partial list/ updated 1 Sept 2003
African and Africa-related videos in Middlebury College collections
1) Videos from the California Newsreel Library of African Cinema
(see their website for more extended descriptions: http://www.newsreel.org/topics/acine.htm)
Africa Dreaming (Sophia's Homecoming, Sabriya, So Be It, The Gaze of the Stars). Four short films on love from Namibia, Mozambique, Senegal, Tunisia. 1997, 109 mins.
Afrique, je te plumerai (Africa, I Will Fleece You) (Jean-Marie Teno, Cameroon 1992) "A compelling and sardonic essay on the history of colonialism in Cameroon, and by extension, on the African continent. Focuses on historical as well as contemporary European cultural domination, particularly in the publishing and media industry." (88 mins.)
Aimé Césaire: Une voix pour l'histoire (A Voice for History) (1994, three parts; 162 mins. total)
1) The film introduces the Martinique author, Aimé Césaire. Cesaire and his wife Suzanne founded in 1939 the seminal literary review, Tropiques, a journal which influenced Caribbean intellectuals and launched the movement called the 'Great Black Cry'. After WWII, Cesaire served as mayor of Fort-de-France and as Martinique's representative in the French National Assembly during the crucial years of decolonization. He discusses the difficulty of balancing the life of a poet with that of a practical politician for over 50 years.
2) Part 2 moves to Paris in the 1930s where Cesaire, Leopold Senghor, first president of Senegal, and the French Guyanese poet, Leon Damas developed the concept of Negritude, a world wide revindication of African values. After WWII the Negritude movement centered around a French publishing house, Presence Africaine, which attracted the support of progressive French intellectuals including Pablo Picasso, Albert Camus and Jean Paul Sartre.
3) In Part 3, Cesaire responds to the disappointments of the post-colonial world and expresses his hopes for the future. In the 1960s his plays were among the first to warn of the dangers of neo-colonialism. French anthropologist Edgar Morin, biographer Roger Toumson, novelist Maryse Conde and American writer Maya Angelou and others testify to Cesaire's central role as a 'founding ancestor' for the current flowering of African Diaspora literature."
Ainsi meurent les anges (Thus angels die) (Moussa Sene Absa, 2001) "Mory [is] a troubled Senegalese poet living outside Paris with his French wife and their children. We watch his marriage fall apart under cross-cultural pressures, specifically his father's demand that he take a second wife in Senegal. Homeless in winter, separated from his children, his poems scattered over a Paris street, Mory returns to Senegal, penniless and with uncertain prospects. At the same time, black-and-white sequences reveal the psychological origins of Mory's present malaise."
Angano... Angano... (Tales from Madagascar) (Clémence & Caesar Paes, 1989) Venerable but unmistakably contemporary storytellers recount for the camera and their listeners the founding myths of Malagasy culture: the creation of man and woman, the origin of rice cultivation, and the reason for animal sacrifice.
Black Girl (Ousmane Sembene, 1966) In Black Girl, a Senegalese maid goes to the Riviera with her employers and gains a new perspective on what it means to be an African outside of Africa. 65 min.
Borom Sarret (Ousmane Sembene, 1966) The film follows a cart driver in Dakar as he meets an unfortunate array of people. 20 min.
Clando (Jean-Marie Teno, Cameroon, 1996) " Sobgui, a former computer programmer, drives a "clando" cab in Douala, Cameroon's streets. He is clandestine, not just because his cab is unlicensed, but because he is hiding from his past. When a radical political group involves him a revenge slaying of an informer, Sobgui knows that it is time to get out of Douala. He gets his chance when he is asked to find a wealthy villager's son in Germany. The film represents a dilemma facing educated Africans: whether to work to change the autocratic regimes at home or seek their fortunes abroad."
Daresalam (Let There Be Peace) (Issa Serge Coelo, 2000) "This feature film focuses on two young men caught up in the Civil War in Chad. It begins in the 1970s with the story of Koni and Djimi as the central government invades their village and insists on buying the farmer's millet at below market and then browbeats the villagers into paying taxes to help fight the war. When they resist the government burns the village and massacres the inhabitants. Djimi, wounded, remains behind with the hard-liners, while Koni joins a faction which supports compromise with the government."
