View
223
Download
0
Category
Preview:
Citation preview
8/2/2019 On Francophonie
1/2
On Francophonie
From Interview with Daniel Maximin (Guadeloupian novelist, poet, and essayist) on the occasion of 2006
Francophonie Festival.
http://www.rfi.fr/Fichiers/MFI/CultureSociete/1703.asp
Question: As a man of culture are you happy that we finally put forward the cultural dimension of the
Francophonie rather than its political dimension, which has been the case?
Daniel Maximin: I am further satisfied that the Francophonie was first cultural, literary, poetic. The
French idea is really born in the postwar years when Damas and Senghor released in quick succession
two anthologies of poetry French-speaking writers, bringing together authors from Africa, Indochina and
the Caribbean. These anthologies, demonstrating an unwavering faith in the language and culture as
vehicles of liberation, founded the Francophonie culture, long before the emergence of a political and
institutional Francophonie. Like it or not, it is culture that is the true legitimacy of the Francophonie. For
the Francophonie is not only a language but also, and perhaps above all, a tradition which has its roots
in the resistance to imperialism that his identity has incarnated writers throughout history and in the
solidarity that has made the Francophonie possible beyond races, continents. I think of Haitian literature
that immediately spoke to the world. I also think of the First Congress of Black Writers and Artists held in
Paris in 1956 and which this year marks the fiftieth anniversary. This conference was an important step
on the road to decolonization. The young Frenchman/woman today, whether from Metropolitan France
or around the world, is heir to all this anti-imperial tradition, as he is of the Enlightenment tradition.
Question: You are right to recall the important role played by writers and poets in the construction of
the Francophonie. Yet the writers of today do not share your enthusiasm, especially in the Caribbean,
where French was often perceived as an imperial language and alienating.
Daniel Maximin : La Francophonie is an indelible aspect of the Antilles. It is part of our experience. For
three centuries, we West Indians were fighting French imperialism without rejecting the language or the
culture: elements that are constitutive of who we are. As for West Indian writers who feel they live in a
country dominated, I remind them that the struggle to free itself from the shackles of language is
organic to the work of every writer, he writes in his native language or a language Colonial. It is not trueeither that it is easier for an English or a Hispanic to express their individuality through their borrowed
languages. Simply go to see up close the work of Walcott or Asturias.
Question: Yet the West Indian writers are not the only ones who are cautious of the francophone
world. Africans also distrust.
http://www.rfi.fr/Fichiers/MFI/CultureSociete/1703.asphttp://www.rfi.fr/Fichiers/MFI/CultureSociete/1703.asphttp://www.rfi.fr/Fichiers/MFI/CultureSociete/1703.asp8/2/2019 On Francophonie
2/2
Daniel Maximin: They distrust because they believe that Francophonie is a vehicle for the imperialist
project that seeks to alienate the writer from his/her indigenous setting. But it seems instead that the
emergence of Francophonies, of Hispanophonies, of Arabophonies, of Russophonies, of Hindiphonies
are in line with the affirmation of cultural diversity on the planet. I feel that the alienation felt by the
writer from the French colony is actually the result of a certain cultural Jacobinism that trapped the
French language in the hexagon, making it difficult to express other identities through the french
idiom. The interest of the Francophone Festival in France will also show how colonial writers have taken
the French, have transformed and adapted it to their geographic and cultural realities. The universality
of French through acceptance of local Francophone identity; be it Congolese, Martinican, Vietnamese or
anyone who wants to enter the French to absorb its uniqueness!
Recommended