“In the Hunter's Footsteps: Chérif Keïta—Griot, Scholar, Teacher”

Abstract

"In the Hunter's Footsteps:Chérif Keïta—Griot, Scholar, Teacher" Joseph Hellweg (bio) KEYWORDS Chérif Keïta, Massa Makan Diabaté, Mande, hermeneutics, multi-modality, orality, dozos, Manding MOTS-CLÉS Chérif Keïta, Massa Makan Diabaté, Mandé, herméneutique, multimodalité, oralité, dozos, mandingue Re-Encountering Chérif In October of 2010, standing outside a conference center (Point Sud) in Bamako, Mali, with other participants, I heard a familiar voice from across the grounds. It was full of joy and intensity. I knew it well. Sure enough, I saw Chérif Keïta speaking to a group of students he had brought from Carleton College to Bamako. It was no surprise to find him introducing them to life in Mali. He had once done the same for me—though from far away and through books—in Northfield, Minnesota, two and a half decades before. Not surprisingly, Chérif's friendship, mentoring, and scholarship have proven as important to me since graduating from Carleton in 1988 as when I was studying there. I cannot conceive of my life or research without him. His boundless generosity, brilliance, and enthusiasm have repeatedly inspired me and given me hope.1 I therefore begin this tribute to Chérif by explaining what his scholarship means to me as an anthropologist and scholar of religion, as well as its broader significance to anyone interested in Mande Studies. For me, though, learning from Chérif began with his introductory course on African Francophone [End Page 181] literature. But his influence extended far beyond Carleton, as I discovered during my first research stay in Côte d'Ivoire. Even now his presence deepens my understanding of my ethnographic research, and his writing on Mande aesthetics has paved the way for my own future work. I am therefore deeply grateful to belong to a network of scholars who trace their interest in West Africa to Chérif, and I am pleased to share this testimony to Chérif's wisdom and collegiality. Keïta: Griot? Chérif's innovative scholarship places the field of Mande Studies at the heart of the contemporary humanities and social sciences. Outstanding among his many publications, two of his books, Massa Makan Diabaté : Un griot mandingue à la rencontre de l'écriture (1995a) and Outcast to Ambassador: The Musical Odyssey of Salif Keïta (2011; see also Keïta 2001, 2009a), highlight the contributions of Malian Manding performance to the study of textual interpretation and world music. In Chérif's (1995a) study of the writing of Massa Makan Diabaté, he develops a literary hermeneutic grounded in African orature. In doing so, he complements the work of scholars such as Paul Connerton (1989), Ruth Finnegan (2007), and Karin Barber (2000, 2007) who question sharp distinctions between orality and literacy such as those made by Jack Goody (1977, 2010) and Walter Ong (1982). For Finnegan, even unwritten verbal production in Africa—or elsewhere—far from being purely "oral," is "multi-modal," relying on "sonic patternings, visual gestures, facial expressions, interactions with audience and in many cases singing and sometimes dancing or dance-evoking movements," in addition to spoken words (Finnegan 2007: 51). Writing, for Finnegan, is just another "mode" of communication among many, lying along a vast continuum of embodied and material manifestations that verbal creativity may take. The genius of Chérif's approach to the work of Massa Makan Diabaté lies in Cherif's use of the supposedly "oral" aesthetics of Mande griots—jaliw or jeliw in the Bamanankan of Mali—as a hermeneutic with which to interpret Diabaté's writing. Chérif grounds his analytical frame, beyond both orality and literacy, in the dynamics of Mande social life, in which griots play definitive roles (Keïta 1995a: 9-10, 37-38). According to Chérif, Diabaté's writing amounts to more than a transcription, translation, or literary projection of Mande praise songs, or fasa. Rather, it became Diabaté's way of doing a griot's work—jaliya. "Massa Makan Diabaté saw in writing, first and foremost, a way to make a distinct place for himself . . . in the shining line of his fathers and place of origin" (Keïta 1995a: 55...