foreign lover. As in the statement: "I had to defend her, because she too was a victim in the same way as the other women of the country she had come to live in"(La Répudiation 13).

The word "victim" in this excerpt suggests that Céline is also a woman repudiated by her homeland, France. This would justify her adventure in search of identity. Earlier, after his mother's repudiation, Rachid said to himself: "I didn't want to contradict the principles I had forged throughout my nightmares, in which women always played very important roles". (13)

In fact, Céline is said to have suffered the same fate as Rachid's mother, creating a rapprochement that fosters otherness between Céline and Rachid. Céline, the foreign lover, is now a figure who defines Rachid'sinner self . The proof is that she becomes the clutch of the narrative, asking Rachid, whenever the need arises, to take up the story of repudiation.

 Céline is an essential figure in the construction of discourse by her interlocutor Rachid. The text even goes so far as to say that the relationship between Rachid and Céline has become very intimate as a result of the discourse. Already at the start of the story, Rachid referred to Céline as his "lover", then his "similar", then his "double" and finally his "mistress", his "congener" or his "French lover" (213). So we consider this resemblance to be not insignificant.

The reasons for the coexistence of Rachid-narrator and Céline can also be found in paratextual data, which constitute significant referential clues in discourse analysis. For example, Boudjedra's thesis on one of French writer Louis-Ferdinand Céline's masterpieces was based on a number of biographical sources (Gafaïti 35).^[2]another writer excluded and marginalized in his own country, France. In real life, Boudjedra married a French woman. All these extratextual clues would justify Boudjedra's ultimate adoption of Céline as an alter ego. From these analyses, we can deduce that otherness is an existential reality between Rachid and Céline.

• Teldj / Nieve

It's true that in today's globalized world, relations between cultures are becoming increasingly frequent and take on all sorts of configurations: exchanges, confluences, influences, frictions and even conflicts. Yet literature remains by far the most emblematic place where certain questions about interculturality are asked and often answered. In Printemps, Teldj takes a look at his immigrant neighbors. Teldj's desire for otherness stems from his quest to discover the real causes of his neighbors' immigration.

Initially (p.9), relations between Teldj and her immigrant neighbors were very complex and tense, precisely because she was culturally ignorant of her neighbors. She found them strange and rude, and therefore hated them. So far, we assume that this character is in non-alterity. But, some time later, what brought Teldj closer to her neighbors were the foreign languages in which the neighbors communicated when they talked on the phone:

They telephoned, or rather shouted into their cell phones, their instructions or orders to interlocutors in offices in London, Barcelona, Paris, Moscow, Dubai, Shanghai or New York"; "And so, unwittingly, Teldj learned a few phrases of Russian and a few snatches of German, and perfected her English and Spanish. But what annoyed her most was the dump that had become the terrace they occupied.(Spring 9.)

From this moment on, Teldj puts into perspective her initial image of her neighbors. From then on, a process of interaction, exchange and reciprocity is set in motion. As Carmel Camilleri points out: "We speak of interculturality when the concern arises to regulate relations between these carriers [carriers of different systems], at the very least to reduce the untoward effects of the encounter, at best to enable them to benefit from its supposed advantages" (Camilleri 35), Teldj too understood that her neighbors, whether immigrants or expatriates, had nothing to do with it, because it could happen to anyone. She recalled that she too "had spent two years in China, teaching Arabic language and civilization at Shanghai University, thanks to cultural exchanges".

Apart from this first aspect of otherness made possible by language teaching and cultural reciprocity, Teldj will have another interaction with Nieve, her new Spanish neighbor who occupied the terrace after the departure of this horde of immigrants.

This time, with Teldj's predisposition to otherness, everything seems to move fast. Like Boudjedra's other character-narrators, notably Rachid and Zahir, Teldj has been in revolt against her society, culture and religion ever since her mother was beheaded by Islamists. As a result, her desire to reform this society is gaping inside her. She wanted this "open society, that is, a society betting on building its performance on exchange, diversity and respect" (Badie and Sadoun 18-19).

The otherness between Teldj and Nieve is not only physical but also biological, despite their differences. Teldj (Algerian) and Nieve (Spanish) have the same first names, referring to the same referent in both languages. Their first names mean "Snow". The two young women were all born in January, in the middle of winter, and in the same year, 1984. They are the same age: 30. They share the same passions, the same characters (83). So many natural and cultural coincidences bring the two women together, and they end up loving each other, frolicking and expressing their otherness.

From all these analyses based on the alteration and otherness of the characters in the two novels, we have been able to see that each of the characters carries an individual or social identity, depending on his or her history. By understanding the cultural and social systems of the Other, each character adapts his or her identity to a format that resembles neither the initial identity nor the one acquired through the system of cross-fertilization with the Other, which is precisely how he or she becomes a transcultural subject (Kanga 7-21).

