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African Documentary Cinema investigates the inception and trajectory of contemporary documentary filmmaking in sub-Saharan African countries and their diasporas. The book challenges critical paradigms that have long prevailed in African film criticism, shedding light on the diverse discourses and evolving aesthetic trends present within documentary films. Situating his analysis within the context of the significant transformation of the African film industry, the author focuses on the development, diversity, and shifting dynamics that have impacted contemporary documentary cinema. Examining the historical, political, sociological, economic, and cultural factors that have facilitated the rise...
Examines the attempts to establish viable, popular African cinema cultures with postcolonial forms and identities beyond nationalist frameworks.
Analyzing a range of South African and West African films inspired by African and non-African literature, Lindiwe Dovey identifies a specific trend in contemporary African filmmaking-one in which filmmakers are using the embodied audiovisual medium of film to offer a critique of physical and psychological violence. Against a detailed history of the medium's savage introduction and exploitation by colonial powers in two very different African contexts, Dovey examines the complex ways in which African filmmakers are preserving, mediating, and critiquing their own cultures while seeking a united vision of the future. More than merely representing socio-cultural realities in Africa, these films engage with issues of colonialism and postcolonialism, "updating" both the history and the literature they adapt to address contemporary audiences in Africa and elsewhere. Through this deliberate and radical re-historicization of texts and realities, Dovey argues that African filmmakers have developed a method of filmmaking that is altogether distinct from European and American forms of adaptation.
The most comprehensive reference work on African literature to date, this book covers all the key historical and cultural issues in the field. The Encyclopedia contains over 600 entries covering criticism and theory, African literature's development as a field of scholarship, and studies of established and lesser-known writers and their texts. While the greatest proportion of literary work in Africa has been a product of the twentieth century, the Encyclopedia also covers the literature back to the earliest eras of story-telling and oral transmission, making this a unique and valuable resource for those studying social sciences as well as humanities. This work includes cross-references, suggestions for further reading, and a comprehensive index.
For a long time, economic research on Africa was not seen as a profitable venture intellectually or professionally-few researchers in top-ranked institutions around the world chose to become experts in the field. This was understandable: the reputation of Africa-centered economic research was not enhanced by the well-known limitations of economic data across the continent. Moreover, development economics itself was not always fashionable, and the broader discipline of economics has had its ups and downs, and has been undergoing a major identity crisis because it failed to predict the Great Recession. Times have changed: many leading researchers-including a few Nobel laureates-have taken the ...
An “excellent [and] incisive” look at identity, immigration, and culture in postcolonial France (Journal of West African History). This stimulating and insightful book reveals how increased control over immigration has changed cultural and social production in theater, literature, and even museum construction. Dominic Thomas’s analysis unravels the complex cultural and political realities of long-standing mobility between Africa and Europe. Thomas questions the attempt to place strict limits on what it means to be French or European and offers a sense of what must happen to bring about a renewed sense of integration and global Frenchness. “Essential reading for anyone investigating the debates surrounding contemporary French identity and the ever-changing relationship between France and her former colonial possessions.” —African Studies Bulletin
When the World Laughs is a book about the intersection of humor, history, and culture. It explores how film comedy, one of the world's most popular movie genres, reflects the values and beliefs of those who enjoy its many forms, its most enduring characters and stories, its most entertaining routines and funniest jokes. What people laugh at in Europe, Africa, or the Far East reveals important truths about their differences and common bonds. By investigating their traditions of humor, by paying close attention to what kinds of comedy cross national boundaries or what gets lost in translation, this study leads us to a deeper understanding of each other and ourselves. Section One begins with a ...
With chapters on under-explored cinemas as well as traditional centres, Independent Filmmaking around the Globe explores how contemporary independent filmmaking increasingly defines the global cinema of our time.
Un essai, politique, sur l'oralite dans un corpus de films d'Afrique noire francophone de 1950 a 2000. Dans un langage clair, l'auteur illustre comment dans les societes de l'ecriture, le texte engagerait l'Homme et que cette ecriture aurait impose un genre, un style et des modes de production de sens qui sont propres a ces societes de l'ecriture d'ou, par exemple, la naissance du langage cinematographique formalise. Ainsi il se demande ce qui arriverait a une analyse de film calquee sur ce langage dont les articulations discursives ne sont pas necessairement en adequation avec la mysticite de la parole qui, elle, engagerait veritablement l'Homme en Afrique noire? Qu'arrive-t-il a l'analyse quand l'image d'une parole detourne le sens prescrit dans les modes operatoires du langage cinematographique des societes de l'ecrit ? Comment le cinema, a travers la technique audiovisuelle, devient-il une technologie par excellence capable de nous faire voir la nature mystique et culturelle de cette parole ?
Challenging established views and assumptions about traditions and practices of filmmaking in the African diaspora, this three-volume set offers readers a researched critique on black film. Volume One of this landmark series on African cinema draws together foundational scholarship on its history and evolution. Beginning with the ideological project of colonial film to legitimize the economic exploitation and cultural hegemony of the African continent during imperial rule to its counter-historical formation and theorization. It comprises essays by film scholars and filmmakers alike, among them Roy Armes, Med Hondo, Fèrid Boughedir, Haile Gerima, Oliver Barlet, Teshome Gabriel, and David Murphy, including three distinct dossiers: a timeline of key dates in the history of African cinema; a comprehensive chronicle and account of the contributions by African women in cinema; and a homage and overview of Ousmane Sembène, the "Father" of African cinema.