Couscous: The Assimilation (or Not) of Empire
Marseille has been one of France’s most important gateways since the pre-Roman era. Like many ports, it suffers from high rates of crime and economic inequality, which have given it a seedy reputation, one that is not entirely deserved. Visitors today will discover a lively city of museums, markets, and seaside promenades—and some of the best food in France. Many of the world’s historic port cities feature phenomenal local cuisines, rooted in local seafood and flavored by their diverse populations, and Marseille is no different. One of its oldest and best-known specialties is bouillabaisse, originally a simple fisherman’s soup designed to use up all the leftover bits of the daily catch but today a much pricier and elaborate affair. Luckily, there is a panoply of seafood to be enjoyed at more reasonable prices, just as local residents have done for centuries—steamed mussels, fresh oysters, octopus stew, grilled sardines. The pleasures of Provençal cuisine are here to be enjoyed as well: rich, garlicky aioli; anchovy-suffused tapenades and tarts; artichokes à la barigoule (braised in white wine and olive oil). And there is a robust Italian influence, one that is unsurprising given several centuries of Italian migration to the city. It may sound ridiculous to visit France and order pizza, but all doubts will be dispelled after tucking into the Marseille version, crisp and wood-fired, topped with a hearty tomato sauce, anchovies, and olives.
But one of the highlights of a gastronomic tour of Marseille is undoubtedly its Maghrebi cuisine, which became permanently ensconced in the city as migration from North Africa expanded in the interwar period.1 At its pinnacle stands couscous, a dish of Berber origin so revered in the Maghreb that in some locales, such as Algiers, it is simply referred to as al taam (the food). The story of couscous in France sheds light on the horrific impact of French imperialism, the complex dynamics of migration to and from the Maghreb, and the ongoing struggle to reconcile different cultural identities within one French nation. France has become Europe’s largest consumer of couscous, and surveys suggest it is now the third-favorite dish of the French people (after magret de canard and moules-frites).2 Yet debate continues as to whether this is evidence of enlightened cosmopolitanism or a mere fig leaf for enduring antagonism.
The single word couscous encompasses a pleasingly flexible array of meanings. It refers both to the tiny grains that are painstakingly rolled and steamed before consumption and to the entire dish that is served upon them, which varies according to region, season, and occasion. Traditionally, the grains are accompanied by a spiced meat and/or vegetable stew, with a seemingly infinite number of local variations; within each country, there may be dozens of versions of the dish. Yet couscous retains a universal appeal to residents across the Maghreb: it is the food of one’s home and family, of celebration and mourning, of comfort and belonging. It is often compared to pasta in Italy, or rice in China. Its central place in the cuisine of the diaspora is therefore not surprising.
The first written evidence of couscous in France appears to be courtesy of a traveler named Jean-Jacques Bouchard, who wrote that he sampled the dish in the southern port of Toulon in 1630. But the real encounter began in the nineteenth century, with the French conquest of Algeria (1830–47). Throughout the colonial era, the coastal regions of Algeria were administered as part of Metropolitan France, with the creation of the three départements of Alger, Oran, and Constantine.3 This meant that unlike other overseas territories, Algeria was seen as part of France itself, and this helps explain why its eventual struggle for independence was particularly brutal and bloody. It is also why there was such significant migration between the two territories, in both directions. Algerians usually went to France for work, as colonial practices destroyed the traditional economic fabric that had previously sustained their communities. Unusually, a large number of French people also migrated to Algeria, where they (and their descendants) became known as pieds-noirs (black feet). Always a minority, they nevertheless occupied a privileged position in Algerian society, and they became a powerful political force both there and in mainland France.
Traditional Algerian cuisine features elements of Berber, Arab, and Turkish cooking, reflecting the country’s history of occupation and adaptation. The French added another gastronomic layer, as seen in the continuing Algerian affection for baguettes and European cheeses. But the French colonists were also influenced in turn, as the pieds-noirs adopted many local dishes, including couscous. By the early twentieth century, French manufacturers in Algeria had developed a mechanized process for preparing couscous, in place of the laborious handmade methods.
As we have seen, European colonization of Africa accelerated in the late nineteenth century. France seized Tunisia from the crumbling Ottoman Empire in 1881 and subdued the independent state of Morocco in 1912, establishing protectorates in both territories. The French embarked on programs of modernization and economic development across the Maghreb, as part of a “civilizing mission” that in fact entailed enormous costs for local residents. They were not granted the same civil and political liberties as French citizens yet were expected to adopt the French language and cultural values. Local economies were reshaped for the benefit of France, and the most profitable industries were controlled by Europeans. The best land was appropriated and given to French settlers, causing significant displacement and disrupting the traditional social order. Maghrebis were taxed at higher rates than colonists, even as their opportunities for work and education shriveled. All of this ensured that various forms of everyday resistance to colonial rule endured, sustaining a base of opposition that would be drawn upon in later decades. French control of the Maghreb—indeed, of all its colonies—was never as absolute as might be assumed from color-coded maps of empire.