Conclusion

At the end of our analysis of the novels in Rachid Boudjedra's corpus, we realize that the character, taken as a creative datum, constitutes in Boudjedra's text a pretext for social reconfiguration. Firstly, he presents himself as a figure of conflict for reasons of cultural, historical and sometimes even sexual divergence. Secondly, as in any situation of conflict, the character undergoes a phenomenon of alteration as he rubs his stereotypes against those of the Other. In this way, he becomes modalized, transfigured and finally gives in to otherness. And it is precisely otherness, as a parameter of negotiation and contingency of differences, that finally favors the emergence in the subject-character of an identity of difference, which is in reality no more than an identity of cultural transcendence, thus placing the cultural consciousness of the transcultural subject in an intermediate zone. In this way, Bouraou's approach to identity is based on a dynamically metamorphosing "split self" that harmonizes the self and the for-self of otherness. We are thus faced with a new type of character, which we are attempting to call the " transcultural character". The transcultural process leading to the construction of the transcultural character can be summed up as follows: Conflict-Alteration /Alterity-Transcultural Identity. This process could be the subject of even more in-depth analysis to improve it, but what we can be sure of is that new French-language writing is increasingly characterized by cross-views, cultural rapprochements, the recognition of differences as an element of diversity rather than conflict, and the birth of a transfugal identity stripped of all individuality and culturocentric narcissism.

Works quoted

Alemdjrodo, Kangni. Rachid Boudjedra, la passion de l'intertexte, Bordeaux, P.U.B. Pessac, 2001.

Belhabib, Assia. "Une poétique de l'interculturel: entre littératures francophones d'ici et d'ailleurs, Université Ibn Tofail, Morocco, 2010.

Bertant, Badie and Marc Sadoun (dir). L'Autre, Presses de Sciences Po, 1996.

Boudjedra, Rachid. Praxis et catharsis chez Louis-Ferdinand Céline, DES, La Sorbonne, 1967.

---- La Répudiation, Paris, Denoël, 1969.

---- Printemps, Algiers, Barzakh, 2014.

Bouraoui, Hédi. Transpoétique. Eloge du nomadisme, Ontario, Mémoire d'encrier, 2005.

Buono, Angela. "Transculturalism: from the origin of the word to the "identity of difference" in Hédi Bouraoui," in journal internationale d'études canadiennes No. 43, 2011.

Bronckart, Jean-Paul et al. Le fonctionnement des discours : un modèle psychologique et une méthode d'analyse, Paris, Delachaux et Niestlé, 1985.

Camilleri, Carmel. "Le relativisme, du culturel à l'interculturel", in L'individu et ses cultures, L'Harmattan, 1993, volume 1.

Colonna, Fanny. Instituteurs algériens (1883-1939), Algiers, Presses de la Fondation Nationale des sciences politiques and Offices de publications universitaires d'Alger, 1975.       

Coulibaly, Adama. "Critique transculturelle dans le roman africain francophone : Aspects et perspectives d'une théorie", Annales de l'Université Omar Bongo, N° 17, 2012.

Diop, Papa Samba. Fictions africaines et postcolonialisme, Paris, L'Harmattan, 2002.

Gafaïti, Hafid. Boudjedra, ou la passion de la modernité, Paris, Denoël, 1987.

Grenier, Eugène. La berbérie, L'islam et la France, Paris, Ed. de l'Union Française, 1950.

Kanga, Arsène Konan. "Le roman transculturel francophone, un roman des convergences d'écritures", in Rhésus, 2011.

Kaoutar, Harchi. "La création littéraire au carrefour de l'histoire intime et de l'histoire collective," online February 26, 2015, accessed April 26, 2021.

Maingueneau, Dominique. Éléments de linguistique pour le texte littéraire, Paris, Bordas, 1986.  

Molley, Koffi Litinmé. "Appendix on transculturality", Lomé, University of Lomé, 2020.

Tassinari, Lamberto. "Meaning of transculture" The Vice Versa transcultural project. Proceedings of the CISQ International Seminar, Rome, November 25, 2005.

How to cite this article:

MLA: Akakpo, Kokouvi Jean-Paul. "De l'identité du personnage transculturel dans La Répudiation et Printemps de Rachid Boudjedra". Uirtus 2.1 (April 2022): 370- 387.

§ University of Lomé / [email protected]

[1] Romuald Fonkoua quoted in Anissa Talahite-Moodley, Problématiques identitaires et discours de l'exil dans les littératures francophones, Ottawa, Les Presses de l'Université d'Ottawa, 2007, p. 1.                                                   

[2] Rachid Boudjedra, Praxis et catharsis chez Louis-Ferdinand Céline, DES, La Sorbonne, 1967.

Résumé (La gouvernance des politiques publiques de protection sociale des enfants au Sénégal)

Résumé (La gouvernance des politiques publiques de protection sociale des enfants au Sénégal)

Au Sénégal, la gouvernance et la production de l’action
publique dans les politiques de protection sociale de l’enfant sont
exécutées par plusieurs acteurs. Cet article analyse les dynamiques qui
existent dans cette gouvernance polyarchique sur ces politiques. Cette
coproduction et cette gouvernance polyarchique est une arène où les
confrontations, les interactions, les luttes, les conflits, les compétitions
entre acteurs contribuent à la progression de la vulnérabilité de l’enfant.
Les résultats obtenus montrent que les multiples interactions entre les
acteurs fragilisent les interventions. Les pratiques et les attitudes dans la
prise en charge de l’enfant s’inscrivent dans des logiques différentes. La
gouvernance polyarchique constitue un frein dans les réalisations des
politiques publiques de protection sociale de l’enfant.
Mots-clés : Gouvernance polyarchique, action publique, protection
sociale, vulnérabilité, interaction.

