Fruit and Finals

Welcome to mango and madh season.

Sadly, I've been holed up writing papers in French on topics that I've only studied in French, which makes for some interesting conclusions.

Here's the titles of my papers:

The Crisis in Casamance: Historice Causes
Cheikh Amadou Bamba and the Economic System of the Mourides

Hopefully I'll be able to fill you all in later on the details.

Feminism, Senegalese Style

In my Gender and Development class on Wednesday morning, we watched the film Faat Kine, created by Ousmane Sembène. Sembene used the film to address issues that people don't want to face in Senegalese society and to present an alternative to the traditional African woman, and to some stereotypical aspects of African culture.

The film shows a lot of Dakar, but it also shows something that I haven't experienced very much here- free, independent, powerful women (although the woman who owns the beignet shop previously mentioned is certainly doing well, there's a line all the time). Faat Kine had two children out of wedlock, owns her own business, drives a car, is sending her children to college, bought her own house, and is what we would call in the US, sexually liberted. Now, I don't believe that the last aspect is necessary to be a happy woman, but all in all, Faat Kine is a formidable and welcome character.

The questions that I was left with after watching the movie were the following:

• How was this film received by Senegalese society? Or was it at all? While Sembene is well known, a small portion of the population has access to films in the theatre or in their homes. And if the film didn't reach very broadly, that raises the question...
• How is or isn't this film a depiction of Senegalese society? Where did Sembene draw his idea of an indpendent woman? Is it Western, or do I just think it is because I'm American? Clearly some aspects of the film are true to my experience here, but the film looked a lot different from the scenes I usually see on the TV here.

Below is a 5 minute scene from the film wherein three unmarried, successful women talk openly about issues that sometimes aren't addressed in Senegal. Check it out.

What I do all day.

I thought that I might give you, my readers, something steady to stand on when it comes to understanding where all of my ranting and raving comes from. That would be, my schedule (in a vague sense).

Each week I take classes at WARC, the West African Research Center, which hosts several study abroad programs in Dakar, and from IFEE- L’Institut de Français pour Etudiants Etrangères., which is a section of L’Université Cheik Anta Diop, or UCAD. All my classes except Wolof are 3 hours once a week.

My classes consist of the following:
WARC
French Grammar Review
History of Islam in Senegal
History of the Senegambia
Gender and Development in Senegal
Wolof
IFEE
French-English Translation, Level 3

I had planned to take at least one course at UCAD proper, along with the other, normal, Senegalese students. Unfortunately, the system proved too difficult to navigate for an outsider. I would venture to guess it’s difficult for most insiders as well. I made a good effort to attend a African Literature course, and two weeks in a row the professor did not show up, although both time hundreds of students sat waiting for the entire length of the class. The first time that this happened, I learned when I got home that there was a strike at the University that day. But the second time is still unexplained.

Strikes in the universities here are frequent, usually in response to the inadequate number of classes for the volume of students enrolled. I feel like U.S. universities haven’t had a good strike since the 60’s, but apparently it’s still commonplace in other Western countries, like France, as well. I’m not sure if Senegal picked up the practice from France or if the system here works poorly enough to incite students’ anger time and again.

After sitting through a couple of classes with no professor, I thought that I might like a little striking too, especially if I was paying for that class specifically and needed it to advance to the next level of my degree program.

Why the university works the way it does is a mystery to me still, and I won’t venture a guess into its inner workings. Let’s just say that the final product isn’t a well-oiled machine and there appears to be more organization within departments than throughout the university as a whole.

If this entry is any evidence, my English spelling is slowly disintegrating. I hope that means my French is getting better.

My comrades.

If you're interested on getting other thoughts on what I'm doing from the girls that I spend a lot of time with, check out the following blogs.


L'Expérience Sénégalaise

Cross Cultural Communications

Maangi fi rekk.

Maangi fi rekk is "I am here only" in Wolof, which is the typical response to "How do you do?".

We had our first Wolof class yesterday at WARC, where I'll be taking most of my classes this spring. Our professor's name is CD, which I don't know how to spell in Wolof, but his nickname, given to him many years ago, is Q-Tip. (He's super skinny.) All our other classes will start next week.

For now, I'll just give you my favorite slip-ups en français.

1. Instead of saying I caught a cold from my father, I said that I caught my father.

2. Instead of saying I like Lebanese food, I said that I like Lebanese cousins.

But, everyone is very pleasant when I say that in French, I sound stupid. They don't say that I don't sound stupid, they just say that it's okay and that it will come. Luckily, my host family speaks decent English in case I don't understand.