French Rap as a Flash Point

– By Scott Sayare, for The International Herald Tribune –
PARIS — A gentlemanly patron of the arts, Frédéric Mitterrand, France’s culture minister, seems an unlikely champion of rap. But when the French artist Orelsan called publicly for his support at the height of a months-long free-speech polemic around the rapper’s song “Sale Pute” (Dirty Whore), [...]

Strasbourg Journal: Mayhem

– By Scott Sayare –
STRASBOURG, France — Anarchists rise before dawn.
They wore black, the skinny, pale 20-somethings, tattooed and pierced, in masks or balaclavas – the “Black Bloc,” they were called. They were German, French, British, Turkish, all rallied around the anti-capitalist, anti-imperialist, anti-government cause. They carried red flags marked with the hammer and sickle, [...]

Paris Journal: Students in the streets

– By Scott Sayare –
PARIS – The green trucks and cleaning crews were there well before it was over, waiting in the streets behind the crowd. At 6:15, just before dark, thousands of marchers were asking, “Is it finished?” between cigarette drags. By 6:30, a line of 50 riot police and plainclothes officers in orange arm bands had [...]

Corduroy in the streets: The professors’ protest

– By Scott Sayare –
PARIS — Roused by mounting popular foment and bristling at the government’s proposed education reforms, tens of thousands of French university professors and students, including as many as 50,000 in Paris, took to the streets across the country on Tuesday. Of France’s 83 public universities, only 15 were untouched by the [...]

Do the French like Sarko? It depends who’s asking.

– By Scott Sayare –
PARIS — At 8:15 this past Thursday evening, a full 20 percent of France was in front of a TV, hoping for reassurance in a time of fiscal and social uncertainty. But if President Nicolas Sarkozy’s 90-minute Q and A [...]

Paris Journal: What a day for a daydream

– By Scott Sayare –
PARIS — Already you could hear more cars than usual down in the little one-way street, Rue Georges Pitard. Nothing else apparently different about this Thursday morning, though, except the sunlight pouring through the window of the third-story studio, instead of that diffuse, pavement-gray Paris haze.
It was the first day of [...]

In France, a primetime lineup without the ads

– By Scott Sayare –
PARIS — Primetime television in the US is about advertising revenues. A 30-second spot during last year’s Super Bowl cost an average $2.7 million; last May, NBC announced a starting price of three million dollars for a spot during this year’s game.
But you’ll see nary a primetime ad on any of [...]

“Apartheid” in France, says diversity commissioner

– By Scott Sayare –
PARIS — As Obama’s historic election and inauguration begin to fade from the front pages of the French press, so too does an opportunity to change the country’s culture of quiet, but fierce, racism and xenophobia slip away.
“Today, we’re digging a trench that’s leading us directly to apartheid,” said  Yazid Sabeg, [...]