Changing Times

Changing Times: Considering the many African refugees seeking Asylum in our rich European countries nowadays and our lack of knowledge about their social background, Bakary Sidibe's stories about his life and his explanations about his Gambian society help us to feel more connected with the newcomers and to understand them as people with their own history and values. Bakary Sidibe also shows us how the destabilising influence of the colonial rulers on the traditional social, economic and political structures of African societies still affects the life of the people today. Their young men with no employment and no perspectives at home are now seeking their fortunes in Europe.

Ulla Fels, 1952 in Stuttgart geboren, studierte Ethnologie (MA) und arbeitete als Dokumentarfilmerin und Journalistin. Sie lebt in Hamburg / Deutschland. www.felsfilm.deBakary Sidibe, born in The Gambia in 1928, studied at SOAS / University of London and was the founder and director of the Oral History Division and museum in Banjul.