Résumé (Une vie de bonne ou les employées de maison maliennes à Niamey)

Résumé (La communication selon Jürgen Habermas)

Résumé (Rentas mínimas ante la pobreza y la exclusión social: Un estudio comaparado entre Cataluña y Euskadi)

Kassoum Soro§

Resumen: En Cataluña y en Euskadi, el número de personas con graves dificultades económicas y sociales va creciendo. Ante la precariedad, las autoridades catalanas y vascas elaboran programas de rentas mínimas en sus Comunidades Autónomas respectivas. Se trata de prestaciones de carácter económico a fondo perdido orientadas hacia la lucha contra la pobreza y la exclusión social. El presente artículo examina las analogías y diferencias entre las prestaciones de rentas mínimas desarrolladas en Cataluña y en Euskadi. Entre estas políticas sociales, se destacan similitudes y divergencias. El método utilizado para llevar a cabo el presente estudio es la investigación de campo.

Palabras clave: Cataluña, Euskadi, pobreza, renta mínima, comparación

Abstract: In Catalonia and Euskadi, the number of people with serious economic and social difficulties is growing. Faced with the precariousness the Catalan and Basque authorities elaborate minimum income programs. These are economic benefits aimed at combating poverty and social exclusion. This article examines the analogies and differences between the minimum income benefits developed in Catalonia and the Basque Country. Among these social policies implemented in both Autonomous Communities, similarities and divergences stand out. The method used to carry out the present study is field research.

Keywords: Catalonia, Euskadi, Poverty, Minimum Income, Comparison  

Introducing

Ante las situaciones de vulnerabilidad, las autoridades de Cataluña y las de Euskadi elaboran programas de rentas mínimas. Son políticas de lucha contra la pobreza y la exclusión social (Noemi et al 401). Se trata de prestaciones de carácter económico a fondo perdido orientadas a mejorar las condiciones de vida de las capas sociales afectadas por la precariedad. La renta mínima de inserción es una acción de solidaridad que promueve la inserción o la reinserción social y laboral.^[1] Esta prestación nació en Euskadi en 1986 (Hernández 84). Su implantación tuvo lugar de forma concatenada en las Comunidades Autónomas (Ana 83). Esta iniciativa social queda muy fragmentada y carece de homogeneidad. (José Luis 426). Pero, valiéndose de esta herramienta de lucha contra la precariedad, los poderes públicos reconocen a los ciudadanos el derecho a un mínimo social de inserción (José 207). En las Comunidades Autónomas, las rentas mínimas hacen hincapié en los desempleados y en las personas afectadas por la pobreza y la exclusión social (Manuel 94). Ellas pretenden responder a la creciente demanda sin desincentivar el acceso al empleo (Lucía 161). Los programas de rentas mínimas son prestaciones sociales llevadas a cabo a nivel autonómico. Sin embargo, a la hora de diseñar estas políticas sociales, los poderes públicos catalanes y vascos comparten la misma filosofía: luchar contra la pobreza y promover la integración social. De esta forma, los programas de rentas mínimas elaborados en Cataluña y en Euskadi son susceptibles de abarcar analogías y diferencias. Para descubrirlas, nos interesamos en su estudio comparado. A nuestro entender, existen similitudes y divergencias entre las políticas de rentas mínimas puestas en marcha en Cataluña y en Euskadi.

El presente estudio pretende poner en evidencia las analogías y las diferencias que se observan entre las prestaciones de rentas mínimas desarrolladas en la Comunidad Autónoma de Cataluña y en la de Euskadi. Este artículo consta de tres partes. La primera parte trata de la metodología. La segunda parte remite a los resultados. En la tercera parte abordamos la discusión de los resultados.

1. Metodología

La metodología que usamos abarca el tipo de investigación, el muestreo y las diferentes técnicas de investigación que nos permitieron llevar a cabo el presente trabajo.

1.1. Tipo de investigación

Este estudio es el fruto de una investigación de campo. Sin embargo, antes de la encuesta, hicimos hincapié en la investigación documental que se fundamenta en la recolección, la selección y el análisis de datos. Se trata de un método de carácter interpretativo encaminado a examinar el contenido de las lecturas del investigador (Luis 230). De esta forma, nos interesamos sobre todo por libros y artículos que tratan de los programas de rentas mínimas en Cataluña y en Euskadi. El trabajo de campo se desarrolló entre el 5 y el 27 de agosto de 2015, en la Comunidad Autónoma de Cataluña y en la de Euskadi, precisamente en Barcelona y en Bilbao. Se trata de una encuesta cualitativa que nos facilitó datos recogidos directamente de la realidad (Mario 110). Recolectamos estos datos primarios mediante entrevistas que mantuvimos con los sujetos investigados (Fidias 31).

1.2. Muestra

El muestreo consta de dos Responsables de la Generalitat de Catalunya (Gobierno de la Comunidad Autónoma de Cataluña) y de tres miembros del Gobierno de Euskadi. Se trata de especialistas en políticas sociales. Se encargan del diseño, de la puesta en práctica, de la gestión y de la valoración de los programas de lucha contra la pobreza y la exclusión social, respectivamente en Cataluña y en Euskadi.

