January 01 - Ousmane Sembène

Happy Birthday, Ousmane Sembène! Born today in 1923, this Senegalese author, actor, screenwriter, producer and film director was often credited in the French style as Sembène Ousmane in articles and reference works. It was in this manner of which he seemed to favor as a way to underscore the "colonial imposition" of the naming ritual and subvert it.

Among his credits, Sembène is best known for writing and directing the first film fo which he is best known. This was the 1977 Senegalese drama/political drama film 'Ceddo'(also known as the outsiders, or non-Muslims).

The film is set in Senegal, sometime after the establishment of a European presence in the area but before the imposition of direct French colonial administration.  

It tells of one man who makes a non-conformist stand against the persecution put on him by the proponents of Christianity and Islam.

However, when local king Demba War (Matoura Dia)sides with the Muslims, the Ceddo abduct his daughter, Dior Yacine (Tabata Ndiaye), to protest their forced conversion to Islam. Two members of the tribe try and fail to recapture the princess.  

'Ceddo' was entered into the 10th Moscow International Film Festival in July of that same year of its release.  

Sembène is also best known for writing, co-producing and directing the second and the second film of which he is best known. This was the 2004 Senegalese drama film 'Moolaadé' ("magical protection").

For fear of enduring genital mutilation, a group of girls flee their own "purification" ceremony and take refuge with Collé Gallo Ardo Sy (Fatoumata Coulibaly), a woman who had spared her daughter from the same fate. 

Collé casts a spell to protect the girls, which causes much consternation among the village elders. 

In retaliation, they confiscate all radios from the women villagers and demand that the spell be broken, but Collé nevertheless holds fast. 

 
To outsiders, the act known as "female genital cutting" is often shocking. Practitioners surgically remove part or all of the female genitals. 

Traditionally, it is cut with an iron sheet or a knife, then sutured back with needlework or a thorn. There is no anesthetic during the whole process, and the disinfection is not thorough. 

Kenyan gynecologist Dr. Rosemary Mburu estimates that as much as fifteen percent of circumcised girls die of the excessive loss of blood or infection of the wound.

Sembène was what the Los Angeles Times considered one of the greatest authors of Africa, as he had often been called the "father of African film". 

Sembène had been active from 1963–2004. 

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