Monday, February 20, 2012

Notable Ethiopian Women

From Tadias - an article on women filmmakers from Ethiopia:
Documentary filmmaking holds a special place in the history of African women’s cinema. In 1972, Senegalese filmmaker Safi Faye became the first sub-Saharan African woman to make a commercially distributed feature film when she directed “Kaddu Beykat”. The film, a mixture of fiction and documentary, depicts the economic problems suffered by Senegalese village farmers because of agriculture policies that Faye says rely on an outdated, colonial system of groundnut monoculture. Faye would go on to direct several documentaries often focused on rural life in her native Senegal.


From Abugida - an article on Empress Taitu:
For the first time African forces had defeated a European power bent on forging an empire in Africa. And once again in the history of Ethiopia, the victory was influenced by a powerful Ethiopian woman, Empress Taitu. Also, the question of racial superiority was beginning to affect western societies, especially post-slavery America. Many were surprised that an African nation could defeat a white colonial power such as Italy.

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