Dôlè (Money) (Imunga Ivanga, Gabon 2001) "The action takes place in Libreville, the capital of Gabon. This is where Mougler and his friends Baby Lee, Joker, Akson and Bezingo, four fifteen-year-old boys, live. These boys have to fend for themselves, except for Mougler who lives with Maradou, his mother. The gang is tired of thieving and is full of dreams of more ambitious jobs. The opportunity is given to them with the extremely popular betting kiosks in Dôlè. The temptation is great, and so are the risks."
Faat Kine (Ousmane Sembene, Senegal 2000) "The deceptively light domestic drama of Faat Kine, a gas station operator born, significantly, the same year as Senegalese independence, 1960."
Femmes aux yeux ouverts (Women With Open Eyes) (Anne Laure Folly, West Africa 1993) "Surveys social conditions faced by women in Burkina Faso, Mali, Senegal and Benin, including circumcision, forced marriage, AIDS, and economic repression. Examines grass-roots efforts toward education and improvement as Africa opens to democracy."
Finzan (A Dance for Heroes) (Cheick Oumar Sissoku, 1990) (107 mins.) "Tells the story of two women's rebellion. Nanyuma, a young widow, refuses her brother-in-law, the village fool, when he asserts his traditional right to "inherit" her. Fili, a young girl sent from the city by her conservative father, is brutally circumcised by the village women who are scandalized that she resists the age-old custom".
Flame (Ingrid Sinclair, Zimbabwe 1996) "Feature film depicting the role of women fighters in the Zimbabwean liberation struggle."
Frantz Fanon: Black Skin, White Mask (Isaac Julien, 1995) (50 mins.) "A film biography of Frantz Fanon."
Le grand blanc de Lambarene (Bassek Ba Kobhio, 1994) (93 mins.) "The film provides a fascinating revisionist perspective on Albert Schweitzer, Noble Peace Prize winner and secular saint of the colonial era. Shot on the site of Schweitzer's hospital in Gabon, the film reveals a man blinded to the people around him by his own spiritual self-absorption and arrogance."
Hyenas (Djibril Diop Mambety, 1997). "An old woman returns to her native village after she becomes rich and seeks revenge against the lover of her youth. Eventually she turns the village into a notorious black market, catering to the pleasure of the consumer society. The film represents a pessimistic look of the filmmaker Djibril Diop Mambety at the fate of his continent, Africa."
In a Time of Violence (Mokonenyana Molete and Brian Tilley, South Africa 1994) Three videocassettes (total 150 min.) Television drama which gripped South Africa in 1994 portraying a cross-section of the nation through events in and around Johannesburg.
Kafi's Story (directed and produced by Arthur Howes and Amy Hardie, Sudan ca. 1989) "This film captures Nuba life just at the moment before it was engulfed in the Sudanese civil war in 1989. The Nubian native Kafi narrates his journey to Khartoum, the capital of Sudan, from his village, Torogi, in the Nuba Mountains. Torogi is in the middle of Sudan's encroaching civil war between the Muslim North and the Christian South. Torogi itself is neither Muslim nor Christian and is trying to remain neutral." (See also "Nuba Conversations," filmed ten years later by Howes, also in Middlebury collections.)
Keita (The Heritage of the Griot) (Dani Kouyaté, 1994?) (94 mins) Based on one of the most important works of African oral literature, the Sundjata epic. When a djéliba, a master griot or bard, arrives mysteriously at the home of Mabo Keïta to teach him "the meaning of his name," the boy and griot are inevitably brought into conflict with his Westernized mother and schoolteacher, who have rejected African tradition. The griot reveals to Mabo the story of his distant ancestor, Sundjata Keïta, the 13th century founder of the great Malian trading empire."
The Language You Cry In (Alvaro Toepke and Angel Serrano, 1998) (53 mins.) "Traces the history of a burial hymn of the Mende people brought by slaves to the rice plantations of the Southeast coast of the United States more than two hundred years ago. Joe Opala and Cynthia Schmidt discover that the Gullah family have preserved this song for generations in the United States. They travel to a remote Mende village in Sierra Leone where the villagers reenact the burial ritual."
Lumumba: La mort du prophete (Lumumba: Death of a Prophet) (Raoul Peck, 1992) "Meditation on the tragic events of Patrice Lumumba's twelve month rise and fall as Zaire's first and only popularly elected prime minister."
Monday's Girls, Ngozi Onwurah. California Newsreel, c1993. (49 min.) "A grandmother named Monday Moses in Ogoloma, Nigeria is responsible for taking the young girls of the village through the rites of passage into womanhood so that they will be ready for marriage."