1.3. Técnicas de investigación

Con vistas a la salida al campo de investigación, elaboramos un cuestionario que mandamos, respectivamente, a la Generalitat de Catalunya (Gobierno de la Comunidad Autónoma de Cataluña) y al Gobierno de la Comunidad Autónoma de Euskadi (Gobierno del País Vasco). En un primer lugar, usamos la técnica de la entrevista estandarizada programada. Consiste en plantear a todas las personas encuestadas, una serie de preguntas idénticas, pero de respuestas libres y abiertas (Miguel 180). A lo largo de la entrevista, el investigador puede plantear nuevas preguntas (Carlos Arturo 198). Adoptamos esta actitud para sacar mejor provecho de la encuesta. En un segundo lugar, nos servimos de la técnica de la investigación comparada que lleva al investigador a moverse de forma dinámica entre los acontecimientos y su interpretación. (Roberto Hernández 7). Por fin, El análisis de contenido nos permitió explotar toda la documentación que estaba a nuestro alcance.

2. Resultados

Las políticas públicas de rentas mínimas de inserción elaboradas en Cataluña y en Euskadi quedan gestionadas por varios actores sociales. Tienen una estructura organizativa, su malla de seguridad social es de carácter universalista y tienen un régimen económico específico.

2.1. Programa de la Renta Mínima de Inserción en Cataluña

Para luchar contra las situaciones de vulnerabilidad, la Generalitat de Catalunya (Gobierno de la Comunidad Autónoma de Cataluña) despliega el programa de la Renta Mínima de Inserción por todo el territorio de Cataluña. Se gestiona mediante la Comisión de la misma.

2.1.1. Organización administrativa de la Renta Mínima de Inserción en Cataluña

En Cataluña, la gestión de la RMI (Renta Mínima de Inserción) está en manos de la Comisión Interdepartamental de la Renta Mínima de Inserción. Ella actúa como órgano de dirección y coordinación de las funciones de los Departamentos de Trabajo y de Bienestar Social. También se establecen mecanismos de coordinación del programa de la Renta Mínima de Inserción con los Departamentos de Enseñanza, Justicia, Sanidad Seguridad Social. Para mejor gestionar esta prestación, los Consejeros o las Consejeras de Trabajo y de Bienestar Social nombran a un Presidente o una Presidenta y a un Secretario o una Secretaria con carácter rotativo.^[2]

Con la misma finalidad, la Comisión Interdepartamental de la Renta Mínima de Inserción se dota de un órgano técnico administrativo. A esta Comisión, le corresponde impulsar la aplicación de esta prestación de carácter económico en todos sus aspectos. En este sentido, emite informes sobre los proyectos relacionados con la política social de la RMI (Renta Mínima de inserción) y coordina las actuaciones relativas al programa de la Renta Mínima de Inserción. Además, la Comisión Interdepartamental de la Renta Mínima de Inserción se encarga de coordinar las colaboraciones de las entidades de iniciativa social que participan en la puesta en práctica de esta política pública.^[3]

Por una parte, la Comisión ya mentada evalúa periódicamente la prestación de la renta mínima de inserción con el fin de valorar su grado de desarrollo y los resultados de su aplicación. Por otra parte, la Comisión Interdepartamental de la Renta Mínima de Inserción propone al Gobierno de Cataluña las modificaciones necesarias en la normativa reguladora de dicha prestación. Ella planifica, diseña y mantiene las estadísticas ligadas a la Renta Mínima de Inserción. Por fin, esta Comisión cuenta con un Comité de Seguimiento del programa de la RMI (Renta Mínima de Inserción) que abarca una representación de las administraciones locales, las representaciones de iniciativa social, las organizaciones profesionales, sindicales, empresariales y cívicas relativas a los fines de la prestación de la Renta Mínima de Inserción.^[4]

2.1.2. Tipos de prestaciones de la Renta Mínima de Inserción en Cataluña

Cabe mencionar que la renta mínima catalana tiene por objeto proporcionar a los hogares, recursos convenientes destinados a la inserción social y laboral (Ramón y Anna 27). En otros términos, la noción de inserción se ubica en el corazón del programa de la renta mínima de inserción (Joan 323). Se trata de una política activa de empleo (Ramon 13). Entre la tipología de las prestaciones de la Renta Mínima de Inserción figuran las prestaciones de urgencia y resarcimiento. Es importante subrayar que su concesión provisional por las administraciones locales no implica necesariamente la aprobación del PIR (Plan individual de Inserción y Reinserción). Otra prestación del programa de la Renta Mínima de Inserción es la del apoyo a la integración social. Sus actuaciones remiten a la integración de carácter psicológico, social y educativo, a la información y orientación para que la persona afectada por la precariedad conozca los servicios otorgados por las Administraciones.^[5]

Las acciones de formación de adultos forman parte de las prestaciones de la renta mínima de Cataluña. Consisten en actuaciones formativas dirigidas a las personas adultas con la finalidad de proporcionarles la formación básica. También, las autoridades de catalanas otorgan a los titulares de la Renta Mínima de Inserción, prestaciones de inserción laboral. Son prestaciones de motivación, orientación y de formación ocupacional destinadas a la incorporación de sus beneficiarios al mercado laboral. El Departamento de Trabajo organiza las actuaciones de apoyo a la integración laboral mediante empresas y entidades de inserción, administraciones u otras instituciones colaboradoras.^[6]

