An Historical Perspective / Un regard historique

It's always interesting to take a look at the past, and even more interesting to rediscover something. As the events of the past year have forced people worldwide to take another look around, your blogger investigated the familiarity people in the United States had with world events a century ago.

 This article looks at how people in the past were introduced to other countries and cultures.

C’est toujours passionant de considérer le passé, et encore plus intéressant de redécouvrir quelque chose. Comme les évènements de l’année passée ont poussé des gens à regarder autour d’eux, votre bloggueuse a mené une enquête sur les connaissances des Américains il y a un siècle. 

Cet article s’interroge sur la découverte d’autres pays et cultures dans le passé.

Anthony Shadid RIP

Veteran Foreign correspondent for the New York Times Anthony Shadid passed away Thursday, while reporting inside Syria, of an asthma attack. Shadid was reporting with photographer Tyler Hicks. If it seems that those two names together ring a bell, they were both kidnapped and held, along with two others, in Libya last year.

While this blogger did not always agree with the conclusions Shadid drew, the quality of his reporting and his dedication were impressive. It is important to remember that while information seems so readily available these days, many people, both professional journalists and civilians, put themselves in danger in order to make this possible.

Condolences to Shadid's wife, Nada Bakri, also a Times reporter, their son Malik, and Shadid's daughter Leila.

Anthony SHADID, journaliste correspondent à l’étranger pour le New York Times, est décédé jeudi, suite à une crise d’asthme, en mission en Syrie. Shadid était accompagné par le photographe Tyler Hicks. Si les deux noms sautent aux yeux, c’est parce qu’ils étaient enlevés et détenus avec deux collègues en Libye, l’année dernière.

Malgré que votre bloggeuse ne partageait toujours pas les mêmes avis que Shadid, la qualité de ses reportages et son engagement passionnée imposait le respect. Il est très important de se souvenir que même si l’on a l’impression d’avoir un accès facile aux informations, c’est du au travail hasardeux des journalistes professionnels et des civiles sur place.

Sincères condoléances à sa femme Nada Bakri, également journaliste du New York Times, leur fils Malik et la fille de Shadid, Leila.

Music, Message and Solidarity

Mali Yaro and Goumbe Star

On Saturday, your blogger attended a performance by Mali Yaro and Goumbe Star  at the Calvary Center in West Philadelphia. It was put together by Crossroads Music, which bring musicians from all over the world and promotes understanding and cross-cultural respect through music. Mali Yaro (Doulai Boureima) and his expected guest, Hadiza Mangou are from Niger, in the Sahel region of West Africa. Their music deals with social issues, like disease, armed conflict, and women's issues.

The performance was very entertaining. The combo was Mali Yaro as lead singer, Mahamadoul-Habibou Elh Amadou on bass, and Seydou Mounkaila on percussion and Omar Tankari on guitar. (The last two might be incorrect, as they were only introduced very briefly at the end of the concert.) Apparently, sometimes there are additional musicians, including a rhythm guitarist and a trumpet player, but they were not there Saturday. The music ranged from slow love songs to upbeat, bluesy numbers conducive to dancing.

The true pièce de résistance was their dancer, who appeared to have dwarfism. He was an energetic and acrobatic performer, who encouraged audience participation and, at one point, engaged in a frenetic dance-off with a particularly enthusiastic audience member. The other aspect of the audience participation was something common to griot (jeli) performances, where audience members shower the performers with dollar bills. Both the West African members of the audience and others took part in this ritual, which created a sense of complicity in the room. Since the majority of the songs were in Hausa, at various points throughout the evening, an audience member came up on stage and explained the themes discussed in the music. A couple of songs were sung in French, one “Niger uni et prospère” which talks about different groups in Niger coming together and laying aside their arms in order to build a better future.

Besides being an enjoyable experience, music like this is important for two reasons. The first is the ability to circulate messages within societies, especially those where the populations are spread out and rural (as in Niger) and where other media, like TV or the internet might be hard to access or incomprehensible to populations with high levels of illiteracy. The second reason goes beyond Niger and encompasses the cross-cultural element that Crossroads seeks to facilitate. Experiencing the music and dance of another culture is a window for others onto that culture, and helps create links and mutual respect and understanding. This is particularly important, given the current political context, where we have an unfortunate tendency to view other cultures with hostility and suspicion.

The New York Times had an interesting op-ed about music and its political power. It focuses on rap and explains the power that rap has to communicate ideas among young people. More controversially, it considers the case of Youssou N’Dour and asserts:

“...mbalax singers are typically seen as older entertainers who often support the government in power. In contrast, rappers, according to the Senegalese rapper Keyti, 'are closer to the streets and can bring into their music the general feeling of frustration among people.'”

