Race and racism in post-2011 Tunisia: between skin colour and genealogy

In post-2011 Tunisia, issues like racism and racial discrimination came to the fore, and a lively debate on ethnic, religious, and linguistic minorities emerged. Blackness – intended here as the ascription and self-ascription of specific traits to a social group – marks the presence of an ethnic minority, among linguistic (Berberophones) and religious ( Jews and Christians) ones. After independence (1956), the country went through a nation-building process under its “founding father”, President Habib Bourguiba (1957-1987), who silenced socio-cultural differences among the population in order to present a homogeneous, peaceful, and stable nation. The existence of minorities began being discussed when the discourse on human and civil rights broke out after the popular uprisings which overthrew Bourguiba’s successor, Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali (1987-2011). However, the recent use of the term “race” within the public debate, both in French and in Tunisian Arabic, call for a re flection on some theoretical issues behind them, which I will briefly address in this article.