Mawuena Dabla-Egui, French, Harding University HS
Synopsis
“Du discours de la Baule à l’éveil de la conscience démocratique en Afrique”, is a seven days’ curriculum unit that I am planning to teach to French Level 4 and 5 classes. In my unit, students will be able to learn about how democracy started in the majority of French speaking African countries, by first studying François Mitterrand’s La Baule speech, which served as a whistle signal for these countries to start the democratization process. They will also be able to research these countries to see the challenges they are facing, analyze them to understand whether or not they fit the criteria of what a real democracy should be, and come up with their own definition of democracy after deciding whether President Mitterrand’s ideal in the Baule speech was reached or not. To achieve this goal, students will focus their research on analysis of songs. These songs are from politically-engaged francophone African singers who are evoking the (mostly) poor governance of some Francophone African leaders, as well as commenting about dictatorship, how the people are suffering, the lack of freedom and freedom of speech etc. To finish, students will conduct a debate to give their point of views on the topic: democratization in francophone Africa. It is a good way not only to learn about these countries but also, to help them understand better the relationship between France and its former colonies and how challenging the democratization process could be.
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