International Widows Day | Journée internationale des veuves (23/06) : Mary-Noël Niba - Le dos de la veuve | The back of the Widow

The commemoration of the International Day of the Widow, 23 June | La célébration de Journée internationale des veuves, 23 juin

[English]

The commemoration of the International Day of the Widow, 23 June, provides the opportunity to highlight the numerous difficulties that women endure at the death of their husbands. Plunged into a state of mourning, widows sometimes find themselves without the protection of a social net for the first time since their marriage. Too often they are deprived of their inheritance, property rights, access to employment and even the means to ensure their survival.

[Français]

La célébration de Journée internationale des veuves, le 23 juin, offre l’occasion d’attirer l’attention sur les nombreuses difficultés que connaissent les femmes lorsque leur mari meurt.  Plongées dans le chagrin, les veuves se retrouvent parfois sans filet de protection sociale pour la première fois depuis leur mariage.  Trop souvent, elles sont privées du droit d’hériter, de droits fonciers, de l’accès à l’emploi et même des moyens d’assurer leur survie.

Source: Critique de/by Maturin Petsoko. Journal du Cameroun

[English]
When asked what was the underlying motivation that led her to make such a work, Mary-Noël Niba responded: I want to be the voice of the voiceless. This is the feeling that drove me when I decided to make this documentary; to discover the basis of the tradition of succession among the Koms and their impact on society. Based on a woman's story, I wanted to put under the spotlight, the courage of some of the victims of a form of enslavement of women in the name of tradition; to highlight the women who decided to rebel despite the threats, and to raise their heads as they face the magnitude of the phenomenon

A la question de savoir quelles sont les motivations profondes qui ont poussé l’auteure à réaliser une telle œuvre, Mary-Noël NIBA déclare : Je voudrais être la voix des sans voix. C’est le sentiment qui m’anime lorsque je me décide à faire ce documentaire qui a pour but de faire découvrir les fondements de la tradition de succession chez les Koms et leurs conséquences sur la société. A travers l’histoire d’une femme, je voudrais mettre sous les feux des projecteurs, le courage de quelques victimes d’une forme d’asservissement de la femme au nom de la tradition, des femmes qui ont décidé de se révolter malgré les menaces, de lever la tête devant l’ampleur du phénomène.

LINK | LIEN

"Le dos de la veuve" (the back of the widow) by Cameroonian Mary-Noël Niba, critique by Maturin Petsoko

http://africanwomenincinema.blogspot.com/2012/05/le-dos-de-la-veuve-back-of-widow.html

«Le dos de la veuve», le documentaire engagé de la camerounaise Mary-Noël NIBA, critique par Maturin Petsoko

http://africanwomenincinema.blogspot.com/2012/05/le-dos-de-la-veuve-le-documentaire.html

The African Women in Cinema Blog celebrates World Refugee Day

 

The African Women in Cinema Blog celebrates World Refugee Day

World Refugee Day is an international day designated by the United Nations to honour refugees around the globe. It falls each year on 20 June and honours the strength and courage of people who have been forced to flee their home country to escape conflict or persecution. 

Image: switchboardta.org

Focus on/sur “On Call” | “La Permanence” by/par  Alice Diop

[English]

This is a film about the pain of exile, but it is told through the contemplation of the faces of these men. What grabbed me when I started working on this subject were the images of these undifferentiated and anonymous masses who flock to our doors. While initially, this image was not negative in its intent, it produced something that can be experienced as threatening. For me it was important to put faces, to put names and specific stories on what is often treated as an all-encompassing problem.

[Français]

C’est un film qui raconte la douleur de l’exil, mais qui la raconte au travers de la contemplation du visage de ses hommes. Ce qui m’avait saisi quand j’avais commencé à travailler sur ce sujet, c’était les images de ces masses indifférenciées et anonymes qui affluaient à nos portes. Même si, à la base, cette image-là n’était pas négative dans son intention, elle produisait quelque chose qui peut être vécu comme menaçant. Pour moi, il était important d’aller mettre des visages, d’aller mettre des noms et des histoires singulières sur ce qui est très souvent traité comme étant un problème globalisant.

LINK | LIENS

Alice Diop : Addressing political issues through sensitivity and empathy | Les questions politiques par le biais de la sensibilité et de l’empathie

BLACK CAMERA - Black Women at the Louvre, Practices of Worldmaking, and the Rehabilitation of Disfigured Images: Reflections on Alice Diop's Fragments for Venus by Beti Ellerson (Spring 2026)

 

Black Camera: An International Film Journal Vol. 17, No. 2 (Spring 2026)

 

Black Women at the Louvre, Practices of Worldmaking, and the Rehabilitation of Disfigured Images: Reflections on Alice Diop's Fragments for Venus

by Beti Ellerson

 

https://doi.org/10.2979/blc.00109

 

Image: Screen capture from Fragments of Venus  

 Abstract

This article navigates the journeys, voyages, odysseys of Black women’s creative power, as the Louvre becomes their point of inquiry. The article explores their practices of looking; how they reimagine ways of seeing, reinvent a world that centers their experiences. The Louvre becomes a metaphor, a space that allows world-making and self-making based on their terms. The Louvre is also a space of resistance and confrontation, as Black women crash the gatekeepers, by dismantling the structures that exclude and efface representations of the Other. The article examines as well, the ways that Black women reformulate practices of curating inside and outside the museum, creating exhibitions, cultural spaces, less foreign, more human, more welcoming. Faith Ringgold, Toni Morrison, Beyoncé, Barbara Chase-Riboud, and more recently Alice Diop, have journeyed there in their work, in their imaginary. Other women have excavated the museum from without, such as Robin Coste Lewis, in her poetry. The article follows their paths, crossings and peregrinations as they interrogate art, language, race, gender, class, the body, belonging, the foreigner.

