Kenneth W. Harrow

Mariama Ba

Written by award-winning African novelist Mariama Ba and translated from the original French, So Long a Letter has been recognized as one of Africa's 100 Best Books of the 20th Century. The brief narrative, written as an extended letter, is a sequence of reminiscences-some wistful, some bitter-recounted by recently widowed Senegalese school teacher Ramatoulaye Fall. Addressed to a lifelong friend, Aissatou, it is a record of Ramatoulaye's emotional struggle for survival after her husband betrayed their marriage by taking a second wife. This semi-autobiographical account is a perceptive testimony to the plight of educated and articulate Muslim women. Angered by the traditions that allow polygyny, they inhabit a social milieu dominated by attitudes and values that deny them status equal to men. Ramatoulaye hopes for a world where the best of old customs and new freedom can be combined. Considered a classic of contemporary African women's literature, So Long a Letter is a must-read for anyone interested in African literature and the passage from colonialism to modernism in a Muslim country.

So Long a Letter

This volume attempts to join the disparate worlds of Egyptian, Maghrebian, South African, Francophone, and Anglophone African cinema—that is, five “formations” of African cinema. These five areas are of particular significance—each in its own way. The history of South Africa, heavily marked by apartheid and its struggles, differs considerably from that of Egypt, which early on developed its own “Hollywood on the Nile.” The history of French colonialism impacted the three countries of the Maghreb—Tunisia, Algeria, and Morocco—differently than those in sub-Saharan Africa, where Senegal and Sembène had their own great effect on the Sahelian region. Anglophone Africa, particularly the films of Ghana and Nigeria, has dramatically altered the ways people have perceived African cinema for decades. History, geography, production, distribution, and exhibition are considered alongside film studies concerns about ideology and genre. This volume provides essential information for all those interested in the vital worlds of cinema in Africa since the time of the Lumière brothers.

Five Formations

African Filmmaking

Carmela Garritano

An authoritative guide to African cinema with contributions from a team of experts on the topic A Companion to African Cinema offers an overview of critical approaches to African cinema. With contributions from an international panel of experts, the Companion approaches the topic through the lens of cultural studies, contemporary transformations in the world order, the rise of globalization, film production, distribution, and exhibition. This volume represents a new approach to African cinema criticism that once stressed the sociological and sociopolitical aspects of a film. The text explores a wide range of broad topics including: cinematic economics, video movies, life in cinematic urban Africa, reframing human rights, as well as more targeted topics such as the linguistic domestication of Indian films in the Hausa language and the importance of female African filmmakers and their successes in overcoming limitations caused by gender inequality. The book also highlights a comparative perspective of African videoscapes of Southern Nigeria, Ethiopia, and Côte d’Ivoire and explores the rise of Nairobi-based Female Filmmakers. This important resource: Puts the focus on critical analyses that take into account manifestations of the political changes brought by neocolonialism and the waning of the cold war Explores Examines the urgent questions raised by commercial video about globalization Addresses issues such as funding, the acquisition of adequate production technologies and apparatuses, and the development of adequately trained actors Written for film students and scholars, A Companion to African Cinema offers a look at new critical approaches to African cinema.

A Companion to African Cinema

Novels of testimony, novels of revolt, novels of struggle, followed by post-colonial writings, filled with complexities and ambiguities, have created a literary tradition expressive of the African spirit.

The Emergence of a Tradition

Thresholds of Change in African Literature

Frieda Ekotto

Frieda Ekotto, Kenneth W. Harrow, and an international group of scholars set forth new understandings of the conditions of contemporary African cultural production in this forward-looking volume. Arguing that it is impossible to understand African cultural productions without knowledge of the structures of production, distribution, and reception that surround them, the essays grapple with the shifting notion of what "African" means when many African authors and filmmakers no longer live or work in Africa. While the arts continue to flourish in Africa, addressing questions about marginalization, what is center and what periphery, what traditional or conservative, and what progressive or modern requires an expansive view of creative production.

Rethinking African Cultural Production

A chaque fois qu'une critique féministe de la littérature africaine a été écrite durant les vingt dernières années, pourquoi était-il nécessaire que l'auteur s'excuse d'avoir recours à la théorie féministe occidentale, ou de ne pas avoir utilisé la théorie de Lacan ou de Derrida ? On a habituellement justifié ces réticences par le fait que la théorie occidentale a été élaborée dans un contexte culturel occidental, et qu'elle n'est par conséquent valable que pour des œuvres occidentales. Au-delà de ces questions de points de vue - de chercher à savoir qui a le droit intrinsèque ou l'éducation adéquate, pour comprendre ou parler des textes africains - il y a la question plus importante de savoir ce que cette résistance à la théorie féministe occidentale signifie, et par la suite, que gagne-t-on ou que perd-on à utiliser cette théorie. Cette étude tentera d'aborder ces questions en mettant l'accent sur un aspect de la pensée féministe, celui que l'on associe aux féministes françaises et à ceux ou celles qu'elles ont influencés. Cette approche fixe l'outil théorique à l'intérieur de la sphère de la critique psychanalytique, et débouche sur les questions concernant l'écriture féminine, le sujet et les problématiques de la position du sujet, et avant tout, les nuances de langage qui requièrent une lecture plus rigoureuse des œuvres. Parmi ces œuvres, on compte les premiers écrits par des femmes écrivains, telles que " Certain Winds from the South " de Ama Ata Aidoo, le film Mossane de Safi Faye, et plus récemment les œuvres de Tsitsi Dangarembga, Calixthe Beyala, Véronique Tadjo et Tanella Boni, celles qui comprennent la seconde vague d'écrivains féministes. Comment peut-on lire ces auteurs à la lumière des analyses de Julia Kristeva, Luce Irigaray, Jane Gallop, et Judith Butler et plus généralement des approches théoriques influencées par Jacques Lacan ? Là est le défi pour une étude dont le but est de lire toute une série d'œuvres africaines passionnantes à travers le regard des penseurs féministes qui comptent parmi les meilleurs et les plus provocateurs.

une lecture féministe de l'écriture africaine des femmes

Moins d'un et double

This volume analyses the vitality of certain African literary traditions that have a common sense of belonging to the world of Islam.

New Approaches to Islam in African Literature

The Marabout and the Muse

Uses trash as the unlikely metaphor to show how African films have depicted the globalized world

African Cinema from Below

Trash

Bibliografie : p. 193-218 Survey of some projects by female African filmmakers from different countries ; the problematic encounter between Western feminism and African feminist filmmaking practice; the representation of women in African film.

Women and African Cinema

With Open Eyes

Although there were film-making practices in Africa dating back to the colonial period, the films generally discussed in this collection are those made after independence in the early 1960s.

Kenneth W. Harrow

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