However, the assertion that older singers, or singers who use a different style, are close to the government is problematic. First of all, as Mali Yaro and Goumbé Star demonstrate, singers using different styles are capable of transmitting powerful social messages. Another example is Salif Keita, whose music also carries an important social message and speaks out against discrimination.

While the Times article argues that this is inaccessible to many people, since “Rapping can simulate a political speech or address, rhetorical conventions that are generally inaccessible to the marginal youth who form the base of this movement.” your blogger finds this reasoning to be condescending. Later in the article, the author draws an analogy between the way rappers convey messages and the traditional art form of griots. If West Africans were able to understand the (sometimes complicated) cultural conventions of griots in the past, there is no good reason that they should now lack this ability, unless they are ignorant of their own cultural heritage. If so, that is a larger problem.

Furthermore, the article takes an overly rosy view of the messages that rappers transmit. While some might critique the corrupt actions of government or pernicious social problems, others might use rap to attack others, like in the case of the rapper Psyco-M. Additionally, rap is not necessarily the product of mature reflection, but people can be taken in by fine words, and be persuaded by form rather than content.

However, whatever the message that rap contains, it is certainly useful to create a conversation. Societies across Africa and the Middle East that were previously subject to strict controls on speech are now able to express themselves freely. It's a process, and like electoral politics, it would be naïve to expect these processes of transition to be overly smooth.

As mentioned earlier, music serves a broader purpose as well. It allows people around the world to see into other cultures and to gain appreciation and understanding for them. The internet makes it easier to diffuse music and other creative art forms and makes it possible to exchange ideas that are not only on an elite or professional level. Music helps people to relate to on another and to remember that even faraway people share many of the same hopes and dreams that we do. Each little step towards greater solidarity, each small concert, has a worth, that when put together, is far greater than the sum of its parts.

Lending a hand at Nawaat

This blogger has been doing a little bit of translation for Nawaat. It's been keeping her quite busy, which explains the lack of new articles.

There will be several articles appearing soon, but in the meantime, take a look at some coverage of Freedom of Expression issues: http://wp.me/p16NIR-2RK and http://wp.me/p16NIR-2OG

FESPACO Winner Screening in Philadelphia

I recently attended a screening of the film "Da Monzon" by Sidi Diabaté. This film won the FESPACO prize this year in the feature film category. The event was supposed to have a discussion with Diabaté, but unfortunately he had to return to Mali. Luckily, he has given interviews, which help me to better understand the film.

"Da Monzon" is a historical film, depicting the Segu kingdom in the former half of the 19^th Century. A son succeeds his father and begins expanding his territory. He is particularly focused on overcoming Bassi, a nearby Fulani king.The film follows his quest to expand his kingdom through political maneuvering, clever ruses, and military campaigns.

Between the Modern Languages program at Penn, the Ritz theaters in Philadelphia, and several years of living in France, I've had the opportunity to see a large variety of films by Francophone directors. As far as I recall, this is the first film that I've seen from West Africa of the historical epic genre. It was thrilling to see names and places I knew from books come to life on screen. The details of the settings, as well as the dazzling variety of clothing and objects, were amazing to see. Were I to have been able to speak with Diabaté, I would have liked to know his sources for these objects, since they date from before the invention of photography.

While the film was very enjoyable, it was also very one-sided. The narrative was engaging, but although the action did switch to Bassi's kingdom, it did not investigate his motives, nor how or why he had defeated Da's father. This is a common drawback to historical films; in order to make them interesting, they flatten some of the events and don't show or investigate the complexity of the historical events themselves. Similar examples are "Lion of the Desert," "Lawrence of Arabia," and "Gandhi". There's nothing wrong with this flattening in terms of story-telling, but since these films are sometimes the only encounter viewers have with the history they depict, it leads to an overly simplified understanding of history and a tendency to idealize the past.

Another interesting aspect to the film was the representation of relationships and reciprocity. I'm familiar with the idea of “caste” in West African societies and also the function of people occupying the position of “griot” to question, tease and deliver bad news. There's even a scene where the “griot” figure is faced with an angry person and shouts “You cannot kill a casted man!” The depiction of women in the film was also striking. Da routinely consults a matriarch figure and seeks advice from her. The representation of the character Niyale, who is sent to seduce and trick Bassi is also remarkable, especially when she discusses being selected for this mission with her husband and parents. The status of women in West Africa is complex today, so there is no reason to suppose it was not complex 200 years ago, but it was nonetheless notable that Diabaté chose to include these scenes. 

 

Additionally, the film highlighted the complexity of the pre-colonial religious landscape, including both Islamic and varied indigenous beliefs and the king seeking support from multiple different religious leaders. It is easy to fall into the error of thinking that because the centers of Islamic learning Timbuktu and Djenné are in Mali that Islam is the main religious reference, so the film served as a helpful reminder of Mali's diversity. If Diabaté had been able to attend the screening, I would have liked to ask him if he was trying to make any kind of point by highlighting this diversity.

