2013-05-19T22:09:36-04:00 Eleanor Stanford http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/author/index.php?author=eleanor-stanford Copyright 2008, HuffingtonPost.com, Inc. HuffingtonPost Blogger Feed for Eleanor Stanford Good old fashioned elbow grease. tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2013:/theblog//3.2711899 2013-02-18T13:13:25-05:00 2013-04-20T05:12:01-04:00

Eleanor Stanford http://www.huffingtonpost.com/eleanor-stanford/
Rallies in September saw 1.5 million people take to Barcelona's streets to demand independence for Catalunya. Since then the movement has catapulted into the world's attention, although few outside of Catalonia thought the movement would come this far. Indeed, for months Spain's central government in Madrid has been hoping that Catalonia will quieten down. Spanish prime minister Mariano Rajoy and his government have refused to open a dialogue on the issue and obstinately asserted that Spain's "most-treasured jewel" will never become a separate state. This is in contrast to David Cameron's co-operation thus far concerning the movement to Scottish independence. Whilst Cameron may have recently trumpeted the "unbreakable bonds" between England and Scotland, in October his government nevertheless granted the Scottish Parliament the right to hold a legal referendum on independence. He said this was out of "respect" for the Scottish people and it does seem to have somewhat quashed the blaze of righteous anger that was driving support for the Scottish National Party. A January poll saw 23% of Scots desiring independence.

In Catalonia, however, things are rather more complicated. A referendum on Catalan independence is illegal under the 1978 Spanish constitution. A small matter such as this is not enough to slow the movement's progress, however, and a referendum has nevertheless been promised for 2014. To do this the Catalan President Artur Mas struck a deal with the left wing party Esquerra Republicana, flummoxing commentators who believed the two parties to be too politically incompatible to co-operate. In recent weeks, the Catalonian parliament has also symbolically declared the north-eastern area a sovereign entity, an attempt to circumnavigate the 1978 constitution. It would seem the Catalans will not allow the Madrid government to reject the issue as an irrelevance any longer.

Emma faces 50% youth unemployment if she stays in Spain. The trials of Spain's economy during the financial crisis have been well documented and support for Catalan independence has increased four fold since 2008. Economically, Catalonia certainly is a 'jewel' for Spain. The region accounts for approximately 20 per cent of Spain's economic output, whilst holding only 15 per cent of the population. This output is obviously closely tied to the Spanish state, with independence problematising these ties, but it would seem that the region would enjoy a more secure economic independence than Scotland, with questions being raised about the country's economic clout even taking North Sea Oil into account. Catalonia also pays €12billion more in taxes per year to Madrid than it gets back to spend, again in contrast with Scotland's current relationship with England. These figures are accompanied by the reckless public spending and significant central government payouts of recent years as well as continued refusal by the Madrid government to engage with Catalan concerns.

It looks increasingly, therefore, as if this 'jewel' of a region may not be Prime Minister Rajoy's to possess for much longer. Western Europe has not seen major changes to international borders since the First World War and the delicate balance of the Eurozone would be shaken by Catalan independence - perhaps fatally. For many Catalans, however, their political concerns are more immediate and Emma may well see independence for Catalonia earlier than we, and the Spanish government, think.]]> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2012:/theblog//3.1309940 2012-02-29T19:00:00-05:00 2012-04-30T05:12:01-04:00

Eleanor Stanford http://www.huffingtonpost.com/eleanor-stanford/
French Prime Minister François Fillon has announced that women in France will no longer have to define their marital status on administrative documents, from passport applications to tax forms.

Instead, France will graduate to a country of Madames, a title currently predominantly reserved for married and implicitly older women. This will be in line with 'Monsieur', which can refer to any male from one to 100. The feminist groups Les Chiennes de Garde (Guard Bitches) and Osez le Féminisme! (Dare Feminism!) who have campaigned for the change believe that the legislation will herald a cultural shift, promoting equal gender equality as a symbol of wider gender inequalities.