 En el programa de la renta mínima catalana, la prestación económica es muy relevante. Tiene carácter periódico y queda sujeta al correcto desarrollo del plan individual de inserción y reinserción. Su cuantía está en función de las cargas familiares de la persona perceptora. Tiene como finalidad atender las necesidades de alimentos y subsistencia. Es gestionada por el Departamento de Trabajo y puede otorgarse de forma complementaria con otros ingresos de los beneficiarios. Cabe señalar que la prestación de la Renta Mínima de Inserción está dirigida a la unidad familiar. Sin embargo, asistimos a una feminización de esta prestación social (Alícia 43). Una de las fases más importantes de este programa es la del pago de la prestación.^[7]

2.1.3. Financiación de la Renta Mínima de Inserción en Cataluña

La financiación del programa de la Renta Mínima de Inserción corresponde a la administración de la Comunidad Autónoma de Cataluña. En este sentido, los gastos administrativos del funcionamiento de la Comisión Interdepartamental y su órgano técnico administrativo corren a cargo de los Departamentos de Trabajo y de Bienestar Social. Le incumbe al Departamento de Bienestar Social tramitar los gastos de las actuaciones de apoyo a la integración social y financiar esta prestación de acuerdo con la normativa de la Renta Mínima de Inserción. También, este Departamento financia las acciones de formación de adultos.^[8]

En cuanto al Departamento de Trabajo, se encarga del abono de la prestación de la RMI (Renta Mínima de Inserción) y tramita los gastos de motivación y orientación laboral, de formación ocupacional y de inserción laboral. Además, al Departamento de Trabajo le corresponden los gastos de las subvenciones a las empresas, entidades de inserción, administraciones locales y demás instituciones implicadas en el desarrollo de programas dirigidos a los titulares de un plan individual de inserción y reinserción social y laboral. En la Comunidad Autónoma de Cataluña, las administraciones locales constituyen la tercera fuente de financiación de la política de la renta mínima de inserción. Ellas se hacen cargo de las prestaciones de urgencia y resarcimiento necesarias para las personas atendidas según sus respectivos PIR (Plan Individual de Inserción y Reinserción).^[9] También en Euskadi, los poderes públicos otorgan una prestación de renta mínima a las poblaciones hundidas en la precariedad.

2.2. Política social de la renta de garantía de ingresos en Euskadi

Para mejorar las condiciones de vida de sus conciudadanos afectados por la pobreza, las autoridades de la CAE (Comunidad Autónoma de Euskadi) ofrecen a las personas en situación de exclusión social, la prestación de la renta de garantía de ingresos. Su estructura organizativa es relevante.

2.2.1. Coordinación administrativa de la Renta de Garantía de Ingresos en Euskadi

En Euskadi (el País Vasco), la renta mínima que se otorga a las poblaciones en situación de vulnerabilidad se conoce con el nombre de Renta de Garantía de Ingresos. Para su despliegue en los Territorios Históricos, las administraciones prestan entre sí, la coordinación necesaria para garantizar la máxima eficacia en el funcionamiento de este programa social. A los efectos de encauzar dicha coordinación, el Sistema Vasco de Garantía de Ingresos y de Inclusión Social se dota de una organización institucional que se apoya en dos Comisiones.^[10] La primera, denominada Comisión Interinstitucional para la Inclusión Social, se constituye como máximo organismo de colaboración entre las administraciones públicas vascas. Se dedica a la coordinación institucional de las diversas actuaciones relativas a la prestación de la renta de garantía de ingresos. Corresponde a esta Comisión el ejercicio de varias funciones. Primero, propone los criterios para la elaboración de las normas de desarrollo, de aplicación y de revisión de la ley de renta de garantía de ingresos. Luego detecta y analiza las necesidades básicas de las personas en situación de exclusión social. También elabora la propuesta del Plan Vasco para la Inclusión Social y propone a las distintas administraciones públicas vascas la adopción de las medidas necesarias para la coordinación de sus actuaciones ligadas al programa de la renta de garantía de ingresos. Además, analiza los criterios de distribución de los recursos económicos destinados a la financiación de las ayudas de emergencia social.[11]

En cuanto a la segunda Comisión, se conoce con el nombre de Comisión Interdepartamental para la Inclusión Social. Es el órgano de coordinación de las actuaciones del Gobierno Vasco en materia de inclusión social adscrita al departamento competente en garantía de ingresos e inclusión social. Entre sus distintas funciones, se destacan la identificación, el censo de las intervenciones y actuaciones de lucha contra la exclusión. También, se interesa por las acciones de promoción de la inserción social y laboral de las personas en riesgo de exclusión social en la Comunidad Autónoma de Euskadi. Además, propone las líneas básicas para la ejecución del Plan vasco para la Inclusión Social por los departamentos a través de los programas orientados a la inclusión.