Mortu Nega (may be listed as "Mortu Negra" in MC holdings) (Those Whom Death Refused) (Flora Gomes, Guinea-Bissau...) "In 1973, independence was proclaimed [in Guinea Bissau], ending five centuries of Portuguese colonization and a decade of armed struggle. [This film], Gomes' first feature-length film, portrays this critical period in history through the story of one woman, Diminga, whose husband is fighting on the front lines. The camera captures Cabral's assassination, the ending of hostilities, and the reconstruction of the economically and spiritually devastated country struggling with drought and famine. The term 'Mortu Nega' means those that death did not want, and Gomes films a ceremony using 3000 extras, in which survivors call upon the dead, asking them how they can go on living in such terrible conditions."
Nuba Conversations (Arthur Howes, Sudan 1999) "Ten years after filming Kafi's story [also held by Middlebury], British filmmaker Arthur Howes re-entered the Sudan clandestinely to find out what had happened to the Nuba of Torogi. Everywhere he encountered the jihad or holy war. The fundamentalist Sudanese regime is pursuing its policy of forced assimilation through a systematic disruption of the Nuba people, by killing their cattle and burning their villages. While Nuban women hide in caves 60,000 Nuba children have been abducted to camps were they are forcibly converted to Islam. Howes estimates that 40% of the Sudanese Army is now composed of Nuba men."
La petite vendeuse de soleil (The Little Girl Who Sold the Sun) (Djibril Diop Mambety, 1994) "Parable uses the struggles of a young crippled girl in Dakar trying to earn her living in the market place selling newspapers to mirror Africa's role in the international marketplace."--
Quand les etoies rencontrent la mer (When the Stars Meet the Sea) (Raymond Rajaonarivelo, Madagascar, 1996) "A boy born during a lunar eclipse survives abandonment and inherits magical powers".
Rostov-Luanda (Abderrahmane Sissako, Mali 2000) "Sissako spent a year in Rostov on the Don and there became friends with a young man from Angola. This film chronicles the director's search for a friend of the past. In this personal retrospective, Sissako encounters present-day Angola and traces the great lines of Africa's recent history."
Rouch in Reverse (Mantha Diawara, 1995) "French ethnologist/filmmaker, Jean Rouch discusses his work with Manthia Diawara."
Sango Malo (The Village Teacher) (Bassek Ba Kobhio, 1991) "Malo, the radical young teacher, emphasizes the practical skills needed to build a self-reliant rural community... With his help, the peasants establish a cooperative store and a cocoa marketing cooperative which undercut the power of the village chief, store owner and priest. When Malo alienates the villagers by demanding too rapid change, his enemies call in the army..."
Taafe Fanga (Skirt Power) (Adama Drabo, 1997) "A gender-bending farce set among the 18th Century Dogon of Mali... in part inspired by the actual role women played in Mali's 1991 revolution... [Tells] the parallel stories of four women who challenge male supremacy among the Dogon's legendary elf-like andumbulu spirit ancestors; their semi-historical human descendants, the indigenous, cave-dwelling Tellem; the Dogon who invaded and massacred the Tellem in the 17th century (leaving them a place only in folklore;) and finally their present-day listeners to this tale. "
Tableau Ferraille (Moussa Sene Absa, 1997) (88 mins.) "Tells the story of an idealistic young politician's rise and fall. Daam, a well-intentioned but vacillating European-trained politician, must choose between two social paradigms exemplified by his two wives. The film offers a view of how modernization, as practiced in today's Africa, corrodes traditional communities and retards grassroots development."
Three Tales from Senegal (Le Franc, Fary L'Anesse, Picc Mi; 1994) "Le franc is a parable about the plight of everyday Africans buffeted by the changing winds of the international monetary system. Picc mi is a story of two destitute boys who escape the predatory demands of adults to spend one day of freedom together. Fary l'anesse is a tale of a man led into folly by his pursuit of the perfect woman. When he thinks he has finally found her, she turns out to be a donkey."
Udju Azul di Yonta (The Blue Eyes of Yonta) (Flora Gomes, Guinea-Bissau 1994) "Uses the device of a young woman's search for the author of a love letter to explore the political and social environment in the former Portuguese overseas province of Portuguese Guinea, now the independent country of Guinea-Bissau."
La vie est belle (Life is Rosy) (Ngangura Mweze and Benoit Lamy, Zaire [now DR Congo] 1987) Originally produced as a motion picture in 1987. "The rollicking story of a rural, Zairian musician, played by Papa Wemba, who moves to Kinshasa and uses his wit and talent to get his big break on television."
