| Chapter 1: | Introduction |
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My volume is devoted to the study of Sembène’s readily accessible films: Borom Sarret, Niaye, La Noire de…, Manda bi, Emitaï, Xala, Ceddo, Camp de Thiaroye, Guelwaar, Faat Kiné, and Moolaade. The study seeks to answer the following series of questions: Who was Sembène? What were the sociopolitical circumstances surrounding his birth and upbringing? What specific events and social movements most influenced his life? How and why did Sembène come to filmmaking? What is the oral tradition, and how did it inspire Sembène’s filmmaking style? How did Sembène compare to the modern griot? How did Sembène perceive his role as filmmaker? How did Sembène manipulate language (verbal and nonverbal) to evoke the emotions of his audience? How did he manipulate language and images to comment on reality? Where did Sembène situate himself regarding the legacy of the oral tradition? Why did language matter so much for Sembène? What determined the choice of national language over French and vice versa in his films? How effective was Sembène’s use of the national languages in his films given that he wrote all his novels in French? How did Sembène’s personal inclination to challenge preconceived notions spill into his filmmaking? How did Sembène portray religion in his films? What was Sembène’s perception of the coexistence of Islam, Christianity, and the traditional African forms of worship? How are women represented in Sembène’s films? How did Sembène represent globalization and what was his take on it? How did Sembène perceive Africa and its place within the overall context of globalization?
I have long been fascinated with Ousmane Sembène, the artist and agent of social change, and my involvement in interpreting his films has a ten-year history. As noted at the beginning of this chapter, I had the good fortune of interviewing Sembène on two separate occasions in his downtown Dakar office, and we communicated regularly thereafter via e-mail until his death in 2007. I began my in-depth analysis of Sembène’s films for my doctoral thesis in African languages and literature, which I completed in 2005, and I have been teaching Sembène’s cinema at the college level ever since. In 2007, I cofounded with several colleagues the