1
00:01:21,715 --> 00:01:23,786
Scarcely twenty years were enough

2
00:01:24,075 --> 00:01:25,483
to make two billion people

3
00:01:25,483 --> 00:01:28,344
define themselves as underdeveloped

4
00:01:30,853 --> 00:01:32,373
I do not intend to speak about

5
00:01:33,000 --> 00:01:34,478
Just speak near by

6
00:02:27,470 --> 00:02:29,001
A film about what?

7
00:02:29,801 --> 00:02:31,277
A film on Senegal;

8
00:02:32,107 --> 00:02:33,654
but what in Senegal?

9
00:02:36,676 --> 00:02:38,151
The Casamance.

10
00:02:38,662 --> 00:02:40,135
Sun and palms.

11
00:02:40,534 --> 00:02:42,033
The part of Senegal...

12
00:02:42,225 --> 00:02:44,612
where tourist settlements flourish

13
00:02:47,342 --> 00:02:48,454
In Enampore,

14
00:02:48,854 --> 00:02:51,700
Andre Manga says his name is listed,

15
00:02:51,700 --> 00:02:53,557
in the tourist information book.

16
00:02:54,636 --> 00:02:56,383
Above the entry of his house,

17
00:02:56,911 --> 00:02:59,550
is a hand-written sign which says�

18
00:02:59,629 --> 00:03:02,131
"Three hundred and fifty francs"

19
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A flat anthropological fact.

20
00:03:30,399 --> 00:03:31,535
In numerous tales...

21
00:03:32,192 --> 00:03:33,978
Woman is depicted as the one...

22
00:03:34,035 --> 00:03:35,516
who possessed the fire.

23
00:03:36,638 --> 00:03:38,604
Only she knew how to make fire.

24
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She kept it in diverse places.

25
00:03:42,450 --> 00:03:45,263
At the end of the stick she used
to dig the ground with,

26
00:03:45,263 --> 00:03:46,631
for example.

27
00:03:46,930 --> 00:03:48,840
In her nails or in her fingers.

28
00:06:10,828 --> 00:06:12,831
Reality is delicate.

29
00:06:13,730 --> 00:06:16,021
My irreality and imagination...

30
00:06:16,655 --> 00:06:18,377
are otherwise dull.

31
00:06:19,106 --> 00:06:21,513
The habit of imposing a meaning...

32
00:06:21,843 --> 00:06:23,723
to every single sign.

33
00:07:31,582 --> 00:07:33,579
She kept it in diverse places.

34
00:07:34,037 --> 00:07:36,859
At the end of the stick she used to dig the ground with,

35
00:07:36,859 --> 00:07:37,739
for example.

36
00:07:48,370 --> 00:07:50,965
First create needs, then, help.

37
00:07:51,818 --> 00:07:53,927
Sitting underneath the thatched roof...

38
00:07:53,955 --> 00:07:56,142
which projects well beyond the front wall...

39
00:07:56,232 --> 00:07:58,265
of his newly built house,

40
00:07:58,673 --> 00:08:01,902
A Peace-Corps Volunteer
nods at several villagers,

41
00:08:02,521 --> 00:08:04,316
who stop by to chat with him.

42
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While they stoop down besides
him and start talking,

43
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he smiles blankly,

44
00:08:10,058 --> 00:08:12,155
a pair of headphones over his ears...

45
00:08:12,223 --> 00:08:15,191
and a Walkman Sony cassette
player in his lap.

46
00:08:16,237 --> 00:08:19,141
"I teach the women ho to grow
vegetables in their yard;

47
00:08:19,142 --> 00:08:21,961
this will allow them to have an income"

48
00:08:22,000 --> 00:08:25,331
he says and hesitates before he concludes:

49
00:08:26,105 --> 00:08:27,798
I am not always successful,

50
00:08:27,892 --> 00:08:30,569
but it's the first time this has
been introduced�

51
00:08:30,569 --> 00:08:31,807
into the village."