Film and definitions of identity through film are a huge interest of mine. Da Monzon's win at FESPACO is not only a great honor for Mali and also and important encouragement for the arts in Mali, but also an opportunity for West Africans to consider their historical past and how they relate to these historical heroic figures. I was very grateful for the opportunity to see the film here in Philadelphia and disappointed not to be able to have a conversation with Diabaté, but it certainly adds another facet to my understanding of West Africa.

History and graphic novels / L'histoire et la bande dessinée

History and graphic novels

Recently, Jeune Afrique shone the spotlight on a graphic novel about the history of relations between the United States and the Middle East. This first volume, of a projected three part series, is a collaboration between Jean-Pierre Filiu et David B., and covers 1783-1953. Those dates correspond with the end of the American War of Independence and CIA-engineered coup that deposed the popularly elected Iranian Prime Minister, Mohamed Mossadegh. Certainly, it's a narrative with many dramatic twists and turns.

Both authors are well-respected in their fields and there is no reason to suppose that this project is anything other than well-crafted. And that's important; graphic novels have a different, larger readership than the audience Filiu generally reaches, with a different set of expectations and a different toolkit for understanding history. A larger, more diverse audience is a double-edged sword; while it means more readers, it also means more scrutiny, and a greater possibility of backlash.

Les meilleurs ennemis is particularly interesting, because it deals with history, and thus runs up against questions of objectivity and subjectivity. History is a discipline, one of the social sciences, but history is also popular memory of past events. In German, there is a distinction between Historie, which is verifiable facts and Geschichte, which is the interpretation of these facts in a variety of contexts. Pierre Nora's monumental work, Realms of Memory, investigates this cleavage in French history, examining what meaning people attach to historical events, famous individuals, and commemorations. Of course, the question then becomes: who are the people who choose what meaning an event has? And when they choose, what other viewpoints get brushed to the side? A relevant example is the establishment of the state of Israel; the Israeli government and many Israelis view it as a great achievement, while Palestinians refer to it as the Nakba, or catastrophe.

Since the advent of the printing press (which is a disputed historical milestone in itself), governments have sought to use newspapers and other media to present a favorable perspective on their actions. The Atlantic has a wonderful summary of the development of print culture and the impact it has had on politics. It's not for nothing that today's dictators censor the internet, limit access to journalists and hire firms to manage their images. But despite this, citizens find ways to express their dissent, and employ formats that are accessible, like cartoons and songs, which can be disseminated easily. Unfortunately, high visibility puts the dissenters in danger. Since the beginning of the conflict in Syria, several outspoken artists have been targeted for reprisals, including the pianist Malek Jandali's elderly parents and Ali Ferzat, a well-known political cartoonist, whose hands were broken in an attack.

Very few people would come to the defense of these Syrian attackers, but sometimes dissent is more controversial. Thousands of angry people filled the streets several years ago in reaction to the cartoons in the Jyllands-Posten. And more recently, a film by the Franco-Tunisian director Nadia el-Fani caused an uproar in Tunisia. Many Muslims see these as a provocation and don't consider that free speech should extend to what they consider blasphemy. Of course, if some speech is forbidden, who then decides where to draw the line? And what guarantees that they won't abuse this power for their own gain or to hold on to power?

Part of the power of the Arab Spring has been that at long last, the citizens of the Middle East are throwing aside fear of their repressive leaders and expressing themselves. They will finally be able to contest and interpret the meanings of history and current events. When Filiu and David B. get to the third volume of their series, the story might look very different.

L'histoire et la bande dessinée

Dernièrement est apparu en Jenue Afrique une critique de l'album de bande dessinée Les meilleurs ennemis. Une histoire des relations entre les Etats-Unis et le Moyen-Orient. Première partie 1783/1953 qui décrit les relations entre les Etats-Unis et le Moyen-Orient. Ce premier tome, sur une série de trois, est une collaboration entre le chercheur Jean-Pierre Filiu et l'artiste David B. et s'étend sur la période entre 1783 et 1953. Une période qui commence avec la fin de la guerre de l'indépendence des Etats-Unis et qui finit par le coup, orchestré par la CIA, qui a déposé le premier ministre iranien Mohamed Mossadegh. Evidemment, un récit qui comprend des aventures et des rebonds dramatiques.

Tous les deux auteurs sont bien connus et respectés dans leur domaine, donc l'on peut supposer que le travail est bien fait. Et cela est important; les bandes dessinées ont un public plus grand et plus varié que celui dont réjouit habituellement les écrits du chercheur, avec des attentes et une manière différente d'aborder l'histoire. Mais alors un public plus grand et plus varié est une épée à double tranchant; plus de lecteurs entraîne aussi plus de visibilité et une possibilité plus grande des réactions défavorables.

