32

Drawing on ethnographic data with Muslims of Algerian origin who live in a northwestern Parisian suburb, this paper examines marriage preferences for partners and celebrations related to the Bled, or Algerian “home country.” These arrangements are notable given the state’s recent legislation to combat a putative rise in forced and fake marriages, presumably with undesired foreign nationals. While on the surface my interlocutors’ transnational “traditional” marriage patterns might be interpreted as a reaction to the mores of secular France, I aim to show how an imagined Algeria is a repository of a more complex range of sociocultural, political, kinship, sexual and religiously infused ideals. I argue that marriage partners and celebrations that invoke the Bled can be understood as an embodied reclaiming of scrutinized sociocultural values.