Eschewing the postcolonial hubris that suggests Africa could only define itself in relation to its colonizers, a problem plaguing many studies published in the West on African cinema, this entry in the Directory of World Cinema series instead looks at African film as representing Africa for its own sake, values, and artistic choices.

With a film industry divided by linguistic heritage, African directors do not have the luxury of producing comedies, thrillers, horror films, or even love stories, except perhaps as DVDs that do not travel far outside their country of production. Instead, African directors tend to cover serious sociopolitical ground, even under the cover of comedy, in the hopes of finding funds outside Africa. Contributors to this volume draw on filmic representations of the continent to consider the economic role of women, rural exodus, economic migration, refugees, and diasporas, culture, religion, and magic as well as representations of children, music, languages, and symbols.

A survey of national cinemas in one volume, DirectoryofWorldCinema: Africa is a necessary addition to the bookshelf of any cinephile and world traveler. 

Blandine Stefanson is a visiting research fellow at the University of Adelaide. She is coeditor of African Historians and Globalization. Sheila Petty teaches media studies at the University of Regina and is the author of Contact Zones, Memory, Origin and Discourses in Black Diasporic Cinema.