Sponsored by The University Seminar on Beyond France
This symposium on architecture and urban planning in Twentieth-Century Senegal spotlights new research on how the built environment in and around Dakar registered the continuities and ruptures between French rule and independence, indigenous heritage and colonial legacies. What role did the built environment play in constructing citizenship? What opportunities did Senegal’s independence usher in for French and African designers? What effect did Léopold Sédar Senghor’s emphasis on the arts as a path to Négritude have on architectural production and training? Each panel will address one architectural scale: urban, housing, and monumental. Speakers include: Steven Nelson (UCLA); Nzinga Mboup (Worofilia); Ralph Ghoche (Barnard); Lucia Allais (Columbia); Gregory Valdespino (University of Iowa); Mamadou Diouf (Columbia); Martino Stierli (MoMA); Jana Ndiaye Berankova (Suture Press); Souleymane Bachir Diagne (Columbia); Frederick Cooper (NYU).
SCHEDULE
9:30 AM
INTRODUCTIONS
9:45 AM–11:15 AM
From Urbanism to Urban Planning
“Creating Colonial Dakar: Architecture and France’s Imperial Ambition”
Steven Nelson, University of California, Los Angeles
“The Makings of the Wooden Barrack House: A Marker of the Policy of Segregation and the Material Flows of the Colonial Administration”
Nzinga Mboup, Worofila, Dakar (Senegal)
Respondent: Ralph Ghoche, Barnard College
COFFEE BREAK
11:30 AM–1 PM
Concrete Domes and Mortgaged Homes
Mobilities: Dakar’s Maisons-ballons, 1948-1952
Lucia Allais, Columbia University
“Dakar’s El Dorado: SICAP and the Promise of Prosperity”
Gregory Valdespino, University of Iowa
Respondent: Rosalind Fredericks, Gallatin School, New York University
MIDDAY BREAK
2 PM–3 PM
“Ghost Fair Trade” Film Screening (dir. Laurence Bonvin, Cheikh Ndiaye 38 min.)
3:00 PM–4:30 PM
Modernism in the Post-Colony
“The Asymmetric Parallelism of the Centre International du Commerce Extérieur du Sénégal (CICES)”
Martino Stierli, The Museum of Modern Art, NYC
“Architecture as Objet-Témoin: Bureau d’Études Henri Chomette in Dakar”
Jana Ndiaye Berankova, Czech Academy of Sciences, Suture Press Prague (Czechia)
Respondent: Souleymane Bachir Diagne, Columbia University
COFFEE BREAK
5:00 PM
CLOSING REMARKS
Frederick Cooper, New York University
