The Colour of War Memory: Cultural Representations of Tirailleurs Sénégalais

Abstract

This article examines French and francophone cultural representations of the roles played by tirailleurs sénégalais during the First and Second World Wars. It analyses how such representations (produced by authors from both within and outside this group) can be considered as examples of what Max Silverman has defined as ‘palimpsestic memory’, containing traces of the present and the past. Key myths and stereotypes of French African troops have reappeared with relative frequency in images, texts, and films. This article explores the ideological and political purposes to which these representations have been put at different historical moments up to the present.