Carleton’s Regional Carls Program

Tokyo Carleton Club

Carleton Professor Cherif Keïta Film Screening 

Thursday, November 25, 2010, 6:30 p.m.

at the National Film Center

3-7-6 Kyobashi, Chuo-ku, Tokyo 104-0031

Carleton French Professor Cherif Keïta's films "Oberlin-Inanda:  The Life and Times of John L. Dube" (2005, 54mn, Special Mention at the 2005 Pan African Film Festival of Ouagadougou) and "Cemetery Stories:  A Rebel Missionary in South Africa" will be screened as part of the main festival of Cinema Africa 2010.

Professor Keïta came to Carleton in 1985.  A native of Mali, Professor Keïta created and directs Carleton’s francophone seminar in Mali.  He has led four French programs to Pau and Paris for Carleton and a January interim to South Africa for St. Olaf.  On campus, he teaches the French language, francophone African and Caribbean literature, African cinema, and Mande culture.

The Festival will screen more than 35 films from all over Africa.  Celebrating the Centennial of official South Africa-Japan relations, Cinema Africa 2010 will also have a special programme focusing on films from the Republic of South Africa. 

Shot in Oberlin (Ohio, US) and Inanda (KwaZulu-Natal province of South Africa), "Oberlin-Inanda", the 55-minute documentary film features the life and work of John Langalibalele Dube (1871-1946), pioneer educator, journalist, musician, churchman and politician, who co-founded the African National Congress in 1912 (before Nelson Mandela was born) and served as its first president until 1917.  "Oberlin-Inanda" connects Dube's education in 19th century United States with his struggle for political and economic independence and celebrates his enduring legacy in today's democratic South Africa.  This film is a tribute to the township of Inanda, the place which nurtured not only John Dube but also Mahatma Gandhi and his Satyagraha movement in the early 1900s a! nd many other movements for social justice in South Africa.  Professor Thandabantu Nhlapo, Deputy Vice Chancellor of the University of Cape Town said: "this film's message is relevant to contemporary South!  African society, both young and old, and at many levels: educational, historical, social and political."

"Cemetery Stories", a continuation of Keïta's first movie, connects the family of John Dube in Inanda, South Africa, with the family of his American benefactors, missionary William Cullen Wilcox and his wife Ida Belle Clary, a native of Northfield, Minnesota(USA) This film has received positive acclaim at prominent festivals in Africa.

Here is a link with a site map:http://www.momat.go.jp/english/nfc/general_information/index.html