52
00:08:33,542 --> 00:08:34,632
It's the first time this has�

53
00:08:34,697 --> 00:08:36,622
been introduced into the village.

54
00:08:38,227 --> 00:08:39,245
Woman is depicted...

55
00:08:39,331 --> 00:08:41,253
as the one who possessed the fire.

56
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Only she knew ho to make fire.

57
00:09:42,913 --> 00:09:45,496
What can we expect from ethnology?

58
00:10:31,033 --> 00:10:33,265
The land of the Sereer people.

59
00:13:49,799 --> 00:13:52,925
The land of the Manding and
the Peul people.

60
00:14:03,907 --> 00:14:05,270
A film about what?

61
00:14:06,194 --> 00:14:07,377
My friends ask.

62
00:14:22,381 --> 00:14:23,725
A film on Senegal.

63
00:14:25,317 --> 00:14:26,571
But what in Senegal?

64
00:14:27,327 --> 00:14:28,818
I feel less and less...

65
00:14:28,818 --> 00:14:30,682
the need to express myself.

66
00:14:31,089 --> 00:14:33,123
Is that something else I've lost?

67
00:14:37,325 --> 00:14:39,000
Something else I've lost?

68
00:16:13,925 --> 00:16:15,881
Filming in Africa means...

69
00:16:15,951 --> 00:16:17,176
for many of us...

70
00:16:17,443 --> 00:16:18,868
colorful images,

71
00:16:19,000 --> 00:16:20,527
naked breast women,

72
00:16:21,015 --> 00:16:23,877
exotic dances and fearful rites.

73
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The unusual.

74
00:16:50,422 --> 00:16:53,667
First create needs, then, help.

75
00:16:53,824 --> 00:16:56,301
Ethnologists handle the camera...

76
00:16:56,309 --> 00:16:58,088
the way they handle words.

77
00:16:58,727 --> 00:17:01,676
Recuperated, collected, preserved.

78
00:17:02,823 --> 00:17:05,399
The Bamun, the Bassari, the Bobo.

79
00:17:07,300 --> 00:17:09,705
What are <i>your</i> people called again?

80
00:17:09,849 --> 00:17:12,280
An ethnologist asks a fellow of his.

81
00:17:30,750 --> 00:17:32,440
In numerous tales.

82
00:17:39,829 --> 00:17:41,851
Diversification at all costs.

83
00:17:43,003 --> 00:17:45,120
Oral traditions thus gain...

84
00:17:45,120 --> 00:17:47,584
the rank of written heritage.

85
00:17:56,552 --> 00:17:58,750
Fire place and woman's face...

86
00:17:59,510 --> 00:18:02,553
The pot is know as a universal symbol...

87
00:18:03,023 --> 00:18:04,961
for the Mother, the Grand-Mother...

88
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the Goddess.

89
00:18:07,700 --> 00:18:09,990
Nudity does not reveal...

90
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the hidden.

91
00:18:12,431 --> 00:18:14,200
It is its absence.

92
00:18:19,546 --> 00:18:22,520
A man attending a slide show on Africa...

93
00:18:22,922 --> 00:18:24,851
turns to his wife and says...

94
00:18:24,959 --> 00:18:26,566
with guilt in his voice...

95
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"I have seen some pornography tonight".

96
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Documentary...

97
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because reality...

98
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is organized into an explanation of itself.

99
00:18:42,263 --> 00:18:44,972
Every single detail is to be recorded.

100
00:18:46,214 --> 00:18:48,299
The man on the screen smiles at us

101
00:18:48,869 --> 00:18:50,197
while the necklace he wears,

102
00:18:50,554 --> 00:18:52,754
the designs of the cloth he puts on,

103
00:18:53,556 --> 00:18:55,000
the stool he sits on,

104
00:18:55,489 --> 00:18:58,337
are objectively commented upon.

105
00:18:59,642 --> 00:19:01,155
It has no eye,

106
00:19:01,442 --> 00:19:02,700
it records.

