Droit islamique et droits de la femme d’après les registres du TribunalMusulman de Ndar (Saint-Louis du Sénégal)

Selon les archives du tribunalmusulman de Saint-Louis du Sénégal, fondé en 1857, cet article s’intéresse au cas des femmes qui étaient les plus nombreuses à recourir à la médiation des juges musulmans au sein de cette institution judiciaire. A partir d’une analyse des droits de la femme en matière de divorce, nous examinons l’application du droit islamique au sein du Tribunal Musulman. Nous nous interrogerons tout particulièrement sur la politique judiciairemusulmane des cadis de Ndar en ce qui concerne le code familial et les droits de la femme. Mais, en premier lieu, nous abordons les péripéties du TribunalMusulman, qui fut la toute première institution judiciaire publique en Afrique de l’ouest francophone.     

Art et artisanat en Afrique Noire: Problèmes d'une définition différentielle

In 1977, John Lonsdale published a review of William R. Ochieng's study APre-Colonial History of the Gusii of Western Kenya in the Kenya Historical Review. Entitled “When did the Gusii (or any other group) become a ‘Tribe’?”, the ten-page article was less a book review and more a treatise on the practice of history in Africa. Taking Lonsdale's question as a point of inspiration, this article provides a critical rethinking of the theories of “tribe”, ethnicity and identity politics that continue to dominate African scholarship by examining the particular case of the Luyia in western Kenya. Through the seemingly incongruous and stubbornly diverse accounting of Luyia political community, this study suggests that histories of ethnic identity remain trapped by their own constructivist logic, elevating the “inventors” of traditional accounts at the expense of the plural and dissenting voices that characterise the multiple forms of political imagination practised across Africa that, while diverse, continue to rely on the idiom of the “tribe”.     

Instrumentalisation de la coopération chinoise et transition politique au Sénégal: analyse de l’ère Wade

In countries like Senegal where democracy seems to be institutionalising itself, evaluation of the quality of this practice often happens at critical points of reference such as elections. The democratic changes between Presidents Diouf and Wade in 2000 and between the latter and President Macky Sall in 2012 are generally deemed to be indicators of the healthy condition of democracy in this country. The present article stipulates that the politicians involved in this alternation plan and prepare for it as much at the heart of their administrations as do the political parties, but often also outside election periods. This article demonstrates that the Wade regime, following that mindset, has instrumentalized its cooperation with China in attempt to consolidate its power.     

L’année 1998 en République démocratique du Congo: Survie et pratique du politique dans le miroir du quotidien

The four texts comprising this research note were written at the end of 1998 by Congolese scholars asked by B. Jewsiewicki to present people’s actions and local perception of the each region’s situation. Charles Djungu-Simba, a scholar and a writer, presents a fictionalized report of the August 1998 rebels’ intrusion into the city of Kinshasa. The second contributor (writing under a pseudonym) brings in interviews with two officers of the former Zairian army who were incorporated into Kabila’s armed forces. Justin Bisanswa analyses briefly the situation in Kivu with special attention to the local people’s attitudes toward the main militia groups. Jean-Pierre Nzunguba brings in a life story of a Bunia popular painter, an opportunity to present local perception of the life during the past forty years.     

Assimilation coloniale et identités religieuses de la civilité des originaires des Quatre Communes (Sénégal)

In his prize-winning monograph on the tirailleurs sénégalais, Myron Echenberg points out that most soldiers in the French colonial army were of slave origin. This article examines the role of slaves in pre-colonial African armies and the problem that the French had in keeping their soldiers alive within a hostile disease environment. The response of Governor Louis Faidherbe was to create a professional unit of African soldiers, the tirailleurs. Recruited overwhelmingly from slaves, the tirailleurs became the basis of the French army that conquered much of West Africa. Even after slavery had ended, about three quarters of Africans in the French army during World War I were of slave origin. The article also examines the role of veterans after the war and the French success in converting them into one of the pillars of the colonial social order. The article concludes with a consideration of the role of memory in both France and Africa.     

L’exil et la négociation du manque dans trois romans de Calixthe Beyala

This article takes as its theme the literature of sub-Saharan Africa, and in particular the prolific work of the Cameroonian author Calixthe Beyala, who, since 1987, has published numerous novels in exile. Calixthe Beyala is among those expatriate writers for whom exile, far from being synonymous with banishment, on the contrary represents true salvation. The article examines how Calixthe Beyala speaks of expatriation in three of her novels: Tu t’appelleras Tanga (Your name shall be Tanga) (1988), Les honneurs perdus (1996) and Comment cuisiner son mari à l’africaine (2000). Belonging to three successive decades, these works relate specifically to the theme of exile and plunge to the heart of Cameroon and to the Cameroonian diaspora in Paris, shedding light on the grieving process linked to the loss of one’s own geographic space, and to the loss of self.     

Les Ninja,les Cobra et les Zoulou crèvent l’écran à Brazzaville: le rôle les médias et la construction des identités de violence politique

In his recently published studies, the author analyzed the development and use of militia groups in the political conflicts that shook Congo-Brazzaville in the 1990s. After briefly reviewing these events, he points up the change in recruiting militiamen that occurred in the last phase of these conflicts. His text is primarily concerned with the role of Western mass culture in shaping the bodies and identities of these militiamen and the militiamen’s sense of identity. From the late 1950s (here the author draws on the research of Georges Balandier) to the late 1990s, the young men of Brazzaville were inspired in constructing a modernity of their own bodies by certain Western action films. The graphic violence in these films, perpetrated by characters whom the young men adopted as their heroes, legitimated their own use of violence.     

La "frontière africaine" revisitée: "ethnogenèse" dans les Grassfields de l'est(le cas de la chefferie bamiléké de Batié)

Cet article tente de dater la genèse et de suivre l'évolution dans le temps d'une chefferie Bamiléké (ouest-Cameroun) en l'inscrivant dans ses contexte régional et historique, couvrant la période précoloniale (fin du 17ième siècle approximativement à fin du 19ième siècle). Pour ce faire nous avons recours à la tradition orale telle que celle-ci a été définie par Jan Vansina (1985), que nous complétons par d'autres sources confirmant ou infirmant ces traditions. Nous essayons de mettre à l'épreuve le paradigme de la "frontière africaine" introduit par Igor Kopytoff (1987) et montrons en quoi notre étude de cas conforte certaines de ses hypothèses et en réfute d'autres. L'article porte l'accent sur une contextualisation historique et culturelle des sources utilisées. S'appuyant sur les travaux de certains historiens de l'Afrique centrale (MacGaffey, Miller, Vansina), il conclu par des remarques concernant la conceptualisation du temps et de l'agencéité, l'historicité et la culture des sociétés Grassfields précoloniales.