"LES LANGUES NATIONALES DE KOCC BARMA A CHEIKH ANTA DIOP"
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"Professor Saliou Kandji made a historical survey of Senegalese national languages from Cocc Barma Fall to Cheikh Anta Diop and concluded that, without such languages and Islam, our traditional values would have irremediably disappeared". Such is the summary offered by the Senegalese daily "Le Quotidien" (March 22, 2006, page 7) on the first of the Warc lectures presented Tuesday, March 21, 2006 from 4pm to 7:30 pm by former ambassador and professor Saliou Kandji and moderated by one of the most distinguished faculty on University Cheikh Anta Diop campus, Mamousse Diagne, professor of Philosophy and a great expert on Senegalese traditional wisdom, national languages and local cultures.
In his introductory remarks, Professor Diagne, a great master of ancient Greece and Rome, recalled that the Greeks managed to control their environment and think and discuss on the world surrounding them because of language which they named and conceptualised things and beings thus identifying them and giving them their own existence and specificity. Thereafter, he narrowed the introduction down to the relevance and importance of Senegalese national languages in the nation's daily struggle for existence, visibility and development.

The famous writer Cheikh Hamidou Kane (left) and M. Ba, an AROA member

Pr Sene introducing the speaker Pr Saliou Kandji (right) and Pr Mame Mousse Diagne, moderator (middle)

After being given the floor by the moderator, Professor Saliou Kandji, former ambassador of Senegal in several countries, chiefly in the Arab and Moslem world, explained to the audience that writing and translating reality in Senegalese national languages, defending such languages against the inroads of foreign tongues such as Arab and French, was the lifelong struggle and objective of Cocc Barma Fall, a prince in one of the former Senegalese kingdoms who forfeited his princely privileges to wage a battle for the perpetuation of Wolof and other Senegalese national languages and the cultural values attached to them and of Professor Cheikh Antta Diop, the celebrated Senegalese Egyptologist and africanist who gave his name to the University of Dakar.

Several specialists and writers in the national languages attended the lecture and made major contributions through very appropriate and apt questions and remarks.
Prof Diagne concluded the lively and long session (from 4pm to 7:30pm) with the following "there is no more radical domination than the fact and the act of coercing a people into speaking a language other than their own tongue".
The event was attended by Senegalese celebrities and household names including writers such as Cheikh Alioune Ndao, Cheikh Hamidou Kane, Annette Mbaye d'Erneville, former ambassadors and government ministers, current Senegalese ambassadors to arab and islamic countries, national language experts, students, researchers and teachers. The quality, qualification and expertise of the audience who attended the lecture has been so far unprecedented and this is certainly stimulating enough for the Center to keep up the efforts to contribute to the cultural, academic, intellectual and research vibrancy of the Senegalese capital.

The writer Cheikh Aliou Ndao (left)

Tata Annette Mbaye D'Erneville, writer and former journalist