Muna at the intersection | The Press

I had just finished the very beautiful novel Hotline by Dmitri Nasrallah^* when the controversy over intersectionality, strangely repudiated by the CAQ and then torpedoed by the Bloc Québécois, broke out. I thought while closing it that the next time someone asks me to explain to him what this word transformed into a scarecrow really means, I will tell him: read this book. It would no doubt also be excellent reading for the Bloc leader, Yves-François Blanchet.

Rest assured, Hotline is neither a thesis novel nor a forbidding pamphlet disguised as fiction. The word “intersectionality” does not appear anywhere in this magnificent 369-page novel. No trace of academic jargon either in this moving tribute to the perseverance of immigrant mothers who drool more often than not at intersections. The only language spoken in this work is that of the heart.

This moving novel tells the story of Muna, a young Lebanese mother forced into exile after the disappearance of her husband in the middle of the civil war. A French teacher in Lebanon, she set sail for Quebec in 1986 with Omar, her 8-year-old son. She is told that her knowledge of the language will be an asset there and that she will be able to pursue her career as a French teacher. After several job applications remained unanswered in French and English schools, she was disappointed the day when, in an interview at a training center for immigrants, she was clearly told that her efforts were in vain.

“Listen, ma’am, I’m sure you’re very capable, but you can’t work here.

– I’m sorry. Have the places been filled?

– No, there are still places, but I can not hire you. And I’m going to be honest with you, no one is going to hire you.

– What’s wrong ?

“Nothing, you speak very well.” It’s just that… ”

The English-speaking lady explains to Muna that her status as a foreigner puts her at a disadvantage, especially since she has neither studied here nor obtained any Canadian experience. While Muna specifically chose to start a new life in Montreal because she is French-speaking, she is ironically recommended to move to Toronto, where she would have a better chance of being hired as a French teacher.

Muna politely thanks her dream gravedigger for her time. But when she goes out into the street, she cannot repress a “kol khara!” (eat shit!) well felt in the face of the injustice she suffered.

By inviting us to walk in Muna’s shoes, Dimitri Nasrallah, who was inspired by the difficult journey of his own French teacher mother in Lebanon to create this character, really allows us to understand in a very concrete way what it can be than living “at the intersection” of racism, sexism and classism when one is at the same time a woman, a mother, an immigrant and poor in Quebec.

The novel echoes a reality that has nothing fictitious for many immigrant women. Despite their high qualifications and the fact that they were chosen on the basis of their language skills, immigrant women are more likely to experience high unemployment, low incomes and precarious working conditions, pointed out economist Marie- Thérèse Chicha, professor at the School of Industrial Relations at the University of Montreal, in a study published in 2012¹. While immigrant men generally fare better², things have not improved over time for immigrant women, she observes. “The question of deskilling due to intersectionality is unfortunately still a reality that affects women. Many are those who, very quickly, after having come up against closed doors, will take up survival jobs.

This is exactly the fate that awaits Muna in Hotline. Despite her skills, faced with the impossibility of getting a job in her field, she will be forced, like the author’s mother, to abandon her dream of teaching to resign herself to selling lunch boxes. dietetics on the phone in order to survive. To ensure that her son has the right to a good life in spite of everything, she will spare no effort, also giving French lessons on weekends to immigrants who regret that the French courses of the State are not better adapted to their needs.

Hotline is not a book of lamentations. Muna’s character is so endearing that you almost want to subscribe to the bogus diet program she sells, just to have the opportunity to chat on the phone with her. Over the pages, we feel his pain, we cling to his hopes. She touches us with her empathy for her clients who feel bad about themselves, who, because of their overweight, experience other forms of loneliness and discrimination, mirrors of her own. We recognize in her these immigrant “courageous mothers”, who face with dignity bereavement, pitfalls, humiliation, discrimination and professional downgrading out of love for their children. Mothers like so many, whose harsh reality remains invisible in the false debates carried out at their expense.

* Hotline by Dimitri Nasrallah, translated from English by Daniel Grenier. The People, 2023. 369 pages.