Cultural Representations of Massacre

the long version

Over the past sixty years, the massacre of Thiaroye (Senegal), the 1944 mutiny of African soldiers that was severely suppressed by the French army, has been continuously reinterpreted by artists such as L.S. Senghor, F. Keita, Doumbi-Fakoly, O. Sembene, B.B. Diop, R. Bouchareb, and F.F. Faye. In this book, Parent puts together a history of these representations, characterizing their socio-historical role and the way each document (re- )interprets the events. Combining a first-hand analysis of the works and their intertextual interactions, as well as an external perspective (which consists of reconstructing the socio-historical contexts of production and reception of each document), Parent engages with history, literature, film, poetics, and politics and highlights the importance of remembering the past.