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SUMMARY:Mediating Voice: Writing Letters to Address the Public at a Local 
 Radio Station in Mopti\, Mali - Dr Aïssatou Mbodj\, Centre d’études de
 s mondes africains (CEMAf)
DTSTART:20140310T170000Z
DTEND:20140310T180000Z
UID:TALK49496@talks.cam.ac.uk
CONTACT:Judith Weik
DESCRIPTION:This presentation relies on the analysis of letters sent to a 
 show in a local radio station in Mopti (Mali) called “C’est pas normal
 ” throughout the 2000s. I focus on one of its regular listeners\, a youn
 g man from a neighboring village\, unschooled but literate in Bamanan\, wh
 o became a prolific writer\, sending at some points as many as four letter
 s per weekly show\, expressing his opinions on a variety of topics ranging
  from very local to national concerns.\n\nI study the practice of letter-w
 riting in this peculiar context where the letter is inserted in the oral c
 ommunication sphere of the radio\, exploring the tensions between the conf
 ormity to a written genre and the model of public speech. I argue that thi
 s twist whereby his voice is mediated by writing\, language and technology
 \, allows the writer to navigate between the format of the show that incit
 es to public protest\, and the necessity to comply with local social and c
 ommunicative rules\, through an elaborated construction of his letters.\n\
 nIn this talk\, I will follow two lines of inquiries. Firstly\, I will exa
 mine how far his career as a letter-writer led him\, a rather marginal com
 munity member\, to emerge as a public figure\, though in a still fragile w
 ay. Secondly\, I wish to tackle current anthropological debates around the
  issues of materiality and technology\, by exploring how\, in this case\, 
 writing operates as mediation towards speech\, and what this specific cont
 ext means both in terms of the use of writing and the kind of public expre
 ssion it makes possible.\n\nDr Aïssatou Mbodj-Pouye is Research Fellow at
  the CNRS\, affiliated to the Centre d’études des mondes africains (CEM
 Af). Her main field of investigation is the anthropology of literacy throu
 gh ethnographic projects in Mali on writing practices in various settings\
 , as well as broader reflections on written culture. Currently she investi
 gates issues of memory\, space and materiality in West Africa\, and Africa
 n migration to France.
LOCATION:Seminar Room S1 Alison Richard Building\, 7 West Road\, Cambridge
  CB3 9DT
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