During World War I, the French colonies played an important role in sustaining France’s military efforts in Europe. Manpower shortages at the front and in the factories were filled with nearly 300,000 men from Algeria, Tunisia, and Morocco. After the war, labor migration from the Maghreb continued, becoming an enduring component of the French economy. Tens of thousands of Algerian men, for example, took up factory jobs in the industrial north and east of France, or in large cities like Paris, Marseille, and Lyon. As is the case with so many labor migrants today, most of them worked temporary jobs, and their earnings were devoted to supporting their families and villages back home.
The shortages and devastation that France experienced during and after the war helped spur a renewed devotion to the imperial project, in particular by the so-called colonial lobby (those living in and/or profiting from the colonies). Colonial enthusiasts strove to convince the French political class and the wider public that the empire was essential to the sustenance of the French nation, and that the costs of preserving and defending it were well justified by the benefits it brought to the metropole. Food became an important part of this narrative, as France struggled to repair its agricultural sector and cope with food shortages. All sorts of colonial products, previously unknown or rarely consumed, were now promoted in France: curries and spicy sauces, tropical fruits, rice from Indochina, canned meat from Madagascar. Yet these efforts found mixed success, as French consumers tended to reject products that were overly strange or too associated with “inferior” colonial peoples.4 Rice, for example, was mostly imported for animal feed in the interwar period, unable to dent the French attachment to bread and pasta. Yet the French accepted elements of colonial cuisine that could be adapted into French recipes, such as curry sauces, or that had an air of exotic prestige, such as tropical fruits. For the first time, ordinary people could enjoy bananas and pineapples.
Couscous was not embraced by the French population in the interwar period. It was a staple food, lacking the sense of exoticism or rarity of other colonial products, and it was flavored with ingredients unappealing to the French palate. It was traditionally prepared by women, an obvious negative given the sensibilities of culinary writers at that time, even those who extolled the virtues of other foreign dishes. But this did not mean that couscous was entirely absent from mainland France during this time. Maghrebi migrants helped root their cuisines in the localities where they settled in increasing numbers—especially in Paris, where they bought up a large portion of the city’s bistros and began serving couscous alongside traditional French dishes. (Today, the couscoussières of Paris are generally well regarded as sources of authentic couscous.) Yet somewhat ironically, it was not until the nations of the Maghreb gained their independence from France that couscous emerged as an increasing favorite among the French people.
This newspaper was published during the 1931 International Colonial Exposition in Paris, an elaborate attempt to highlight the contributions of empire to the French nation. Algeria was represented by a traditional mosque, minaret, and bazaar. The United States (the only non-European colonial power) also contributed a pavilion, a replica of Mount Vernon. In keeping with the loathsome imperial practice of putting living people on display in so-called human zoos, a Sioux chief and his companion were dispatched to Paris as well. Le Journal de l’Exposition Coloniale, no. 3 (Paris: June 1931). Courtesy of the Bibliothèque Nationale de France.
The principles of national self-determination and anti-imperialism increasingly suffused the colonial world in the twentieth century, but it was World War II that really doomed the European empires. The French surrender to Germany, coupled with the economic devastation it endured during the war, greatly diminished its authority and capacity to govern overseas territories, and this breathed new life into nationalist movements. The stunning success of Mao Zedong in China provided an insurgent template that was emulated by resistance movements around the world. The creation of the United Nations and the emergence of the United States as a global superpower formed the basis for a new international order, one in which the old imperial arrangements were increasingly anachronistic. The costs of maintaining an empire were staggering, especially as revolts and resistance grew. In the two decades after the end of World War II, most of the world’s colonies gained their independence, either through force of arms or negotiated agreement. The era of direct imperial rule was over, to be replaced by new forms of coercion and influence (collectively referred to as “neo-imperialism” by critics).
In Indochina, France experienced one of the most humiliating defeats among the imperial powers, as the ingenious Vietnamese insurgent commanders Ho Chi Minh and Vo Nguyen Giap waged a successful guerrilla war against French forces trying to rebuild their Asian empire. In 1954, after the stunning loss at Dien Bien Phu, the French essentially conceded defeat and turned the problem of Vietnam over to the Americans (who would fare no better in the end). By 1960, nearly all of the French colonies in Africa had gained their independence, including Morocco and Tunisia in 1956.
Algeria was a special case, however, given its greater level of integration into Metropolitan France. The French could accept the loss of an overseas colony, but the secession of French départements was a different matter. When the Front de Libération Nationale (FLN) launched an armed insurrection in 1954, the French government was determined to quell the rebellion and preserve the status quo. Algeria suffered eight years of brutal warfare, in which hundreds of thousands of Algerians died. French security forces abducted and tortured thousands of people and herded entire villages into detention camps in an effort to break the insurgency. Instead, these harsh methods drove the Algerian population to support the insurgency and delegitimized the war in the eyes of the French public. While the FLN also engaged in urban bombings and massacres, its overall aim of independence garnered more legitimacy at home and abroad.
