PRIMARY MATERIALS FOR September 24
View the photograph: Unrecorded photographer, Portrait of Cheikh Amadou Bamba
RESEARCH ACTIVITY (Complete BEFORE you come to class):
Research and curate 5 photographs connected with European colonialism; bring in to share.
As part of your curated image collection, write and bring in a short paragraph (approx. 150-200 words) explaining why you chose the photographs you did. Your reasons may be connected with any aspect of the photograph/s.
Intertexts/dialogues:
Samory Touré (alternate spelling: Samori Ture) (as a photographic subject, connected with French colonialism in West Africa)
King Béhanzin (alternate spelling: Le Roi Béhanzin) (as a photographic subject, connected with French colonialism in West Africa)
François-Edmond Fortier (photographer, prolific producer of colonial picture postcards)
“The Africana Historic Postcard Collection” (Library of Congress, USA)
Malek Alloula, The Colonial Harem (book about colonial picture postcards, focused on French colonialism in North Africa) (available as a print/physical book in the HC Library and as an e-book through JSTOR)
Colonial picture postcards; Ethnographic photography; Types et vues (search terms)
Pushpamala N (contemporary artist whose work often draws on colonial-era photography, see especially Native Women of South Asia: Manners and Customs)
Wendy Red Star (contemporary artist whose work often draws on colonial-era photography, see especially 1880 Crow Peace Delegation)
NOTE: You are not limited in your research to French colonialism or regions of the world that were colonized by the French — myriad regions that were colonized by Europeans, including particularly South Asia, East Asia, Southeast Asia, the Caribbean, Central and South America, the South Pacific, and elsewhere, were also scenes of intense photographic activity, and you should feel free to range widely across different cultures and geographies in your research.