ETHNIKKA's mission is to share, divulge and promote the knowledge of the different cultural groups that inhabit our planet, from every continent, religion and origin, to better understand the treasure of human diversity.
ETHNIKKA: Keeping ethnic Knowledge alive
Mame is six years old child, living happily at home with his parents and playing in the fields, forests and nearby rivers with friends. Loved and well fed, he leads an idyllic life. In one fateful decision, all that changes.
Burial of a Christian political activist in a Muslim cemetery forces a conflict imbued with religious fervor. A satiric portrayal of religion and politics, sometimes humorous, sometimes deadly serious.
Guelwaar is a very accessible introduction to the often difficult delights of African cinema. Like Kurosawa and Satyajit Ray, Sembene has often been patronised as a non-Western director making films for Western audiences. And certainly, the film is full of elaborate, didactic speeches - about military, police and civic corruption; first world imperialism etc. - that play like lectures to the uninformed, and would presumably seem like statements of the obvious to indigenous viewers.
Unlike many African films, which are driven by myth, imagery, allegory, or the tropes of oral culture, 'Guelwaar' is reassuringly structured in a way familiar to Westerners. As in a film by Costa-Gavras, a detective story plot is used to uncover wider truths about the country's social and political framework.
There are three interrelated detective stories in the film: where is the missing corpse of the title hero (which translates as 'The Noble One'), a revered dissident fomenting opposition to local corruption and first world neo-imperialism?; how did Guelwaar die - if he was killed, who murdered him?; who was Guelwaar the man anyway?
As in Costa-Gavras, the film's initial focus on the local immediately implicates the national. The first detective story - about the corpse - reveals the deep religious hostilities in the country. Guelwaar was a Christian in a largely Muslim society; when it's discovered that his body was, due to an administrative blunder (a mordantly cynical piece of satire), buried in an Islamic graveyard, the dead Muslim's people refuse to 'desecrate' the cemetery, and return the body.
Most of the movie is taken up with the stand-off of the two peoples in which blind intransigence quickly gives way to a violence which is only neutered when the army are called in. It is unclear whether this is a justification for military visibility - the chief policeman is one of the few sane, non-corrupt characters in the film. Much is made of the irony that each clan proclaims the authenticity of a religion originating thousands of miles away.
The second detective story - who killed Guelwaar - again takes the narrative away from the local. It is clear that Guelwaar was a threat to local and international interests, both politically and religiously - at a ceremony celebrating the receipt of foreign aid, he delivers an incendiary speech denouncing his country's craven dependence on others. It is hard to disagree - none of the strong men in the area seem to do any work, the lands remain unharvested; civic dignitaries line their pockets, and their daughters become bread-winning prostitutes at a socially convenient distance. This is a pleasant, anti-Catch-22 state of affairs - the first world retain virtual power after colonialism; the locals get rich. Guelwaar is in serious danger of disrupting it. He has to be wiped out.
This is all very instructive in an educational kind of way, but would be rather dull as film drama in itself. There is a real thrill (and a kind of horror) when the foreign aid van is seized, its supplies sabotaged and trod on, but agit-prop as hagiography can be rather unpalatable. The third detective story complicates this. Who was Guelwaar? He was certainly an inspiring, charismatic, articulate leader. But he was also a bullying patriarch who diminished his wife and was quite content for his daughter to whore herself for his dinner.
Unlike most political films, which can be very macho, Sembene records female experience in such a society, in which rigid social and religious rules keep women at home while their men fornicate freely. Although the film ends with Guelwaar the heroic, the progression of the four flashbacks is more difficult. The first suggests his involvement in thuggish political violence. The second shows his contempt for his wife and family responsibilities. The third shows his taste for 'freedom' was more sexual than political. Only in the fourth do we get any idea of Guelwaar's nominal nobility, by which time our taste for rhetoric, as opposed to action, has worn thin. Surely the idea that two peoples, adhering to foreign religions, and fighting over a corpse, is irony enough.
So far, so Western. This narrative has other familiar trajectories - the uniting of a scattered family; the power and role of language, colonial and local; the transformation of a Western-educated son into a Senegalese patriot. The satire of bureaucracy and corruption can be very funny. The great pleasure of 'Guelwaar', however, are its digressions from the narrative, when it slows down to record a way of life, even in extremis; the mish mash of rites (tribal, Christian/Islamic); the colourful clothes and murals, the music.