La vie sur terre (Life on Earth) (Abderrahmane Sissako, Mali, 2001) "A film about the significance of the start of the 21st Century for people still struggling to enter the 20th. [Abderrahmane Sissako's] solution was to improvise a 'fictional documentary' out of daily life in Sokolo, his father's village in Mali near the southeastern corner of Mauritania. He then overlaid these vignettes with readings from Aimé Césaire ... Behind all of this, he weaves the melancholy tones ["Folon"] of the great Malian tenor, Salif Keita [and music by other artists]."
Zan Boko (Homeland) (Gaston J. M. Kabore, Burkina Faso 1987) "Zan boko means 'the place where the placenta is buried' and symbolizes the continuity between past and present in African village societies. The film tells the story of one village swallowed up by one of Africa's large cities [Ouagadougou], and the change from agrarian society to a mass media culture".
2) Other African cinema and documentary
Africa, series, National Geographic 2001 (ten hour-long episodes from across the continent). "An epic series presenting Africa through the eyes of its people, conveying the beauty and diversity of the continent and the compelling personal stories of those who shape its future."
African guitar: solo fingerstyle guitar music, composers and performers of Congo/Zaïre, Uganda, Central African Republic, Malawi, Namibia, and Zambia / audio visual field recordings 1966-1993 by Gerhard Kubik. Vestapol Productions. 1 videocassette (60 min.). + 1 booklet.
Beauty and the beast: two Igbo masquerades, Herbert M. Cole. University of Washington, c1985. (31 min.) Ekeleke and Okoroshi masquerades filmed in 1983 by Herbert M. Cole and Alexander Attah. Both masquerades videotaped in Agwa.
Black and White in Color
. Lorimar Home Video, 1987. (88 mins) "French colonists in Africa, several months behind in the news, find themselves at war with their German neighbors. Deciding that they must do their proper duty and fight the Germans, they promptly conscript the local native population. Issuing them them boots and rifles, the French attempt to make "proper" soldiers out of the Africans. A young, idealistic French geographer seems to be the only rational person in the town, and he takes over control of the "war" after several bungles on the part of the others."
Black girl, Sembene Ousmane. New York, NY : New Yorker Films, 1965. (56 min.) "A young Senegalese girl leaves to work for a European family in Antibes. The harsh treatment leads her to commit suicide."
Camp de Thiaroye
= Camp Thiaroye. Sembene Ousmane, Thierno Faty Sow. New York, NY : New Yorker Films Video, c1988. (152 min.) "African soldiers, returning home after fighting in World War II, are massacred in a dispute over pay."
Celebrating African life. Mary Lee Nolan & Sidney Nolan. Educational Video Network, c1997. (15 min.) "A recreation of traditional Zulu life in Natal, urban festivities in Johannesburg, and celebrations in Namibia and Senegal reveal ways that Africans celebrate their diverse cultures."
Chocolat, Clair Denis. New York, NY: Orion Home Video, 1990, c1988. (105 min.) "A young French woman returns to Cameroon to trace her past. Soon the sights, sounds and smells sweep her back to her childhood and memories of the people who populated her youth."
Consuming hunger: Shaping the image, Ilan Ziv. Maryknoll World Productions, c1987. (29 min.) "Second program in a series which... [explores] how the media shapes our view of the world, transforming television images into our reality. This segment explores the misrepresentations that result from stereotyped portrayals of [the Ethiopian famine of 1984], juxtaposing typical media images with documentary images of African life."
Fair trade
, Morag Productions, Waterloo, Ontario : Morag Productions, Indiana University, c1990. (27 min.) Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. Some women dare to defy the traditionally male-dominated economy by trading in the market or breaking rocks to sell for cement. Now the Small Industry Development Organization will lend money to ambitious women who want to start a business or expand into larger markets.
Forsaken cries (Amnesty International, Rwanda 1997). (35 mins.) "In 1994, close to one million people were killed in Rwanda. Documentary examines Rwanda as a case study of the human rights challenge of the 21st century.The film incorporates historical footage, interviews, analyses".
Guelwaar, Sembène Ousmane. New York, NY : New Yorker Films, [1996?], c1993. (115 min.) "When Guelwaar, a political activist and a Christian, is mistakenly buried in a Muslim cemetery, family members, political and religious leaders become embroiled in the dispute."
