TABLE OF CONTENTS

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ...... 5 ABSTRACT...... 6 PART ONE: BACKGROUND ...... 8 CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION ...... 9 1.1 BACKGROUND...... 9 1.1.1 Research Questions ...... 10 1.1.2 Thesis Structure ...... 10 1.2 SOME IMPORTANT DEFINITIONS ...... 11 1.2.1 ‘The Hereditary Muslim’: Conflating Race / Ethnicity / Culture / Religion ...... 11 1.2.2 ‘Discourse’...... 12 1.3 THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK...... 14 1.3.1 ‘Discourse’: Foucault ...... 14 1.3.2 ‘Performativity’: Butler ...... 15 1.3.3 Habitus, Field, Capital and Symbolic Violence: Bourdieu ...... 17 1.3.4 Reading Foucault, Bourdieu and Butler Together...... 21 1.4 METHODOLOGY...... 23 1.4.1 Critical Discourse Analysis ...... 24 1.5 SIGNIFICANCE OF THIS RESEARCH...... 27 CHAPTER TWO: GENDER, AND THE NATION...... 29 2.1 INTRODUCTION...... 29 2.2 NATION ...... 30 2.2.1 The Nation as Construct ...... 31 2.2.2. Narrating the Nation, Performing the Nation ...... 34 2.3 GENDER ...... 36 2.3.1 De-naturalising Gender Identity ...... 36 2.3.2 The ‘Essential Woman’...... 37 2.3.3 Masculinities...... 40 2.4 GENDERED NATIONALISMS, NATIONALISED GENDERS ...... 42 2.4.1 Regulating the Body/ies of the Nation...... 43 2.4.2 Nation as Family ...... 46 2.4.3 Woman as Body of the Nation ...... 48 2.4.4 The Heterosexual Nation ...... 49 2.5 RAPE...... 52 2.5.1 Rape as violent crime...... 52 2.5.2 Rape and Normative Heterosexuality: Telling the Difference ...... 54 2.5.3 ‘Battle of the Patriarchies’ – Rape as an Act ‘Between Men’...... 59 2.5.4 ...... 65 2.6 CONCLUSION...... 69 CHAPTER THREE: PUBLIC DISCOURSE IN AUSTRALIA AND FRANCE ...... 71 3.1 INTRODUCTION...... 71 3.2 AUSTRALIA – ‘THE GOOD WHITE NATION’? ...... 72 3.2.1 The White Settler Nation...... 72 3.2.2 The ‘Ordinary Australian’...... 74 3.2.3 From White Australia to Multicultural Australia to ‘Australian Values’ ...... 77 3.2.4 The language of ‘tolerance’ and ‘commitment’ ...... 78 3.2.5 ‘Culture’ as the New Race and The Myth of ‘Choice’...... 79 3.2.6 The ‘Nasty Migrant’ and the Fantasy of ‘Goodness’...... 82

1 3.2.7 “This sun-burned, muscular continent” ...... 86 3.2.8 The Value of ‘Mateship’...... 88 3.2.9 Conclusion ...... 89 3.3 FRANCE...... 90 3.3.1 The ‘Old and Static’ Nation...... 90 3.3.2 Republican Universalism and the Legacy of Colonialism...... 93 3.3.3 “On ne naît pas Français, on le devient”: The Myth of Integration ...... 95 3.3.4 The Banlieue and ‘les violences urbaines’ ...... 99 3.3.5 Les Affaires du Foulard: Against Laïcité or Egalité?...... 101 3.3.6 Islam, Republican Feminism and La Mission Civilisatrice...... 105 3.3.7 Republican Egalitarianism ...... 113 3.3.8 The Exceptional Heterosexuality of the Republic ...... 115 3.3.9 Conclusion ...... 121 3.4 ‘PUBLIC DISCOURSE’...... 121 3.4.1 The National Public Sphere(s) ...... 122 3.4.2 The Role of the Media in Public Discourse...... 125 3.4.3 Autobiography and The Testimonial...... 127 3.4.4 The Law...... 129 3.4.5 Public Intellectual versus ‘Ordinary citizen’ ...... 132 PART TWO:...... 134 ‘THE SYDNEY GANG ’...... 134 CHAPTER FOUR: BACKGROUND ...... 135 4.1 INTRODUCTION...... 135 4.2 THE FIRST TRIALS – R V AEM SNR, AEM JNR AND KEM 2001 ...... 136 4.3 THE ‘SKAF TRIALS’ ...... 138 4.4 THE ‘K BROTHERS’...... 140 CHAPTER FIVE: ‘FALLEN ANGELS’, ‘NASTY MIGRANTS’ AND THE AUSTRALIAN COURTS141 5.1 INTRODUCTION...... 141 5.2 VICTIMS’ DISCOURSES: RESISTANCE AND CO-OPTION ...... 142 5.3 “THE MAKING OF ME”: THE TRIAL OF TEGAN WAGNER ...... 145 5.3.1 ‘Performing the Victim’ ...... 146 5.3.2 ‘The Fallen Angel’...... 151 5.3.3 What ‘Real’ Rape Looks Like ...... 155 5.3.4 Violence Against Women: A Game Between Men?...... 157 5.3.5 Resisting the ‘Law and Order’ Rhetoric...... 161 5.3.6 The Invisible Marker of Whiteness...... 162 5.4 THE JUDICIAL DISCOURSES...... 167 5.4.1 Reinforcing Normative Gender Identity...... 167 5.4.2 Rape Trials: “Pornographic Vignettes”?...... 179 5.4.3 The ‘Cultural Timebomb’ ...... 185 5.5 PROTEST MASCULINITY AND THE ‘NASTY MIGRANT’ – THE RAPISTS’ DISCOURSE...... 191 5.5.1 Competing Racisms...... 192 5.5.2 The ‘Anti-Muslim Conspiracy’ ...... 196 5.5.3 The ‘Young Lebanese Muslim Man’: (Post)colonial Habitus?...... 201 5.5.4 White Man = Racist, Black Man = Sexist...... 208 5.6 CONCLUSION...... 218 CHAPTER SIX: ‘TALKING RACE OR RACISM’? RESPONSES TO THE RAPES...... 220 6.1 INTRODUCTION...... 220 6.2 POLITICAL DISCOURSES ...... 220 6.2.1 Initial Responses...... 220 6.2.2 Introducing new legislation: the Crimes Amendment (Aggravated Sexual Assault in Company) Bill 2001 (NSW)...... 223 6.3 MEDIA DISCOURSES ...... 228

