Gender Terrains in African Cinema

The highly talented author, Dominica Dipio was inspired by a desire to undertake this study from her interest in gender, and the increasing attention African cinema is drawing in the history of world cinemas. Attaining its identity in the 1960s, this cinema is characteristically a post colonial art form. The first group of filmmakers and critics saw themselves, together with the political elite, as responsible for building their new nations and came up with a series of statements which underline what cinema should be in their contexts - an instrument for educating, decolonising the mind and developing critical participatory viewership. To some extent, the cinema continues the role of the griot with a difference. The interests in this subject led the author to analyse how the cinema and the filmmaker are located within the predominantly patriarchal hegemonic structure as they address issues related to gender and, in particularly, the position of women in African communities. The central question is the representation of women and gender discourses in the cinema. The films selected for analysis are all directed by male filmmakers that are considered representative of African filmmaking. The films selected span from the 1970s to the 2000s. The focus is the comprehensive analysis of gender relations reflected in the portrayal of the girl child, the young woman and mature, as well as the grandmother, vis a vis their male counterparts.