The distinction between 'Mademoiselle' and 'Madame' is certainly one of the quirks of the French language. As a polite address to a stranger, the word crops up frequently in conversation across the country, far more frequently than its English cousin 'Miss'. It also has far more nuanced meaning, able to imply cheeky flattery to a lady of advanced age, condescension if thrown out during a disagreement and at other times affection and flattery. It is a key component of the mild flirting that characterises interaction between the sexes in France.

Along with the choice between the formal 'vous' and informal 'tu', choosing between 'Mademoiselle' and 'Madame' is one of the ways in which the French language can be manipulated to convey a specific and at times personal meaning. As far as I'm concerned, its significance is more cultural than legal and has long been an important cultural determiner.

Would the eponymous Chanel perfume have the same allure if it were called Coco Madame? Would the story of Emma Bovary have had as much impact if we did not know that she carried a married name and title? I think not. Should women today be offended by the title 'mademoiselle' though? Should it by now be considered condescending, even when said with affection?

Despite the engrained cultural significance, campaign groups argue that to make a distinction between married and unmarried women but not men is antiquated and discriminatory. This seems especially cogent when the etymology of the word is considered. The core of the word 'oiselle' means virgin or simpleton. The male equivalent for the innocent is 'Damoiseau', which disappeared from speech hundreds of years ago, just as Master has in English.

In common usage, however, Mademoiselle's original meaning has been lost by now. A quick survey of available female friends was mostly met with indifference, or vague mutterings that they'd rather be called Mademoiselle than Madame. But then we are all in our 20s. We are not unmarried 50-year-olds who feel that their unmarried status is made a daily source of embarrassment.

It also should be noted that France is in the run up to a presidential election, with Nicolas Sarkozy trying to ward off Marine le Pen on the far right and Francois Hollande on the left.

Attracting female voters would give his polling numbers a well needed boost and a government spokesperson has said that the change will not happen immediately, that the existing Mademoiselle carrying paperwork will have to be used up. Considering the French's love affair with bureaucracy of all kinds this could take several millennia. France is also still reverberating from the shock waves of Dominique Strauss Kahn's sex scandal and gender equality is currently enjoying well-deserved media interest at the moment.

I very much doubt that banning Mademoiselle from administrative forms will lead to the social change the campaign groups are hoping, no matter how admirable their aims. It is too engrained in daily verbal communication and has too many positive, as well as the negative, associations.

Trying to regulate a society's behaviour through the language available for use is rather shaky political ground, reminiscent of Orwell's Ministry of Truth's determination that 'good' and 'not good' replace other adjectives complicated by nuances.

There are plenty of more serious gender inequalities in France against which to battle - only 10% of rapes are reported and there is a 27% gender pay gap. Bring back its brother Damoiseau certainly, mes soeurs, but for now, I am happy to be a Mademoiselle.]]> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2012:/theblog//3.1236448 2012-01-30T19:00:00-05:00 2012-03-31T05:12:01-04:00

Eleanor Stanford http://www.huffingtonpost.com/eleanor-stanford/
All in all, it is a far more vibrant and surprising city than the French tourist board gives it credit. However, the codes of Parisian dating have proved to be above and beyond even my affection for the absurd.

Paris's reputation as the international capital of l'amour means you can barely turn a corner (in Paris or on Facebook) without being confronted by a couple kissing in view of the Eiffel Tower. However, among Parisians themselves, if traditional romance isn't dead, it is at least in a coma on life support.

The French are a proud nation, which translates into an interesting balance of power between the genders. Any self respecting Parisian man sees himself as a little Napoleon, marching around with a bulletproof ego and great shoes in search of some female territories to invade and conquer. And as any good commander knows, there is no room for shyness on a military campaign.

I have been asked to dinner by a middle aged policeman and his brother, for coffee by a 14-year-old and to 'share languages' with a hyperactive student. Invitations are offered at any or every given occasion with a metaphorical French shrug of 'pourquoi pas?' (as a female under 40 there are certain streets in Paris which you cannot walk down without a man launching himself from the shadows to enquire whether you are thirsty.) I am not going to pretend, of course, that this isn't sometimes flattering, but it is indiscriminate, rather than romantic.

It seems to me that the problems really start when you accept one of the little Emperors' invitations. For better or worse, in England a couple of dates (or drunken encounters) more often than not leads to that murky 'seeing each other' area, where all is still to be decided. In the inflexible code of Parisian dating, however, limited time spent together can constitute a relationship.