107
00:19:47,402 --> 00:19:51,167
"A fine layer of dust covers
us from head to toe.

108
00:19:52,087 --> 00:19:53,734
When the sandstorm comes",

109
00:19:53,924 --> 00:19:55,015
says a child,

110
00:19:55,337 --> 00:19:58,600
"we lay on our mat with our
mother's headscarf

111
00:19:58,716 --> 00:20:01,960
on our face and wait until
it goes away".

112
00:20:41,835 --> 00:20:43,397
The omnipresent eye.

113
00:20:44,449 --> 00:20:45,575
Scratching my hair,

114
00:20:45,919 --> 00:20:47,033
or washing my face,

115
00:20:47,629 --> 00:20:49,938
became a very special act.

116
00:21:11,322 --> 00:21:13,032
Watching her through the lens.

117
00:21:13,401 --> 00:21:15,846
I look at her becoming me...

118
00:21:15,746 --> 00:21:17,435
becoming mine.

119
00:21:23,518 --> 00:21:26,361
Entering into the only reality of signs...

120
00:21:26,970 --> 00:21:29,367
where I myself am a sign.

121
00:22:04,381 --> 00:22:07,721
The land of the Bassari and the Peul people.

122
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Early in the morning.

123
00:23:40,967 --> 00:23:44,525
A man is sitting with his little girl
on his lap

124
00:23:44,525 --> 00:23:46,654
next to the circular stone hut

125
00:23:47,101 --> 00:23:49,959
built after the model of a Bassari house.

126
00:23:50,648 --> 00:23:53,449
A Catholic white sister comes up to him...

127
00:23:53,584 --> 00:23:54,790
and blurts out:

128
00:23:55,203 --> 00:23:56,790
"It's only 7am.

129
00:23:56,910 --> 00:23:58,818
Your little girl is not that sick.

130
00:23:58,903 --> 00:24:00,806
How many times have I told you...

131
00:24:00,880 --> 00:24:03,703
our dispensary is closed on Sunday?

132
00:24:04,152 --> 00:24:05,830
Come back on Monday".

133
00:24:08,633 --> 00:24:11,198
An ethnologist and his wife gynecologist...

134
00:24:11,332 --> 00:24:13,580
come back for two weeks to the village

135
00:24:13,692 --> 00:24:15,768
where they have done research in the past.

136
00:24:16,456 --> 00:24:19,592
He defines himself as a person who
stays long,

137
00:24:19,520 --> 00:24:21,611
long enough in a village,

138
00:24:21,861 --> 00:24:24,729
to study the culture of an ethnic group.

139
00:24:25,689 --> 00:24:27,806
Time, knowledge, and security.

140
00:24:28,851 --> 00:24:31,232
"If you haven't stayed long enough in a place,

141
00:24:31,537 --> 00:24:33,257
you are not an ethnologist"

142
00:24:33,257 --> 00:24:34,474
He says.

143
00:24:36,459 --> 00:24:37,775
Late in the evening,

144
00:24:38,098 --> 00:24:41,604
a circle of men gathers in front
of the house where the

145
00:24:41,666 --> 00:24:44,808
ethnologist and his wife gynecologist stay.

146
00:24:45,755 --> 00:24:48,867
One of the villagers is telling a story,

147
00:24:49,356 --> 00:24:53,937
another is playing music on
his improvised luth,

148
00:24:53,980 --> 00:24:56,182
the ethnologist is sleeping...

149
00:24:56,558 --> 00:24:59,624
next to his switched-on cassette recorder.

150
00:25:00,577 --> 00:25:03,396
He thinks he excludes personal values.

151
00:25:03,724 --> 00:25:05,851
He tries or believes so...

152
00:25:06,100 --> 00:25:07,937
but how can he be a Fulani?

153
00:25:08,279 --> 00:25:10,097
That's objectivity.

154
00:26:33,373 --> 00:26:35,161
Along the Senegal River,

155
00:26:35,734 --> 00:26:38,712
the land of the Sarakhole and
the Tukuleur people.

