Country Notes

“The role of African cinema today is to reflect the vitality of a people⁠—an African people in all its diversity⁠—and through this people, reflect the world.”

– Safi Faye (Senegalese filmmaker)
Through African Eyes: Dialogues with the Directors, 2003.

The Country Notes present brief historical overviews of the individual countries of origin for the festival’s feature and documentary films and provide key elements in the social and artistic context of the past and present-day life in each nation state. Readers are guided to further resources, including relevant African novels and films that add additional perspectives. CFAF Country Notes are provided to audiences through the CFAF Endowment Fund and are to be used for educational purposes only.

 

CFAF Country Notes Coordinator, Editor, and Contributor:

Candice Goucher, Professor Emerita of History, Washington State University; Visiting Professor of Global Studies, University of California, Berkeley; co-author of In the Balance: Themes in Global History (1998), World History: Journeys from Past to Present (2008), and Striking Iron: The Art of African Blacksmiths (2019), among other books; author of the award-winning book, Congotay! Congotay! A Global History of Caribbean Food (2014); and editor of the four-volume Women Who Changed the WorldTheir Lives, Challenges, and Accomplishments through History (2022).

Fred Hardyway received his doctorate in African/World/Middle Eastern History at Washington State University.  He was a member of the Bandafassi Regional Archaeological Project in 2016 and is currently Director of Transition Services at Partners for Sacred Places in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. 

Daniel Kotin is an independent historian and adjunct faculty member at Washington State University, Vancouver, and Willamette University. He received his PhD in African/World History from WSU in 2021 and conducts research on African and African Diasporic cultures.

We understand this notes are capturing moments in time, so fill out our Country Notes feedback form if you have any important information that will help in our continued efforts to provide educational resources to the community.