Nachaz is a cultural, intellectual and civic association that aims to contribute to building a space for debate, clarifying and spreading the democratic idea… For this, it seeks to mobilize the resources of the web and the possibilities now available in the public sphere.
Nachaz is literally meant to be a meeting place: of ideas, interdisciplinary perspectives, documentary resources… A space of activities focused on deep-seated questions related to politics, society and culture in resonance with what seems to us to be reshaping Tunisian society since 14 January.
Free speech must be the speech of every voice or it will be nothing: everyone, from all social backgrounds, from all generations, and from all levels of education, having understood this fundamental truth of democratic requirement: that every voice counts.
The founding group is made up of teachers, researchers university-affiliated or not, translators… united by friendship and some intellectual convergences, perhaps vague and unstable but solid enough to cement a sense of complicity and a shared horizon that one hesitates to designate with a single word: culture, the concern to “defend society” (in the sense given to this expression by M. Foucault).
But what Nachaz, as a site and association, aims for is not to cultivate a self-enclosed group of self-proclaimed democrats. Rather, it will primarily be a space for proclaimed disagreement, claimed and put into writing on the web and in the public sphere. A significant place will be devoted to discussion, argument against argument, reflection against reflection among intellectuals and actors of all stripes and all generations. The only exclusion will be the anathema of any legitimacy that dresses itself in religious, identity-based or “laicist” legitimacy.
The founding team includes social-science practitioners, writers, literary and cinema critics, translators and associative activists: a composition favorable to activities in partnership with NGOs from various fields: social, cultural, political, academic… Most group members belong to civic-oriented networks. They have all, more or less permanently, been involved in associative structures across various domains: from human-rights defense actions to cinephile or literary writing workshops…
Jocelyne Dakhlia: Historian and anthropologist, Director of Studies at the School for Advanced Studies in the Social Sciences (EHESS). Author of numerous works on the history of Tunisia, the Muslim world, and the Mediterranean.
Fathi BenHaj Yahia: Writer and translator. Member of the Perspectives Association, dedicated to the memory of the Tunisian left.
Tahar Chikhaoui: Academic and film critic. Former editor of the journal Cinécrits. President of the association Archipels Images and initiator of the travelling film event “Premiers gestes.”
Sami Bargaoui: Historian. Author of various research works on the history of modern and contemporary Tunisia. Member of the editorial team of IBLA.
Hajer Bouden: Translator. Singer. Former coordinator of the website Université des Libertés.
Insaf Machta: Assistant professor at the Faculty of Human and Social Sciences of Tunis, where she teaches French literature and cinema. Facilitator of the Faculty’s film club.
Mohamed Khenissi: Former director of the Hammamet Hotel School. Short-story writer. Founder and host of the Citizens’ Forum in Hammamet.
Mohamed Cherif Ferjani: Professor of Political Science at Lumière-Lyon University. Author of several works on Islam and political Islam. Member of the Lyon section of the French Human Rights League (LDH).
Hichem Abdessamad: Translator. Member of the association Truth and Justice for Farhat Hached.
Amna Guellali: International jurist, researcher for Human Rights Watch for Tunisia and Algeria.
The website Nachaz has existed since mid-2012. In the opinion of many, as evidenced by testimonies on the web and in some Tunisian and Maghreb media, it is one of the most significant intellectual initiatives after 14 January 2011. This first experience constitutes a step and a springboard for a second, more ambitious step: outward-looking, since we plan to articulate digital expression with initiatives in the public space; diverse, combining reflection and exchange, attentive to new cultural expressions without abandoning social-science research tools; mobile, with leaving Tunis being one of our watchwords in this new phase.
The site had been dormant for months. Many of our friends felt that after a strong start, the experience stopped abruptly, as if halfway. We won’t elaborate excuses the fact is there was a rapid exhaustion. No doubt we overestimated our capacities… There also was a slight financial problem: volunteerism and enthusiasm alone are not enough to grease the machinery technical skills and availability are also needed to ensure the sustainability of our activities.
For long months we discussed intermittently about ways to revive the project, half amused by our own setbacks, half determined to reclaim a small place in the small republic of ideas and culture and in the vast undertaking the country has become.
Truth is, we no longer knew where to place the cursor between the cultural and intellectual requirement that marked our original commitment and the imperative of sharing. We felt more or less in conflict with the spaces where things were moving, where things were being created…
A few truths quickly imposed themselves: the necessity to break the isolation of our project, to open the site to other horizons, to equip ourselves with minimal means and stewardship to ensure follow-up and coordination… In that context the idea of forming an association naturally imposed itself. And it has been done for more than a year. Nachaz is no longer the name of an electronic review, but that of a Tunisian association.
An association that extends, bends and goes beyond the initial vocation of the site. An association that now aims to be cultural in the broadest sense, which intends to participate, which wants to initiate and support the growing initiatives of creation and exchange that emerge here and there…
An association that wants to go beyond the “useful Tunisia,” and develop partnerships for local events with civic, literary, cinematographic character, throughout the country, beyond the capital…
Our activities are now organized into programs with schedules. We have initiated youth-workshops in three regions around “local democracy.” In our view it is about building a “citizenship university” on a small scale, to prove to our future partners the feasibility of the project…
The reconfigured website will be a window on the association’s activities, and more broadly a space for exchange and sharing of experiences.