Intimacy Politics, Self-Construction, and State Destruction in the Banlieue of Aulnay-sous-Bois

TRANSLATED FROM FRENCH BY LÉOPOLD LAMBERT

In her final year architecture thesis, Zara Metin presented an illustrated analysis of her grandmother’s neighborhood, “Les 3000,” in the northeastern banlieues of Paris. She describes the drastic destruction that the large housing project has experienced these past years, as well as the daily resistance of its residents, who are always reconstructing forms of architectural expressions of their intimacy.

“Digging on construction sites, digging in our homes, we’re tired of digging, of being dug…”

“Being dug” is an expression that struck me. It was used by a resident of the Gros Saule neighborhood, filmed by Eva Penot. The Gros-Saule borders the Cité des 3000 housing project in Aulnay-Sous-Bois, in the Paris banlieues. Nothing works there anymore, not the elevators or the shops, and yet the government is there, but only to destroy, to harass through its police, and to leave mud behind. And the others watch, waiting for the library promised for this site, in place of the “drug tower,” wondering if that’s all they deserve, mud and nothing more.