Water, North African Immigrants, and the Parisian Bidonvilles, 1950s – 1960s

Water was a fundamental issue in the life of North African residents of the shantytowns, or bidonvilles, that proliferated around Paris in the postwar period. In this regard, this essay examines these immigrants' experience of inadequate shelter in the face of the wet Parisian climate, the supply and use of water in the shantytown home, and the ordeal of being gazed at by French neighbors of the bidonvilles because of their muddy appearance or while undergoing the arduous task of fetching water from communal water points. In large part, the article draws from the archives, diaries, and interviews of Monique Hervo, who lived and worked in the shantytowns of Nanterre in northwestern Paris. Furthermore, it engages with her explicit commitment to justice to examine how the daily experience of water for the North African residents connected to questions of justice, in terms of both material distribution and recognition.