Harvest, 3000 years [Ethiopia], Haile Gerima. Mypheduh Films, 1976. (150 min.) "A feature film set in contemporary Ethiopia [on the eve of revolution] which tells the real-life story of a peasant family's struggle for survival under virtually feudal conditions on the farm of a wealthy landowner."
The Hunters (Jun Twasi of Kalahari). John Marshall. Watertown, MA : Documentary Educational Resources, 1989, c1983 [original from 1959]. (72 min.) "In this classic documentary, the Kalahari Bushmen of Africa wage a constant war for survival against the hot arid climate and unyielding soil. 'The Hunters' focuses on four men who undertake a hunt to obtain meat for their village. The chronicle of their 13-day trek becomes part of the village's folklore, illustrating the ancient roots and continual renewal of African tribal cultures."
In and Out of Africa
, by Gabai Baare, Ilisa Barbash, Christopher Steiner, Lucien Taylor. Los Angeles, CA : Center for Visual Anthropology, University of Southern California, c1992. "During the colonial period in the 1920's, European interest in collecting African art stimulated a transnational trade between Africa and the West. Today this multi-million dollar trade lies largely in the hands of Muslim merchants. This is a story about Gabai Baare, a merchant who brings 'wood' from West Africa to sell in the United States. It is a story about the meaning of art."
Jaguar
. Jean Rouch, Lam Ibrahima Dia, Illo Gaoudel, Damoure. (93 min.) Films de la Pleiade, Paris; [198-?] "Portrays a condition and state of mind that existed in West Africa in the 1950's--a time when it was possible to travel freely and when there was an exhilarating sense of opportunity in the air."
The JVC Smithsonian Folkways video anthology of music and dance of Africa. Multicultural Media, c1996. 3 videocassettes (156 min.) Volume 1: Egypt, Uganda, Senegal. Volume 2: The Gambia, Liberia, Ghana, Nigeria. Volume 3: Kenya, Malawi, Botswana, South Africa.
Les Maitres fous. Jean Rouch. Films de la Pleïade. New York, NY: Interama Video, [1986?] (29 min.) "This film documents the annual ceremony of the Hauku cult, a religious movement which was widespread in Niger and Ghana from the 1920's to the 1950's."
Long night's journey into day. Iris Films/Iris Feminist Collective. California Newsreel, c2000. (95 min.) Re South African transition from apartheid; profiles of several activists and communities in relation to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission.
Mandela, produced by Jonathan Demme, Edward Saxon, Jo Menell. Manga Entertainment, Inc., c1997. (118 min.) "This candid and provocative portrait of Nelson Mandela takes you to the very heart of the struggle for majority rule in South Africa."
Mandela: the man & his country
. (Anne Benjamin, 1990) (50 mins.) MPI Home Video. "Chronicles the life of Nelson Mandela against the backdrop of South African politics, including interviews and coverage of his release in 1990 after 26 years in prison."--
Mandela's fight for freedom, Stephen Clarke. Associates for Discovery Networks and BBC/ Discovery Channel Video, 1995. (Two videocassettes, total 145 min.)
The Mende (Bruce MacDonald, 1991) Grenada Disappearing World series. (55 mins) Thoughtful ethnographic portrayal of the lives of Mende farmers in the Sierra Leone village of Kpuawala.
N!ai, the story of a !Kung woman (Adrienne Miesmer and John Marshall, 1980 Documentary Educational Resources, 1980. (59 min.) "A compilation of footage of the !Kung people of Namibia from 1951 through 1978. Focuses on the changes in the life of these people as seen through the reflections of one woman, N!ai."
Namibia, rebirth of a nation
. Chicago, IL : Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, 1990. (29 min.) Quiet documentary of the tasks of reconstruction after the liberation war.
Maids and madams: apartheid begins in the home, Mira Hamermesh. New York, NY: Filmakers Library, 1986. (52 min.) "Describes how apartheid affects the daily life of women in South Africa by focusing on the relationship between negro household workers and white employers."
Masai women (Chris Curling with Melissa Llewelyn-Davies, 1994) Granada Television. (52 min.)
"An ethnographic view of Masai culture and society, focusing on the preparation of young Masai girls for marriage and life in their society. Probes, through a candid interview with an older woman, the feelings of the Masai women about polygamy and their inability to own property."