A murder investigation frames the background for narrating the story of Madame Brouette (Rokhaya Niang) - a strong woman, who is dedicated to make a living for herself and her daughter in some poor neighbourhood in Dakar, Senegal. Flash-backs are developing the events which lead to the murder of the police man Naago, who was also her boyfriend and lover. Neighbours comment on her life and her good character - did she really murder Naago or was it maybe "London Pipe", a crook and local gangster? Director Moussa Sene Absa used first time actors (e.g. Naago is played by Aboubacar Sadikh Ba, a school teacher), but they all are playing their part very well. Absa likes to give his movies a specific color - which are yellow and orange in this film - and uses it to increase the beauty of the natural settings. Even though "Inspector Colombo" is only a funny & incapable character in this film, pace and storyline of "Madame Brouette" also remind of the famous detective series. On another thought, famous Senegalese filmmaker Ousmane Sembene used a similar style of telling the life of the main character in flashbacks in his movie "Guelwaar".
As World War II is going on in Europe, a conflict arises between the French and the Diola-speaking tribe of Africa, prompting the village women to organize their men to sit beneath a tree to pray.
Based on a real incident, Emitai dramatizes the tension between West African villagers and French soldiers during the early days of World War II. The Vichy government sends troops to round up young African men to fight as soldiers. The people in a Diola village in Casamance resist, leading to a conflict over rice supplies that escalates into tragedy. The film was considered objectionable in many quarters in France and the final image was censored there. Because the film honestly portrays the complicity of some Africans in their own oppression, it was also banned in Senegal and other parts of Africa.
Dried fish on manioc leaf sauce, a recipe in Baynunk language of Senegal
Baynunk is an Atlantic language spoken in southern Senegal, northern Guinea-Bissau, and the neighboring Republic of Gambia. It belongs to the Nyun-Buy group (according to Ethnologue) – along with Buy, language of the Cobiana ethnic group – of the Niger-Congo language family.
The origins of the Baynunk people are still rather uncertain. But the Baynunk themselves claim to be the most ancient peoples of Casamance: the ancestors are said to have come from the East, chased away by the Malinke and forced to end up settling in Casamance. The Malinke call them Abaynunko (“those who were chased away and seek shelter”). The term Abaynunko decomposes as follows: abay (“he who has been chased away”) and nunko (“he who seeks shelter”).
Ingredients:
manioc leaves
palm nuts
tomatoes
garlic
3 cabbages
onion
aubergine
dried fish
salt
rice
How to cook it:
Recipe by Awa Sambou.
Watch the video to know about the recipe!
This is a recipe from Senegal, told by Awa Sambou in Baynunk language, spoken in the region of Casamance.
The fish is dried, the sauce is made from manioc, and the dish itself is served on thinly ground, local Niamone rice.
Awa Sambou is the one teasing our taste buds here. On beautiful footage by Muriel Lutz, she introduces the ingredients and utensils, and unveils her cooking secrets, in Baynunk language from Casamance.
"Binta and the Great Idea" ("Binta y la Gran Idea") is a 2004 Spanish-Senegalese co-production short film by writer-director Javier Fesser. The film stars Zeynabou Diallo as Binta, Agnile Sambou as Binta's Father, and Aminata Sane as Soda. The film duration is approximately 31 minutes, with dialogue in Diola and French. The film is included in Oscar Nominated Short Films by Magnolia Pictures and Shorts International; the theatrical release of this collection was February 16, 2007.
This film was made in collaboration with UNICEF, to which 100% of the profits will be given.
Binta is a young African girl who serves as the narrator. She talks about her father and his 'great idea'. Binta's father is a small-time, local fisherman in a peaceful village in Senegal. His friend who recently visited Europe describes what fishing is like there. He tells him that the Europeans can catch thousands of fish with bigger boats equipped with sonar. The man, very impressed by this, encourages the father to approach the government and request a permit for a bigger boat. Binta's father also hears from his friend how once he attains wealth he must get a permit for a weapon so he can defend his wealth. The friend also shows off his watch which has an alarm set to ring every day at noon. "What happens at noon?" asks Binta's father. "Why, the alarm rings!" his friend replies.
Binta's father is shown making his way up through the ranks of government, sharing his great idea with various officials. The film switches back and forth between the story of Binta and her father and the struggle between Binta's cousin, Soda, and her father, a village elder. Soda desperately wants to go to school, but her father believes African girls should not be educated; they should learn to tend the home and then get married and tend to home and family.
The village school children put on a play to convince Soda's father to let her attend school. Here we experience the power of art and solidarity; in the end, the father is finally convinced, and Soda is allowed to get an education.
Finally, when Binta's father meets with the provincial leader, we find out what his great idea was: He wants do his part to make the world a better place by adopting a tubab (white child), "preferably weaned," in order to teach him/her qualities which Western industrialized society has largely lost, such as sharing, solidarity, the sustainable use of resources. This film is unusual in that it allows us a glimpse of Western culture as viewed from a third world perspective.