Introduction
African American Women and the Louvre: A Site of Inquiry
- Faith Ringgold: Dancing at the Louvre
- Toni Morrison: Foreigner’s Home
- Beyoncé: I Can’t Believe We Made It
- Barbara Chase-Riboud: When a Knot Is Untied, a God Is Set Free
Louvre Grounds: An Enduring Space for Black Women’s Self-Making
In Search of Black Venuses
Alice Diop’s Journey 

African Women in Cinema Blog celebrates World Environment Day

The African Women in Cinema Blog celebrates

World Environment Day

 

The environment has long been a theme that African women in cinema have addressed in their work. Below is a selection of films promoting care for the environment and the inhabitants who depend on a safe and healthy world.

In Safi Faye's Kaddu Beykat (1975) the story unfolds through the backdrop of an ongoing drought in the village, causing economic upheaval as groundnuts are its sole crop. The recurring theme of drought drives the story in Fad'jal (1979), again underscoring the difficulty of cultivating the land. Similarly, in Mossane (1996) the drought continues to impose hardships on the village, and in hopes of rain, an elaborate ceremony is held calling on the ancestors to bring rain.

Kenyan Wanuri Kahiu was inspired by the late Nobel Prize laureate and compatriot Wangari Maathai, whose Greenbelt Movement challenged Africans to replenish the earth by planting trees, combatting deforestation and soil erosion. In her film Pumzi (2009) Aysha's last gesture was to plant a tree, sacrificing her own life for the continuation of the earth. Wanuri Kahiu has this to say about the importance of nurturing the environment: “My metaphor about Pumzi is life and sacrifice and that we ourselves have to mother mother nature. That we have to make sacrifices in order to live in this world. And that we have to know that our own behaviour will affect generations to come.” Wanuri Kahiu TEDx Forum On Afrofuturism In Popular Culture.

Marcher sur l'eau by Aissa Maiga filmed in northern Niger between 2018 and 2020, focuses on the village of Tatiste, a victim of global warming. In its fight for access to water, it is building a drilling hole. Every day, fourteen-year-old Houlaye as well as the other girls, of the village, walks kilometers to draw water, which is essential to the life of the village. In so doing they, they are prevented focusing on their studies. The absence of water drives the adults to leave their families every year in search of the necessary resources to survive. However, this region draws from an aquifer lake of several thousand square kilometers. Under the impetus of the inhabitants and through the action of the NGO Amman Imman, drilling would bring the requisite water to the center of the village, while offering a better life to all.

Silas by Hawa Essuman (Kenya) features Liberian activist, Silas Siakor, a tireless crusader, fighting to crush corruption and environmental destruction in the country he loves. Through the focus on one country, Silas is a global tale that warns of the power of politics and celebrates the power of individuals to fight back. One man's battle gains momentum and emboldens communities to raise their fists and smartphones, seize control of their lands and protect their environment. It is a new generation of resistance.

Anger in the Wind | La Colère dans le vent (2016) by Amina Weira (Niger). In Amina Weira’s hometown Arlit, in the north of Niger, the company Areva has operated uranium mines since 1976. Swept away by heavy sand winds, today, much of this area is contaminated. Radioactivity cannot be seen and the population is not aware of the risks that it engenders. This mining operation has completely disorganised the life of the population. A part of the year violent sand winds envelop the city entirely, during which dust winds spread radioactive substances and everyone looks for shelter. 

Julie Djikey: Performance "Ozonisation.” In the performance art work, "Ozonisation" (2013), Julie Djikey, as part of the Kisalu Nkia Mbote collective, performs in the streets of Kinshasa. The theme of the piece is in protest against pollution, global warming and the use of cosmetic products. She transforms her body into a “human car”, applying a mixture of engine oil and ashes from burnt tires, and a bra made from oil filter cans. This performance protests against the deterioration of the ozone layer due to the greenhouse gas emissions, the main chemo-physical element responsible for the overheating of the blue planet, which should always be green, without air pollution, and free of ultraviolet (UV) radiation.

Nadine Otsobogo, is the founding director of the Festival du Film de Masuku - Nature et environnement - Film Festival of Masuku - Nature and Environment in Gabon, an international festival, which, through the moving image, examines the place of humans in their environment in a global manner: biodiversity, environmental issues and urbanism. The festival welcomes all genres and formats, from  all cinematic forms, but devotes an important place to African cinemas. In addition, Nadine Otsobogo’s film Tout est lié - It’s all connected is about raising awareness among young audiences of the complexity of our terrestrial ecosystem and to inspire action by encouraging inventiveness and collaboration.

The African Women in Cinema Blog celebrates World Bicycle Day with Twiggy Matiwana's The Bicycle Man

Still from The Bicycle Man

The African Women in Cinema Blog celebrates

World Bicycle Day

with Twiggy Matiwana's the Bicycle Man

 

Twiggy Matiwana uses a simple image of a man on a bicycle, navigating around the city, as he works, does daily activities and chores, in order to tell a poignant story. While cycling conjures images of speed and resilience in sport, it is also a symbol of the everydayness of life, the veritable transportation of the people.

 

 

From a short conversation with Twiggy Matiwana

 

The Bicycle Man shows a sensitive side of the manner in which a man deals with what is generally viewed as a woman’s illness: breast cancer. Talk about why you chose this theme and decided to tell the story in this way.

Cinema is a great tool when it comes to telling a story. I had to make sure that I show those symbols with strong visuals and also not scare people, instead make them understand how things work and how to solve problems.

What have been the responses from the viewers? Men and women?

 

Both men and women still don’t believe that men can have breast cancer; the film has been an eye-opener for them.