La musique du groupe Zebda entre configurations identitaires et pouvoir symbolique

Abstract

The music group Zebda was born from an associative adventure during the 1980s in Toulouse. Composed of French youths of North African postcolonial origins, or coming from Spanish and Italian immigration dating back to early 20th century in South-western France, Zebda had some success in France during the 1990s. After a break of several years (between 2003 and 2008), some members re-formed the Group and released a new album in 2012. This article proposes to approach the music of Zebda as a musical (or socio-musical) whole, to better analyse the different identity configurations that the members of the group claimed. We will also analyse the symbolic power of some of the group’s songs that are intended to express and claim their place in society. The creation of the group is linked to the Beur movement in France. Zebda (which literally means butter in Arabic) is a group of French rock; even “more than French” because of their Toulouse roots, and based on the story of Maghreb immigration in France.

Keywords

• Zebda
• immigration
• Toulouse
• sample
• identities
• citizenship