Dominique Pagani talks about Senghor mainly in two 2017 sessions devoted to Stanislas Adotevi's "Négritude et négrologues"; Adotevi had little regard for him. He dwells on the phrase "emotion is Negro as reason is Hellenic": in his view, it re-establishes a racial division of labour1. He returns to it in 2021, where he presents the Black man dancing while the White man builds tractors. This split between white concept and black rhythm belongs to Senghor, far more than to Césaire2. For him, this négritude is a theoretical and poetic discourse, not a discourse of struggle. He presents it as a concept of interest to White people, shaped by a khâgne classmate of Pompidou who never suffered from being black3. He also describes a politician whose truth is the French language and culture4. Yet he grants that Senghor's early writings played a positive role and that his legend had a function: backed by the continent, Senghor does not have the minority position of the Antilleans5.
Summary produced automatically from 16 of the passages below, to be reviewed; the numbers link to the moment in the session.
Who is this?
Léopold Sédar Senghor ( song-GOR, French:, Wolof: Léwopóol Sedaar Seŋoor; 9 October 1906 – 20 December 2001) was a Senegalese politician, cultural theorist and poet who served as the first president of Senegal from 1960 to 1980. Ideologically an African socialist, Senghor was one of the major theoreticians of Négritude. He was a proponent of African culture, black identity, and African empowerment within the framework of French-African ties. […]
2:24Adotevi was never a Senghorian and did not hold him in much esteem.
12:03He believes in formal democracy and holds a discourse close to colonial discourse. He agrees with Adotevi against the negrologues and defends the civilization of the universal.
17:48A politician who knows his limits, his truth is French culture and language. He is Catholic in a Muslim country.
20:38A participant reproaches him for having broken Senegalese intellectuals and communists, and for having authorized only three political currents.
27:05Adotevi maintains that he eliminated opponents without killing them, that he did not use power for himself, and that the book is not anti-Senghor.
Talks · 17 Jun 2017Adotevi: Negritude and negrologists (1)