In 1958, a coalition of frustrated army officers and pieds-noirs perpetrated a military coup in Algiers, and the ensuing political crisis led to the fall of the French government and the end of the Fourth Republic.5 Charles de Gaulle, the hero of French liberation in World War II, assumed the presidency of France, and the era of the Fifth Republic began. De Gaulle already understood that Algerian independence was inevitable, and he eventually arranged negotiations and a referendum on self-rule. The Algerians voted in favor of independence, which was finally granted in 1962.
Two large-scale waves of migration in the post–World War II era help explain the status of Maghrebi communities—and their cuisine—in France today. Labor migration from Algeria, Morocco, and Tunisia resumed after the end of the war, and by the time these countries gained their independence, hundreds of thousands of their citizens were living and working in France. Many of them were still only working temporary jobs and frequently returning home to their families, but this became less viable once their countries were formally separated from France. Increasingly, entire families relocated to France and settled permanently. This expanded and entrenched Maghrebi cuisine, and especially couscous, which was traditionally prepared by women.6 As families adjusted to their radically different lives in France, their culinary traditions became an important means of sustaining community and identity.
But there was another migration that also contributed to the newfound popularity of couscous. With Algerian independence, about 1 million pieds-noirs returned to France.7 They were repatriated through the southern ports of France, including Marseille, and many chose to stay in this region. They remained a distinct community within France due to mutual hostility with the metropole population, who blamed them for a long, bloody, and unpopular war (for their part, the pieds-noirs were angry at being “abandoned” by the French nation). This antagonism sustained the separate identity of the pieds-noirs, who despite ostensibly returning to their own country, clung to the cultural practices—and especially the food—of their lost home. Their attachment to staples such as couscous also expanded its popularity in the regions where they resettled.
The pieds-noirs remained a potent political and social force within France for decades, even to this day. Emmanuel Macron was delivered a sharp lesson on their enduring influence during the presidential campaign of 2017, when he was forced to apologize to an audience of pieds-noirs in Toulon after characterizing the French colonization of Algeria as a “crime against humanity.” His comments were condemned by Marine Le Pen, the candidate for the far-right Front National (FN), which has traditionally done well in the southern regions of France with a substantial pied-noir population. Jean-Marie Le Pen, her father and the founder of the FN, was a paratrooper during the Algerian war, and he explicitly courted the so-called couscous vote during his political career.8
French manufacturers were also repatriated from Algeria, including those who operated couscous factories, and many of them settled around Marseille and established a new couscous industry there. Over time, the broader French population came around to the appeal of this modern version of couscous, which was noticeably different from the traditional Maghrebi style. Industrial couscous was bought prepackaged, either dried, canned, or frozen, and could be ready in minutes. Instead of a lovingly prepared communal meal, it was an easy comfort food, which could be topped with traditional French meats and vegetables. This assimilated version is now very popular in France, but no one—neither Maghrebi nor French—really sees it as authentic couscous.
It is this lack of authenticity that dictates caution in trying to read too much into the popularity of couscous in France today. It is not so much an embrace of a foreign cuisine and its people as it is a selective appropriation from a cuisine still seen as inferior to French cuisine and a population still held at arm’s length in so many ways. Racial and cultural tensions are still rife in French society. When it comes to multiculturalism, the French generally adhere to the idea of laïcité (which can be translated, somewhat imperfectly, to “secularism”) and to a strict separation of private and public identities. In essence, people are free to indulge their cultural and religious traditions at home, in the private sphere, but the public sphere and the state itself should be a neutral ground, a place where French republican values predominate. Long promoted by the left, laïcité is now increasingly used by the right as a bulwark against the expression of Islamic beliefs and practices that they perceive as threatening. Some argue that laïcité is no longer about a neutral secularism but has been hijacked to promote white Christian French values. This dynamic has been seen in the fierce debates over the banning of the niqab in France, and particularly in the realm of food, such as with the controversies over halal meat and pork on school menus. The FN has also railed against the proliferation of kebab shops in city centers.
Couscous has not really been at the forefront of this rhetoric. While it is undoubtedly associated with the Maghrebi diaspora, it is not really associated with Islamic practices, nor with something alien to French values, and therefore it seems to be less polarizing.9 It is also unlikely that the FN would attack couscous when it is a favorite of their pied-noir supporters.
Yet the history of couscous in France shows that it has always been tied to broader political and social currents. Today, it is not certain exactly what the future holds for Maghrebi communities in France, given the relative popularity of right-wing sentiments, divisive counterterrorism policies, and severe economic challenges. Our chapters thus far have revealed the repeated absorption of diverse cultures into the French nation throughout history, but they have also shown that this process is never uniform or simple—and indeed, some regional and cultural identities have remained remarkably resilient over the centuries. So it is likely that Maghrebi cuisine will continue to reveal important insights into the evolution of identity and cultural exchange in France.