Ce qui rend particulièrement intéressant Les meilleurs ennemis est qu'il traite de l'histoire et donc du clivage entre objectif et subjectif. L'histoire est une science sociale, mais l'histoire est aussi la mémoire du grand public. En allemand, l'on fait une distinction entre Historie, qui comprend que les faits certifiables, et Geschichte, qui est l'interprétation de ces faits dans plusieurs contextes. L'oeuvre monumental de Pierre Nora, Les lieux de la mémoire, examine ce clivage au cours de l'histoire française, interrogeant la signification assignée aux evènements, personnes renommées et commémorations. Et alors la question se pose : qui assigne cette signification? Et quand ils choississent, quelles autres persepctives sont balayées? Tenez l'exemple de la création de l'état d'Israël : le gouverenment israëlien et beaucoup des israëliens célèbrent cet evènement, mais les Palestiniens l'appelle “nakba” ou catastrophe.

Depuis l'apparition de la machine à imprimer (qui est elle-même controversée), des états cherchent à contrôler les journaux et les médias, afin de donner un image favorable de leurs actions. La revue Atlantic résume le développement de la culture imprimée et son effect sur la politique. Ce n'est pas pour rien que les dictateurs de nos jours coupent l'internet, limitent l'accès des journalistes, et engage des conseillers pour soigner leur image. Malgré tout ces obstacles, certains citoyens parviennent à exprimer leur contestation, et utilise des formats abordables, tels les caricatures et les chansons, qui se distribuent facilement. Malheureusement, cette renommée met en danger les dissidents. Depuis le déclenchement du conflict syrien, des artistes sont devenus des cibles des représailles, comme les parents de pianiste Malek Jandali, ou encore le caricaturiste Ali Ferzat, dont les mains ont été brisées lors d'une aggression.

Très peu de gens trouveraint des justifications pour ces abus en Syrie, mais il existe des cas où la contestation est plus controversée. Des milliers de gens en colère ont défilé dans la rue contre la parution des caricatures dans le journal Jyllands-Posten. Plus récemment en Tunisie, le film de Nadia el-Fani crée un scandale. De nombreux musulmans les considèrent comme une provocation, et veulent que la libre expression s'arrête là où commence le blashphème. Mais, quand l'expression est limitée, qui décide ce qui est permis et ce qui ne l'est pas? Et comment assurer qu'ils n'abusent pas ce pouvoir?

La puissance du Printemps arabe est le fait qu'enfin, les gens du Moyen-orient se libèrent de la peur et s'expriment. Ils ont le pouvoir de contester et interpréter l'histoire pour eux-mêmes. Une fois arrivés au troisième tome, l'histoire que dépeignent Filiu et David B. serait bien différente.

The Zon-Mai in Philly; What Viewers does it Reach?

During the Fringe Festival, I went to see the Zon-Mai which is on loan from the Cité nationale de l'histoire de l'immigration in Paris. It's a house with dance performances about the experience of migration projected on the outside. In Philadelphia, it was presented in the Pump House space, along the Delaware River waterfront, which used to be a busy port and is now underused.

The performances showcased in the Zon-Mai were filmed in intimate spaces, like the bathroom of a Parisian apartment. The pain and separation of migration are very private feelings and the Zon-Mai is designed to confront the viewer with this experience.

I visited the installation with someone who has migrated twice; once from the Maghreb to France and now to the US. His reaction highlights a contradiction that I have noticed many times; the art forms used to express migration are often lost on the people who would most likely relate to these feelings. While he was impressed by the flexibility and technical skill of some of the dancers, he did not see how it expressed anything relevant to his experience as a migrant.

Migrants feel a panoply of pressures; to succeed financially, to meet the sometimes inflated expectations of their families in their home countries, to build new lives without forgetting their families and cultures, to be good citizens of their new countries. None of this necessarily gives them time to understand or appreciate high culture.

I wrote my French thesis about films that depict the range of experiences of immigrants and children of immigrants in France and how they relate to their country and its culture. Film and television are more accessible than dance performances, and thus maybe reach more people and can inspire them to reflect on their own identity and experience.

The home site of the Zon-Mai, the Cité nationale de l'histoire de l'immigration was controversial to open and was born out of complex set of academic and political negotiations about France, immigrants and identity. The Palais de la Porte Dorée, where the museum is housed was built for the Universal Exposition in 1931 and housed the museum of the colonies. Many of the migrant populations in France come from France's former colonies. How do they feel about this? Does having a museum dedicated to the history of immigration give them recognition or isolate them from other French citizens? These questions are unresolved.

Does this mean that the Zon-Mai is useless? Not at all; but it also will perhaps reach an elite audience. This isn't necessarily a bad thing. Communicating what other people experience to elites can connect them to the needs and aspirations of the greater population who they are supposed to serve.