Otra estructura administrativa implicada en la organización de la política social de la renta de garantía de ingresos es la del Consejo Vasco para la Inclusión Social. Se constituye como un órgano de carácter consultivo y de participación, adscrito al departamento del Gobierno Vasco competente en el dominio de la garantía de ingresos e inclusión social. Este órgano abarca representantes del Gobierno Vasco, de las diputaciones forales y de los ayuntamientos.^[12]

Consta de varios miembros de las organizaciones sindicales y empresariales, de las personas usuarias y de las organizaciones del tercer sector de acción social que trabajan e intervienen en el ámbito de la inclusión social. Las funciones del Consejo Vasco para la Inclusión Social atañen a la emisión de informes en relación con los anteproyectos de ley, los proyectos de decreto y los planes generales o sectoriales en materia de garantía de ingresos e inclusión social. Además, propone al Gobierno de Euskadi iniciativas de garantía de ingresos e inclusión social y emite recomendaciones para la mejora del Sistema Vasco de Garantía de Ingresos y de Inclusión Social. Cabe precisar que la malla de seguridad social de la Renta de Garantía de Ingresos incorpora varias prestaciones.

2.2.2. Categorías de prestaciones de la Renta de Garantía de Ingresos en Euskadi

La RGI (Renta de Garantía de Ingresos) es una prestación periódica de naturaleza económica a fondo perdido, destinada anualmente a las personas integradas en una unidad de convivencia (Sara 112). Se otorga a unidades convivenciales que no disponen de ingresos suficientes para hacer frente tanto a los gastos asociados a las necesidades básicas como a los gastos derivados de un proceso de inclusión social. Es una prestación económica de derecho subjetivo (Gorka y Javier173). Tiene naturaleza subsidiaria respecto de los recursos de que disponga la persona beneficiaria y las personas integrantes de la unidad de convivencia. Es una prestación que no puede ser objeto de cesión total ni parcial.^[13]

Mediante este programa social, los poderes públicos de la Comunidad Autónoma de Euskadi ofrecen a las poblaciones afectadas por la precariedad dos tipos de prestaciones: la renta básica para la inclusión y protección social, la renta complementaria de ingresos de trabajo. La primera es una prestación periódica de carácter económico, dirigida a las personas que no disponen de ingresos procedentes de rentas de trabajo y cuyo nivel mensual de ingresos no alcanza el importe de la renta básica para la inclusión y protección social. En fin, la renta básica para la inclusión y protección social tiene como finalidad hacer frente tanto a los gastos relativos a las necesidades básicas como a los gastos derivados de un proceso de inclusión social o labor.  La segunda, la renta complementaria de ingresos de trabajo, es otra prestación periódica, de índole económica, orientada a completar el nivel de ingresos de las unidades de convivencia que, aun disponiendo de ingresos procedentes del trabajo, cuentan con un nivel de ingresos que no alcanza el de la renta básica para la inclusión y protección social. Se trata de un nivel mensual de ingresos insuficiente para paliar las necesidades básicas de supervivencia y para llevar a cabo un proceso de inclusión social. Ambas prestaciones quedan vinculadas al establecimiento de un convenio de inclusión con la persona beneficiaria del programa de la renta de garantía de ingresos.^[14] Varias fuentes proporcionan esta prestación a las unidades de convivencia afectadas por las situaciones de vulnerabilidad.

2.2.3. Fuentes de financiación de la Renta de Garantía de Ingresos en Euskadi

En Euskadi, existen sistemas que proporcionan a los ciudadanos vulnerables una garantía de ingresos. En esta Comunidad Autónoma, para pagar la Renta de Garantía de Ingresos, se requiere la previa provisión en divisas del Sistema Vasco de Garantía de ingresos e Inclusión Social. Primero, cabe mencionar que la financiación de este programa social es el fruto de una colaboración de las administraciones públicas vascas entre sí. Luego, es importante subrayar que, en la Comunidad Autónoma de Euskadi, la garantía de ingresos queda proporcionada por la seguridad Social del Estado Central y por el Sistema Vasco de Garantía de ingresos e Inclusión Social.^[15] En un primer lugar, con la finalidad de conceder esta prestación a las unidades de convivencia en situaciones de pobreza, la CAE (Comunidad Autónoma de Euskadi), los Territorios Históricos y los ayuntamientos se conciertan. En un segundo lugar, se consignan anualmente, en los presupuestos generales de esta Comunidad Autónoma, los recursos económicos necesarios para financiar la Renta de Garantía de Ingresos. También, las diputaciones forales y los ayuntamientos dedican, de manera anual, una parte de sus presupuestos al pago de esta prestación de naturaleza económica. Además, se acepta cualquier otra aportación amparada en el ordenamiento jurídico destinada a la mejora de las condiciones de vida de la población.^[16] 

3. Discusion de los resultados

Ante las situaciones de vulnerabilidad, las autoridades de Cataluña y las del País Vasco otorgan rentas mínimas a varios de sus conciudadanos. A primera vista, estas políticas sociales desarrolladas respectivamente en tierra catalana y en territorio vasco se parecen. Sin embargo, al observarlas con un ojo atalayador, notamos algunas divergencias.

3.1. Análisis comparado de las prestaciones de rentas mínimas en Cataluña y en Euskadi

En los programas de rentas mínimas puestos en práctica en la Comunidad Autónoma de Cataluña y en la de Euskadi, se destacan varias similitudes tanto en la organización administrativa de estas prestaciones como en su tipología y sus fuentes de financiación.  