Mau Mau. Anthony Howarth and David Koff. Silver Spring, MD: Bellwether Group, 1988 (53 min.) "Originally produced as a documentary film in 1973. Musindo Mwinyipembe. Recounts the events from 1952 through 1963 which culminated in the installment of an independent national government in Kenya, and the role of "Mau Mau" in these events."
Monday's girls, Ngozi Onwurah. California Newsreel, c1993. (49 min.) "A grandmother named Monday Moses in Ogoloma, Nigeria is responsible for taking the young girls of the village through the rites of passage into womanhood so that they will be ready for marriage."
Our friends at the bank, Peter Chappell. New York, NY : First Run/Icarus Films, 1997. (84 min.) "Filmed over a period of 14 months, documents the negotiations between the World Bank and Uganda in an attempt to understand and describe the relationship and its implications for Uganda. Describes the activities of James Wolfensohn, president of the World Bank, and Yoweri Museveni, leader of Uganda."
Pull ourselves up or die out (Jun Twasi San, Namibia) : a field report / from Documentary Educational Resources ; produced by Claire Ritchie. Watertown, MA : Documentary Educational Resources, c1985. (26 min.)
Second nature: building forests in West Africa's savannas, Graham Maughan. Cyrus Productions, c1996. (40 min.) With James Fairhead, Melissa Leach, Dominique Millimouno. "Contrary to widely-held notions that West Africa's transition zone, one of the world's most ecologically fragile areas, is undergoing rapid deforestation at the hands of local villagers,British and Guinean social anthropologists, after doing much in-depth research in Guinea's Kissidougou prefecture, have shown that local villagers/farmers have been using their skills in transforming savanna to forest, and that, in fact, forest in Kissidougou is actually on the increase."
The Speeches of Nelson Mandela, MPI Home Video. Oak Forest, IL : MPI Home Video, c1995. (70 min.) "Offers a demonstration of his oratory prowess, from his long fight against apartheid, to his triumphant release from prison and ensuing political career."
Sizwe Bansi is dead. Fugard, Athol. BBC/British Open University. RMI Media Productions, 1978. (60 min.) Videocassette release of live performance of Fugard's play in 1974.
Tilai ("The law"). (Idrissa Ouedraogo, Burkina Faso 1990). "A simple but haunting tale of forbidden love, honor and revenge, Tilai follows the tragic story of Saga, who returns to his village after a long absence. He finds that his young fiancee, Nogma, has been married off to his father." Music by Abdullah Ibrahim.
To live with herds
, David MacDougall. University of California Extension Center for Media and Independent Learning, 1996?, 1971. (69 min.) Videocassette release of a 1971 ethnographic motion picture. " Looks at life in a traditional Jie homestead during a harsh dry season. Demonstrates the effects of nation building in pre-Amin Uganda on the seminomadic pastoral Jie." Beautiful black and white ethnographic cinematography.
Touki bouki, Djibril Diop Mambety. New York, NY: Kino on Video, c1996. (85 min.) "Two young lovers look to escape from their dusty hometown of Dakar to travel to imagined freedom in Paris."
Visages de femmes (Desire Ecare, Ivory Coast 1987) (103 mins.) "Politically and stylistically adventurous film exploring the links between feminism, economics and tradition in modern-day west Africa."
Where credit is due (Barbara Doran, 1990) MORAG; Indiana University, c1990. (28 min.) Profiles market women in Nairobi, Kenya "and how the Women's World Banking has helped them to obtain enough credit to borrow money to improve their businesses and their ways of life."
White man's country. Anthony Howarth and David Koff ; written by David Koff, 1988 (52 min). "An overview of Kenya's history from colonization by the British in the 1890's, through the formation of its own independent national government in the early 1960's."
Witness to apartheid, Sharon I. Sopher. California Newsreel, 1986. (56 min.) "Testimonies from subjects as diverse as Bishop Desmond Tutu, an obscure white business executive, and a young Black social worker are among the voices of anguish heard protesting the injustice of apartheid in South Africa."
Xala, Sembene Ousmane. New York, NY : New Yorker Films, 1974. (119 min.) "A savage and funny satire on the impotence of young African nations over-dependent on European technology and white bureaucratic structures."
Yaaba Soore: the path of the ancestors, the dance of the spirits. Documents mask styles and dance performance in the Upper Volta [now Burkina Faso]. Christopher Roy. University of Iowa, 1986-1988. (43 min.)
This list was created in 2003 by Professor David Eaton and has not been updated to include new acquisitions.