2 6.3.1 Initial Reporting ...... 229 6.3.2 Left Wing Anti-Racist Responses...... 237 6.3.3 Left-Wing Feminist Responses...... 240 6.3.4 Right-Wing ‘Feminist’ Responses ...... 242 6.3.5 Australia: the Feminist Utopia?...... 245 6.3.6 ‘Protecting Our Women’: Cronulla 2005...... 246 6.3.7 Conclusion ...... 249 6.4 GIRLS LIKE YOU: PAUL SHEEHAN ...... 255 6.4.1 Introduction ...... 255 6.4.2 Creating Victims and Villains...... 257 6.4.3 The ‘Cultural Context’ of Rape ...... 262 6.4.4 Merging Misogyny with Ethnicity ...... 264 6.4.5 Competitive Racisms and the ‘Anti-Muslim Conspiracy’...... 271 6.4.6 “Intifada”: The ‘Nasty Migrant’ Strikes Again…...... 278 6.4.7 Conclusion ...... 280 PART THREE: ‘LES TOURNANTES’...... 282 CHAPTER SEVEN: GENESIS OF THE TERM...... 283 7.1 INTRODUCTION...... 283 7.2 LA SQUALE...... 283 7.2.1 ‘Les violences urbaines’...... 284 7.2.2 ‘Hyper-sexual, Violent Blacks’, ‘Prudish, Uptight Arabs’ and the ‘Civilised French’: Reinforcing Colonial Sexual Stereotypes...... 287 7.2.3 Reinforcing the Public/Private Divide of the Banlieue...... 289 7.4.4 A ‘Feminist Perspective’ on the Banlieue?...... 291 7.2.5 Reception of the Film ...... 296 CHAPTER EIGHT: THE (SEXUALLY) LOST BANLIEUES OF THE REPUBLIC...... 297 8.1 INTRODUCTION...... 297 8.2 MEDIA RESPONSES...... 297 8.2.1 Situating Sexual Violence: use of the term ‘les tournantes’ ...... 298 8.2.2 The ‘Backward Immigrant’ versus ‘Enlightened France’...... 300 8.2.3 ‘Voileurs et Violeurs’: Men of the Banlieue ...... 302 8.2.4 ‘Tribal Practices’ ...... 306 8.2.5 “La Misère Sexuelle” and The Exceptional Nature of French Heterosexual Relations ...... 308 8.3 DISCOURSES FROM THE BANLIEUE ...... 312 8.3.1 Binary Understandings of the Banlieue: Site of Racism or Sexism? ...... 313 8.3.2 Banlieue Habitus ...... 315 8.3.3 Homosociality in the Banlieue...... 321 CHAPTER NINE: THE ‘BEURETTE’ AND THE REPUBLIC ...... 324 9.1 INTRODUCTION...... 324 9.2 TESTIMONY OF A SURVIVOR - DANS L’ENFER DES TOURNANTES ...... 324 9.2.1 ‘Ma Propre Verité’: Self-Narrative as ‘Truth’...... 324 9.2.2 Testimony and The Role of the Collaborator ...... 328 9.2.3 ‘La petite beurette’ ...... 334 9.2.4 Between a rock and a hard place: how to reconcile the ‘postcolonial’ with the ‘feminist’?...... 345 9.2.5 Problematising the Authority of Experience ...... 348 9.2.6 Conclusion ...... 355 9.3 NI PUTES NI SOUMISES – THE NEW ‘VOICE OF THE BANLIEUE’? ...... 357 9.3.1 : Providing a Manifesto for Women of the Banlieue ? ...... 358 9.3.2 The politicisation of ‘personal experience’ ...... 359 9.3.3 The Immigrant Woman versus the French Woman...... 363 9.3.4 ‘Liberté, Égalité, Laïcité!’ – the Paradoxes of French Republican Values ...... 367 9.3.5 Ni Putes Ni Soumises – Heterosexist Feminism and the Reinforcement of Normative Feminine Identity 374