3.1.1. Similitudes entre las rentas mínimas en Cataluña y en Euskadi

Los actores del diseño de las políticas de rentas mínimas de Cataluña son parecidos a sus homólogos de Euskadi. Dicho de otra manera, tanto en tierra catalana como en territorio vasco, los protagonistas de la elaboración de los programas de rentas mínimas son los Gobiernos autonómicos. Otra semejanza entre la Renta Mínima de Inserción de Cataluña y la Renta de Garantía de Ingresos de Euskadi se destaca en la gestión de dichas prestaciones. Para gestionar las prestaciones ya mentadas, las autoridades de Cataluña, a semejanza de sus homólogos de Euskadi crean estructuras orientadas a desplegar la malla de seguridad social de las rentas mínimas. Una característica común a Cataluña y a Euskadi en materia de aplicación de las políticas de rentas mínimas es la colaboración de las Comisiones encargadas de poner en práctica estas políticas, con otras estructuras administrativas. También, el Gobierno de Cataluña y el de Euskadi comparten la misma filosofía en términos de diseño de la estructura organizativa de las rentas mínimas. En Ambas Comunidades Autónomas, Esta estructura consta de dos pilares. El primero es vertical y abarca al Gobierno autonómico, a los departamentos implicados en la acción social y a las entidades administrativas locales que participan en la puesta en práctica de los programas de rentas mínimas. El segundo es horizontal e incorpora a todos los departamentos participantes en la realización de las políticas sociales. Una de las similitudes que se contempla en las prestaciones de rentas mínimas promovidas en Cataluña y en Euskadi se halla en su naturaleza. Se trata de prestaciones de carácter económico a fondo perdido, encaminadas a erradicar la pobreza y a promover la integración social. Tanto en Cataluña como en Euskadi, la principal fuente de financiación de las prestaciones de rentas mínimas es semejante y corre a cargo de la administración autonómica. Sin embargo, se destacan varias diferencias entre los programas de rentas mínimas implantados en tierra catalana y en territorio vasco.

3.1.2. Divergencias entre los programas de rentas mínimas en Cataluña y en Euskadi

En términos de divergencias, la denominación de la renta mínima de inserción difiere de una Comunidad Autónoma a otra. En Cataluña, este programa social se conoce con el nombre de RMI (Renta Mínima de Inserción). Al contrario, en Euskadi, la prestación de la renta mínima se denomina RGI (Renta de Garantía de Ingresos). En tierra catalana, la gestión de la renta mínima está en manos de una sola Comisión. Se trata de la Comisión Interdepartamental de la Renta Mínima de Inserción. Ahora bien, en territorio vasco (en Euskadi), la Renta de Garantía de Ingresos queda coordinada por dos Comisiones: la Comisión Interinstitucional para la Inclusión social, la Comisión Interdepartamental para la Inclusión social. Mientras que la renta mínima catalana se organiza a escala de la Comunidad Autónoma, la Renta de Garantía de Ingresos se diseña a nivel autonómico y se despliega a los Territorios Históricos.

A diferencia de la prestación de la Renta Mínima de Inserción de Cataluña que se otorga a la unidad familiar, el programa vasco de la Renta de Garantía de Ingresos tiene como blanco la unidad de convivencia. El programa de la renta mínima de Euskadi es nítidamente diferente del de Cataluña, ya que abarca la formación de adultos que no figura en las prestaciones de la Renta Mínima de Inserción de esta Comunidad Autónoma. También, las divergencias entre las prestaciones de rentas mínimas desarrolladas en Cataluña y en Euskadi se observan en las fuentes destinadas a financiar estas políticas públicas. Prueba de ello es que, ahora bien, la financiación de la Renta Mínima de Inserción de Cataluña corresponde a la administración de esta Comunidad Autónoma, en Euskadi, el pago de la Renta de Garantía de Ingresos corre a cargo del Estado Central, de la Comunidad Autónoma de Euskadi, de los Territorios Históricos y de los ayuntamientos. Por fin, comparativamente a la malla de seguridad social de la renta mínima catalana, la de la renta mínima vasca es la más heterogénea y la más descentralizada.

Conclusión

Para mejorar las condiciones de vida de sus conciudadanos, las autoridades de Cataluña y las de Euskadi elaboran programas de rentas mínimas en sus Comunidades Autónomas respectivas. El propósito del presente estudio es llevar a cabo un estudio comparado de las rentas mínimas promovidas en Cataluña y en Euskadi. Este estudio nos ha permitido confirmar la hipótesis que nos sirvió de punto de partida. En otros términos, hemos comprobado que las políticas de las rentas mínimas implementadas en Cataluña y en Euskadi abarcan similitudes y divergencias. Efectivamente, cuando echamos un ojo atalayador sobre las políticas públicas de las rentas mínimas desarrolladas en Cataluña y en Euskadi, observamos algunas similitudes entre ambas políticas sociales. Por ejemplo, los programas de las rentas mínimas elaborados en Cataluña y en Euskadi son parecidos, dado que todos estos programas son promovidos por los Gobiernos autonómicos. Tanto en Cataluña como en Euskadi, la gestión de las rentas mínimas es similar y está en manos de las administraciones públicas autonómicas. Uno de los rasgos comunes a las prestaciones de rentas mínimas desarrolladas en estas Comunidades Autónomas es su naturaleza. En este sentido, la Renta Mínima de Inserción y la Renta de Garantía de Ingresos son prestaciones de carácter económico a fondo perdido, encaminadas a la lucha contra la precariedad. Otra similitud entre las rentas mínimas implementadas en la Comunidad Autónoma de Cataluña y en la de Euskadi es su modo de financiación que, en ambas Comunidades Autónomas, corre a cargo de la administración autonómica. Tanto en Cataluña como en Euskadi, la puesta en aplicación de las rentas mínimas requiere una labor de colaboración entre los departamentos participantes en la realización de las políticas sociales.