I did accept the hyperactive student's invitation to 'share languages' (for I am of course a diligent language student) and found him introducing me to his friends as his girlfriend. After one evening spent together. When he didn't know my surname. When the most physical contact we'd had was a kiss on the cheek in greeting. I thought he was joking. But he wasn't. A friend similarly had a boy she did once lock lips with turn up unannounced at her work weeks later to see his 'girl.' Another couple of Erasmus girls have had 'where is this relationship going' conversations sprung on them on the second date (which is a far more effective test of your language ability than discussing French immigration in Oral classes.) To me, this attitude not romantic; it is a bit creepy.

I had always assumed that those lofty creatures the young Parisiennes needed the security of these instant relationships. Just as they don't like wearing colour, or dancing as if they're enjoying themselves. The more time I spend in Paris and the more French girls I meet, however, the more they seem to use relationships as social smokescreens, behind which all sorts of other naughtiness can occur. The Napoleons' eagerness to claim and commit often seems to let the girls have their cake and eat it (or do whatever else they want with it) without the promiscuous connotations reserved for blonde English girls. Who knows if these generalisations are fair, but in my experience they are.

One thing, however, that proves endlessly entertaining is French flirt translated to English. As far as I'm concerned, being told "you make an earthquake in my heart" by a Parisian who describes himself as "the smooth and flex guy you've heard about!" makes up for all of Paris's other dating oddities.]]> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2012:/theblog//3.1196529 2012-01-10T19:00:00-05:00 2012-03-11T05:12:01-04:00

Eleanor Stanford http://www.huffingtonpost.com/eleanor-stanford/
There is the man who has played a musical box by Saint Lazare station for many years, in bad weather sheltering under a large umbrella attached to his cart. There is the woman with a collection of rabbits in hutches who wanders the bridges of the Seine and the family of four who sleep on a pile of mattresses at the end of my road.

The homeless population of Paris is estimated to number between 10,000 and 15,000 people and is varied, surprising and ever visible. They may be absent from postcards and films, but sleeping bags and scrawny dogs are in reality as synonymous with Parisian streets as soft afternoon light. Outside of the capital, recent estimates tell of as many as 3.5 million French people living in poor or unfit housing.

In 2007 Nicholas Sarkozy promised that he would eradicate homelessness if he were elected President of France. He promised that nobody would be forced to sleep and die on the streets in France by 2009. He said that fixed housing was a basic human right and that a person forced to sleep outdoors upsets the whole balance of a society. Unsurprisingly, he has utterly failed to achieve this ambitious social change. In 2011 over 370 people died on the streets of France; the latest statistics estimate 33,000 people daily sleeping rough and the national housing crisis affects 10 million people. It has proved to be a broken promise that has dogged him throughout his Presidency. The plight of those affected by the French housing crisis have just been given a surprise celebrity spokesman in the form of footballer turned actor turned French national treasure, Eric Cantona.

In a letter published in French daily paper Libération, Cantona has appealed to local mayors for 500 signatures, traditionally the number needed to run in the presidential elections.

The signatures are actually asked for in support of housing charity the Abbé Pierre Foundation's campaign to make France's housing crisis a priority in the upcoming election. Cantona writes that he wishes to see a "general mobilisation on the issue of housing" and to send a message of "solidarity" for the millions of families who suffer daily at its hands. If he does 'run' for presidency, Cantona's popularity could significantly unsettle the election battle, in a similar way to stand up comedian Coluche's short term campaign in 1980. What is certain is that both candidates will soon have to respond to the Abbé Pierre Foundation's claim that 500,000 lodgings must be built per year for the next 5 years in order to provide all French residents with adequate housing.

This is not the first time publicity stunts have been used to bring the French housing crisis to the public's attention. Organisation Les Enfants de Don Quichotte installed 100 red tents on the banks of the Seine in 2006 in a powerful visual to draw attention to the capital's homeless population. The protest received extensive media coverage and prompted presidential hopeful Sarkozy to make his audacious election promise. Similar protests and 'solidarity nights' in tents have followed in the years since, but the organisation have had little impact in encouraging the government to enforce laws already in place to help France's homeless population.

