Wednesday, September 26, 2007
Safety : Do gooders doing some good
After our screening of Black Girl on Monday we touched briefly the issues surrounding safety and I can't stop thinking about that concept. I remember listening to Portia speak a little about why Sembene might have chosen for the white people to talk about that during the dinner party scene. Since safety really depends a lot upon a person’s specific situation (race, class, age, political situation) I thought it interesting to think of Diouana's safety in relation to the people she worked for. I hadn't thought of how their (the employers) idea of a "safe" Senegal could be to the people of Senegal, a roadblock to further independence. Since there (or I'm guessing from the commentary during that dinner party) was still some kind of outside party "keeping the safety" that there was an occupying force on the other party (the people of Senegal) being "kept safe." There is a flip side to who is kept safe and who is doing the keeping. After hearing the issue of safety explained in these terms I appreciated how Sembene specifically chose to bring the issue up. In his choice to leave Diouana out of the conversation physically and politically, while the white folks talked about safety in the company of like-minded people, Sembene was indirectly and metaphorically commenting on the current politics of Senegal. Where does Diouana's safety come in? How about the safety of her family, her community?
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I wonder if the idea of "safety," in the context of the dinner party conversation, is not the crux of racism. If I think I am better then you and that I know what is better for you, then in a real sense, I am asserting my superiority over you. Is that not the basis for racism? I know better, so I'll treat you as a child, tell you where to live, and hand out a small pittance to keep you satisfied.
What the "white dinner party" doesn't discuss is the vibrant culture that existed in Senegal, while the "white dinner party" attendees' forefathers were living lawlessly in fiefdoms and dying of plague from poor sanitation. They also seem to miss the point that one of the reasons the slave trade thrived in Goree was that the "benevolent white man" saw a wonderful source of cheap labor to exploit the resources of the New World. If the "white dinner party" attendees and their forebearers were truly interested in "safety" wouldn't they have taken steps to stop slavery by not buying slaves?
Sembene is a "master storyteller," whose film is like an onion. It has layer upon layer of meaning, which the viewer can peel away to discover the "heart" of his philosophy. I think Sembene is not only a pioneer in African Cinema, but he is a radical black filmmker, because he shines a bright light upon the the double standard of a European Culture, which thirsts for "liberty," but does not share that elixir (liberty) in its interaction with other cultures; African, Asian, Native American, or Aboriginal.
James Kimball
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