Sin embargo, entre las rentas mínimas elaboradas en Cataluña y en Euskadi, las diferencias tienen cabida. En este sentido, primero, la denominación de la renta mínima otorgada a las poblaciones en Cataluña y en Euskadi difiere de una Comunidad Autónoma a otra. En la Comunidad Autónoma de Cataluña, esta prestación se conoce con el nombre de Renta Mínima de Inserción. Al contrario, en la CAE (Comunidad Autónoma de Euskadi), ella se denomina Renta de Garantía de Ingresos. Luego, los titulares de las prestaciones de las rentas mínimas elaboradas en Cataluña y en Euskadi son divergentes. Prueba de ello es que, la Renta Mínima de Inserción de Cataluña se dirige al hogar mientras que la Renta de Garantía de Ingresos de Euskadi está destinada a la unidad de convivencia. Además, a diferencia de la Renta Mínima de Inserción de Cataluña que queda gestionada por una sola Comisión que es la Comisión Interdepartamental de la Renta Mínima de Inserción, la gestión de la Renta de Garantía de Ingresos de Euskadi corre a cargo de dos Comisiones: la Comisión Interinstitucional para la Inclusión social, la Comisión Interdepartamental para la Inclusión social. Comparativamente a la malla de seguridad social de la Renta Mínima de Inserción de Cataluña que se despliega a nivel autonómico, la de Euskadi es la más descentralizada, ya que se diseña a escala de la Comunidad Autónoma de Euskadi y cunde a los Territorios Históricos. Mientras que, en Cataluña, se otorga una prestación de renta mínima homogénea a las capas sociales afectadas por la pobreza, en Euskadi, la prestación de la renta mínima encaminada a luchar contra las situaciones de vulnerabilidad es heterogénea.

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How to cite this article:

MLA : Soro, Kassoum. « Rentas mínimas ante la pobreza y la exclusión social: Un estudio comaparado entre Cataluña y Euskadi ». Uirtus 2.1. (avril 2022): 354-369.

§ Université Alassane Ouattara – Bouaké  / [email protected]

[1] Entrevista con Mireia Llorens Poch, Responsable del Ámbito Internacional en el Gabinete Técnico del Departamento de Bienestar Social y Familia de la Generalitat de Catalunya, en Barcelona, el miércoles 5 de agosto de 2015.

[2] Entrevista con Mireia Llorens Poch, Responsable del Ámbito Internacional en el Gabinete Técnico del Departamento de Bienestar Social y Familia de la Generalitat de Catalunya, en Barcelona, el miércoles 5 de agosto de 2015.

[3] Idem.

[4] Idem.

[5] Entrevista con Patricia Oquendo Rodríguez, Técnica del Ámbito Internacional en el Gabinete Técnico del Departamento de Bienestar Social y Familia de la Generalitat de Catalunya, en Barcelona, el miércoles 5 de agosto de 2015.

[6] Idem.

[7] Idem.

[8] Entrevista con Patricia Oquendo Rodríguez, Técnica del Ámbito Internacional en el Gabinete Técnico del Departamento de Bienestar Social y Familia de la Generalitat de Catalunya, en Barcelona, el miércoles 5 de agosto de 2015.

[9] Idem.

[10] Entrevista con José María Chaves Rivera, Jefe de la Sección de Prestaciones, Ayudas y Valoración de la Diputación del Territorio Histórico De Bizkaia, en el País Vasco, en el Departamento de Acción Social de Bilbao, el miércoles 26 de agosto de 2015.   

[11] Idem

[12] Entrevista con Xabier Aierdi Urraza, Profesor de Sociología en la Universidad del País Vasco, miembro del Gobierno Vasco, Consejero del Gobierno Vasco en políticas sociales, en el Departamento de Acción Social de Bilbao, el miércoles 26 de agosto de 2015.

[13] Entrevista con José María Chaves Rivera, Jefe de la Sección de Prestaciones, Ayudas y Valoración de la Diputación del Territorio Histórico De Bizkaia, en el País Vasco, en el Departamento de Acción Social de Bilbao, el miércoles 26 de agosto de 2015.

[14] Entrevista con Xabier Aierdi Urraza, Profesor de Sociología en la Universidad del País Vasco, miembro del Gobierno Vasco, Consejero del Gobierno Vasco en políticas sociales, en el Departamento de Acción Social de Bilbao, el miércoles 26 de agosto de 2015.

[15] Entrevista con Fernando Fantova Azcoaga, Educador social, Licenciado en psicología, Doctor en Sociología, Consultor Social en España y en América Latina, Diseño de políticas sociales, Escritor, Vice-Consejero en el Gobierno Vasco, el jueves, 27 de agosto de 2015, en el Departamento de Atención Social, en Bilbao, Calle, Nicolás Alcorta.

[16] Entrevista con José María Chaves Rivera, Jefe de la Sección de Prestaciones, Ayudas y Valoración de la Diputación del Territorio Histórico De Bizkaia, en el País Vasco, en el Departamento de Acción Social de Bilbao, el miércoles 26 de agosto de 2015.