Various themes are touched upon in this delightful film: the power of art to bring about change (see both the play-within-the-film and the film itself), sustainability and equitable division of resources, and the true meaning of progress and humanity.
Thieboudienne, or ceebu jen, is a traditional dish from Senegal. It is made from fish, rice and tomato sauce. Its other ingredients are onions and peanut oil. All these ingredients are found in abundance in the country. The name of the dish comes from Wolof, meaning rice and fish.
Thieboudienne(rice and Fish Stew)
Ingredients:
3 lb sea bass tail
2 lb broken rice
½ lb pound pumpkin
½ lb sweet cassava
9 cups cold water
1x6 ounce can tomato paste
3” piece smoked fish (any firm white will do)
12 small okra pods
5 small purple turnips
5 carrots
4 sweet potatoes
2 large onions
2 scallions
2 small eggplants
2 large cloves garlic
1 small green cabbage
1 bunch parsley
1 fresh bird chilli
1 habanero chilli
4 Tbsp peanut oil
1 tsp salt
How to cook it:
Dissolve the salt in the water.
Prepare the vegetables as follows:
Peel and dice both the pumpkin and cassava into 1 inch pieces. Wash, top and tail the okra pods, making sure you have no hard pods. Quarter the turnips and sweet potatoes. Peel the carrots and cut into 1 inch rounds. Cut the eggplants into 1 inch slices. Cut the cabbage into 8 pieces. Mince the onions.
Prepare the sea bass by cleaning and cut into 1 ½ inch thick steaks, score the steaks with a sharp knife.
Prepare the stuffing for the sea bass steaks by placing the parsley, garlic, bird chilli and scallions in a food processor and pulsing until they form a thick paste. When the paste is ready poke the stuffing into the slits, previously made by scoring the sea bass steaks
Heat the oil in a large stockpot and brown the onion. Add the smoked fish, tomato paste and ¼ cup of the salted water. When the onion has browned, place the sea bass in the pot with the onion mixture and cook for 5 minutes.
Add the remaining water. Bring to the boil, cover and lower the heat. Add the vegetables as follows: pumpkin, sweet cassava, turnips, cabbage, sweet potatoes, eggplants, carrots, okra and habanero chilli. Remove and reserve the habanero chilli when the Thiebou Dienn is spicy enough to taste.
Cook for 20 minutes.
Remove the sea bass steaks, keeping them whole, and place them on a serving platter. Cover with a little of the cooking liquid and keep warm.
Cook the Thiebou Dienn for a further 15 minutes, thereafter removing the vegetables and arranging them on a platter. Keep warm.
Reserve 2 cups of the liquid to make the sauces.
Bring the remaining liquid to the boil, add the rice, cover and cook for 20 minutes or until the liquid is absorbed and the rice is done.
While the rice is cooking, pulverize the habanero chili and add it to 1 cup of the reserved liquid. Heat, stirring occasionally, and place it in a sauce dish.
Heat the remaining cup of liquid and place in a separate sauce dish.
When ready to serve, mound the rice on one platter and the fish and vegetables on another. Alternatively, place the rice in a deep dish, arrange the vegetables and fish on top, and eat Senegalese-style with your right hand (only!) or with a large spoon.
Add, whichever sauce you prefer, the one with or without the habanero chili according to your taste.
You and your guests or family will undoubtedly find this Senegalese Rice and Fish Stew well worth the trouble taken in it's preparation. Apart from using canned tomato paste, the recipe is the same as that which would have been taken to America and the Caribbean by slaves transported from Senegal, one of the areas, heavily raided by slave traders.
The Ceddo try to preserve their traditional African culture against the onslaught of Islam, Christianity, and the slave trade. When King Demba War sides with the Muslims, the Ceddo kidnap his daughter, Princess Dior Yacine, to protest their forcible conversion to Islam. After trying to rescue the princess, various heirs to the throne are killed, and the King is murdered during the night. Eventually the kidnappers are killed and the princess is brought back to the village to confront the Imam, as all the villagers are being given Muslim names.
The film is about an unemployed African man, Ibrahima (Makhouredia Gueye), who lives with his two wives and kids. A nephew of his sends him a money order from France worth 25,000 Francs which he has saved from working as a street sweeper. He is to keep some of the money for himself, save a portion for his nephew, and give a portion to his sister. However, Ibrahima faces numerous difficulties with the Senegalese bureaucracy in trying to cash the money order. He deals with corruption, greed, problematic family members, the locals and the changing from his traditional way of living to a more modern one. The film explores themes of neocolonialism, religion, corruption, and relationships in Senegalese society.
