Convenience

“Whom were they talking [to], in a language most of you do not understand”  

Bakayoko in Gods Bits of Wood speaks Ouolof instead of French even at meetings with their French employers. When he does speak it he clarifies that it is “as a courtesy”, but one “ … that will not last forever”. Bakayokos stance is nothing new; decolonization efforts included a struggle to reestablish equality of culture and language. What slipped under the radar is the continuation of epistemic colonization through the “convenience” of colonial languages.

 Previously epistemic colonization took place in relegating the knowledge of the colonized as inferior, the present day has a more subtle form of domination: monopolization and gate keeping of knowledge through the guise of convenience and representation. The negotiations that are held between the workers and the employers In Gods Bits of Wood illustrate the implicit and justifiable methods that the French use to promote French against Ouolof. There is a linguistic hierarchy that existed during colonization however even during liberation and equality, the dominance of one language over the other continued through the guise of convenience; just as Dejean justifies using French in the negotiations due to the lack of an “intermediary”. It is this tactic that is still employed in the modern day.

Colonial academias (e.g. English) are the “inclusive” and “premier” forums for discourse and intellectualism. They are profitable, prestigious and global. After the creation of an “equal” world there was now an onus (market) for representation, which was fulfilled by reaching out to knowledge producers around the world. What was problematic however was that “inclusivity” redirected efforts of now “free” writers and thinkers into existing colonial academic institutions, incentivizing them to produce in colonial languages like English. Through the idea of “representation” they once again hold the reins of knowledge. This foray into inclusivity also redirects efforts that individuals of colonized nations would make into their own academic institutions into the systems of mainstream colonial languages. The convenience of utilizing the forum of pre-established colonial systems, due to the lack of “intermediaries” allows the retention of epistemic control. Authors from around the world thus produce with the paradigms and myths that the colonizers systems have. “Representation” and “convenience” of existing systems stunts the growth of independent knowledge systems in the language of the colonized. This means that profitable and visible production of mainstream knowledge still has to take place through English forums as opposed to Urdu ones.

Bakayoko understood this sinister guise of convenience and by his denial he rebuffed the manipulation of the colonizer. He chose to speak in the tongue that his people would understand, a quality that is not shared by our knowledge production. By denying equal space to all languages, knowledge is made further inaccessible through the linguistic monopolization of it. The knowledge is thus restricted in the “languages of intellectuals” and denied to natives to whom it belongs. This question is raised in Gods Bits of Wood, when the Governor General, Governor and Mayor address the public in Dakar in French, prompting questions to why the widely understood Ouolof is not being spoken.

True representation would have been independent institutions of knowledge in all languages, given equal space to grow and create without having established systems become gatekeepers through the excuse of convenience and the absorption of representation. We can still strive to build the required foundations of knowledge in the languages of our people by forgoing the allure of money and prestige that existing institutions and academies bring.

 “There is a great rock poised in our path, but together we can move it”