3 9.3.6 Revisiting Republican Integrationism...... 377 9.3.7 Public Reception of Ni Putes Ni Soumises: Reinforcing the Link between Banlieue, Immigrant, Islam and Violence ...... 381 9.3.8 Woman, Nation and the ‘Other’ ...... 382 PART FOUR: CONCLUSION...... 384 CHAPTER TEN: CONCLUSION ...... 385 10.1 INTRODUCTION...... 385 10.2 PITTING ‘WOMEN’S RIGHTS’ AGAINST ‘ANTI-RACISM’: IS A FEMINIST, ANTI-RACIST RESPONSE POSSIBLE?...... 385 10.3 THE ‘NASTY MIGRANT’ AND THE ‘GOOD (WHITE) NATION’...... 387 10.4 SUBVERSIVE PERFORMATIVE POTENTIAL AND THE (POST)COLONIAL HABITUS ...... 388 10.5 A FINAL MESSAGE OF HOPE? ...... 390 REFERENCE LIST ...... 391 LIST OF CASES...... 423

4 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

This thesis would not have been possible without the support and faith of my supervisor, Professor Murray Pratt. His guidance and belief in me and my topic kept me going even when I was worried I would never finish. I would also like to thank all the people around me who have put up with reading various drafts, listening to me rant and my periods of insanity: my dear friends and family. To Minki Meadows and Piggly Moon whose walkies allowed me time to think and to the new arrival to this world, Giacomo (Babinsk) Midlam who provided the perfect antidote to too much intellectualism and who may one day embark on this process himself (God forbid!). A special thank you goes out to my wonderful volunteer editor, Alison Butler and to Dr Christina Ho and Dr Bronwyn Winter for their very helpful comments and feedback. So too, a big thank you to the two Dis – you know who you are – you both kept me sane and helped me see it was ok not to be perfect! And finally, I dedicate this thesis to the memory of my dad, Balram Singh Grewal who always believed in me and who unfortunately isn’t here to see this day.

5 ABSTRACT

This thesis is a comparative analysis of the public discourses in France and Australia on a series of highly mediatised gang rapes. In the context of Australia, the ‘Sydney gang rapes’ attracted intense media and political attention in 2001 through reports of a gang rape phenomenon involving gangs of young ‘Lebanese’/’Muslim’ men targeting and raping ‘Australian’ girls. Some commentators also identified links between these gang rapes and what they identified as being similar gang rapes involving ‘young Muslim men’ in France: a phenomenon known as ‘les tournantes’.

In France, ‘les tournantes’ became the source of public attention following the release in 2000 of a film depicting a gang rape involving predominantly men from immigrant backgrounds in a Parisian banlieue. The first widely reported criminal trials involving ‘les tournantes’ followed in 2001 and in 2002 a victim of ‘les tournantes’, Samira Bellil published her autobiography, ‘Dans l’enfer des tournantes’ (‘In the Hell of the Tournantes’). Following the murder of a young woman called Sohane Benziane, who was set alight by young men in a cellar in the banlieue in which she lived, a highly publicised women’s march under the banner ‘Ni Putes, Ni Soumises’ (‘Neither Sluts Nor Slaves’) took place throughout France on 1 February 2003.

Drawing on the theories of Pierre Bourdieu, Michel Foucault and Judith Butler and using a Critical Discourse Analysis methodological approach, this thesis explores the various discourses that circulated in attempts to explain and respond to these rapes. In particular, it asks why the issue of gang rape committed by young men identified as belonging to a particular minority cultural background – namely, ‘Muslim’–become such a source of public concern in the two nations in approximately the same period. Are there any similarities in the public discourses on the two instances of gang rape, aside from their contemporaneity? And how

6 have the two nations’ different historical, social and political contexts impacted on public discourses on these gang rapes?

In seeking to answer these questions the central question of this thesis emerges: how have discoures of nation, gender and rape informed the production of public discourse(s) in these cases of gang rape? It is argued that the ‘Sydney gang rapes’ and ‘les tournantes’ provide useful case studies for exploring the ways in which dominant discourses of gender, national, ethnic and sexual identity have informed public reactions to gang rape committed by members of ethnic minorities in the two nations. In particular, it is argued that the identification of the ‘young Muslim man’ as a problematic and sexually threatening figure to the nation provides a useful means for reinforcing dominant gender and racial/ethnic order.

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