Paper short abstract:

This paper examines the heterogenous discursive forms and genres in the play Essinga, created by migrants from Central Africa who were blocked in Bamako after their deportation. The analysis focuses on the central role of interdiscursivity in the play, which calls into question many stereotypes about Africa.

Paper long abstract:

This paper examines the heterogenous discursive forms and genres in the play Essinga, created in 2006 by migrants from Central Africa who were first blocked in Morocco and then Bamako after their deportation. Tracing their trajectory to Morocco and their expulsion and return to Mali, the self-described "travelers" replay (and thus reentexualize) a part of their lives in a specific performative and artistic mode that alternates between comedy and tragedy. Through their use of humor and its capacity to distanciate, these actors are unique in their introduction of elements of irony and comedy in militant discourses about migration, transcend the habitual pathos and tragic representations of this genre. Initially improvised, this play brings together a multitude of genres (songs, conversations, slogans, stories, political discourses, jokes etc. ) and a multitude of linguistic forms and languages (Arabic, French, English, Bamanan, Nouchi...) The analysis focuses on the central role of interdiscursivity in the play, which through the use of irony and humor, calls into question many stereotypes about Africa, Africans and "travelers." At the same time, the analysis shows that discourses on nationalities and nationalism, as modes of self-description by the travelers during their passage, come into conflict with the shifting and unstable nature of sociolinguistic "agencements" (Deleuze et Guattari, 1980) and the "constitutive hetereogeneity of language". Through the enactment of the circulation of multiple languages and linguistic forms, the illusion of "African Unity," reiterated throughout the play, takes on new political significance in the context of contemporary African society.