156
00:26:46,972 --> 00:26:48,407
I come with the idea...

157
00:26:48,546 --> 00:26:50,417
that I would seize the unusual...

158
00:26:50,892 --> 00:26:53,249
by catching the person unawares.

159
00:26:53,875 --> 00:26:56,317
There are better ways to steal I guess.

160
00:26:56,619 --> 00:26:58,398
With the other's consent.

161
00:26:59,010 --> 00:27:01,334
After seeing me laboring with the camera,

162
00:27:01,629 --> 00:27:03,839
women invite me to their place,

163
00:27:03,977 --> 00:27:05,586
and ask me to film them.

164
00:27:42,737 --> 00:27:44,533
The habit of imposing...

165
00:27:47,056 --> 00:27:49,186
every single sign.

166
00:28:40,111 --> 00:28:41,499
For many of us...

167
00:28:41,499 --> 00:28:44,688
the best way to be neutral and objective,

168
00:28:45,276 --> 00:28:48,356
is to copy reality meticulously.

169
00:28:52,509 --> 00:28:53,859
Speak about.

170
00:28:54,700 --> 00:28:55,660
K-about.

171
00:29:03,018 --> 00:29:07,006
The eternal commentary that escorts images.

172
00:31:04,041 --> 00:31:06,667
Stressing the observer�s objectivity.

173
00:31:07,872 --> 00:31:10,970
Circles round the object of curiosity

174
00:31:14,070 --> 00:31:16,738
Different views from different angles.

175
00:31:18,148 --> 00:31:20,403
The abc of photography.

176
00:33:15,972 --> 00:33:18,357
Creativity and objectivity...

177
00:33:18,636 --> 00:33:20,360
seem to run into conflict.

178
00:33:21,660 --> 00:33:24,855
The eager observer collects samples...

179
00:33:24,855 --> 00:33:26,603
and has no time to reflect...

180
00:33:26,603 --> 00:33:28,421
upon the media used.

181
00:33:33,788 --> 00:33:36,034
Scarcely twenty years were enough,

182
00:33:36,034 --> 00:33:38,157
to make two billion people define...

183
00:33:38,157 --> 00:33:40,893
themselves as underdeveloped.

184
00:34:35,900 --> 00:34:38,560
What I see is life looking at me.

185
00:36:50,458 --> 00:36:54,055
I am looking through a circle in a circle of looks.

186
00:37:10,065 --> 00:37:12,904
115 degrees Fahrenheit.

187
00:37:13,362 --> 00:37:14,768
I put on a hat...

188
00:37:14,768 --> 00:37:17,451
while laughers bursts out behind me.

189
00:37:17,777 --> 00:37:19,335
I haven't seen any women...

190
00:37:19,800 --> 00:37:21,377
wearing a hat.

191
00:37:47,477 --> 00:37:49,534
Children, women and men...

192
00:37:49,702 --> 00:37:52,458
come up to me claiming for gifts.

193
00:37:53,000 --> 00:37:55,237
A van drives in the dust road,

194
00:37:55,237 --> 00:37:58,920
greeted by another boisterous wave of children.

195
00:37:59,139 --> 00:38:01,590
"Gift, gift" they all yell...

196
00:38:02,264 --> 00:38:04,948
while the car stops under the shade of a tree.

197
00:38:05,959 --> 00:38:08,144
A group of tourists stepped out...

198
00:38:08,463 --> 00:38:12,000
and immediately start distribution cheap candies.

199
00:38:18,620 --> 00:38:20,432
Just speak near by.

200
00:38:31,446 --> 00:38:33,644
A woman comments on polygamy:

201
00:38:34,198 --> 00:38:36,644
"it's good for men... not for us.

202
00:38:36,736 --> 00:38:40,649
We accept it owing to the force
of circumstances.

203
00:38:41,287 --> 00:38:42,294
What about you?

204
00:38:42,748 --> 00:38:45,342
Do you have a husband all for yourself?"