In my experience, the French are incredibly tolerant of their homeless neighbours. The number of non-profit organisations who devote themselves to the cause of France's housing crisis is testament to the real application of fraternité, from organising the distribution of meals and clothes to recording the passing of those who die on the streets. It remains to be seen, however, whether even the power of Monsieur Cantona is enough to convince France's top politicians that 3.5 million people living in insufficient housing is enough to justify some dramatic policy changes. ]]> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2011:/theblog//3.1116270 2011-11-29T19:00:00-05:00 2012-01-29T05:12:01-05:00

Eleanor Stanford http://www.huffingtonpost.com/eleanor-stanford/
When Nicholas Sarkozy announced the closure of 300 traveller camps in France in July last year it proved one of his most controversial legislations to date. The repatriation programme concerned France's Romanian and Bulgarian Roma travellers only, provoking accusations of racism from the European Commission and the Vatican. There are continuing fears that the race-specific expulsion is encouraging an 'us versus them' mentality in France and as those two shoplifters were discovering, the traveller population is often fiercely mistrusted by French society.

Despite an attempted intervention by the European Union, the French government's deportation efforts are continuing the Roma people's history of displacement and movement across Europe. For the first time, a number of newly published reports have exposed the French government's treatment of the travellers. In the last few weeks both the humanitarian aid organisation Médecins du Monde (Doctors of the World) and the Council of Europe have published reports stating that the state's treatment of the Romani people in France is currently a breach of international human rights. The French government has tried to claim that the Roma people left France "voluntarily" but the Council's report has found that this refuses to explain "discriminatory" expulsions "made under duress".

MDM's annual survey of healthcare found perhaps more disturbing injustices. In France Families are steadily being sent back to their countries of origin via the northern coast of France at Calais and Dunkirk and the report found that police forces actively hinder the intervention of humanitarian workers, at times destroying the aid materials delivered to protect against bad weather and the cold. The MDM found the repatriation programs pose a significant risk to national French health, with the deportations interrupting courses of vaccinations during a period of European health epidemics. Appeals have been made for an investigation into the French government by the European Committee of Social Rights.

With the Presidential elections drawing ever nearer, Sarkozy may start to distance himself from this highly charged political issue. Brice Hortefeux, his then Interior Minister, in 2010, attempted to do so in 2010 by repealing the controversial circular that directed police to evict the Roma camps first. Accusations of ethnic discrimination have dogged the repatriation policy ever since, however, and it looks as if Sarkozy's government will soon have to justify its treatment of the Romani population to the Council of Europe's other 46 member states.

Despite the government's determined efforts, MDM have found that the French Romani population is actually remaining constant, at about 15,000. Although thousands of travellers are leaving the state each year, the majority are simply returning - illegally. The conditions in their home countries of Bulgaria and Romania remain even worse than in the French camps, despite the best efforts of certain police officers and where they no longer have access to water or electricity. The far right party the National Front has inevitably responded by calling for harsher deportation policies. What is clear, however, is that Sarkozy's repatriation policy is not working.

Although Brice Hortefeux failed to justify his statement that one in five Parisian crimes were perpetrated by the Romas, criminality is undoubtedly higher among the traveller population, living as they do illegally and without the protection of the state. As I and most people living in Paris have experienced, these tensions regularly manifest in daily life. A reverend in Lyon was recently heralded by the left leaning French press for offering asylum to local Romani families following their expulsion from the local encampment at the beginning of September. Mathieu Thouvenot has organised monthly concerts to encourage his parishioners to discover the "rich and ancient culture" of the Romani people. The reverend's efforts have been welcomed by the local population, but his is a rare attempt to reconcile the French with their Romani neighbours.

The question of the Romani people in France remains a highly charged issue, be it played out on the streets of Paris or in the chambers of the Assemblée Nationale. What will soon be realised by both is that Sarkozy's deportation of the Romani population may well be breaking international human rights laws, even as it fails to reach its political aim. The Romani travellers are returning to France, to live in the inhumane conditions the French government offers them, but returning nonetheless. ]]>