Cette île n’est pas une île
Cette île n’est pas une île
Locating Gorée
Chapter seven, by Charles Forsdick, introduces part two of the volume with an exploration of one of the most iconic sites of memory for the European-led slave trade: Gorée Island in Senegal. With reference to the wide range of fictional, filmic and political uses of Gorée and its maison des esclaves and porte de non-retour, it raises searching questions about the symbolic location and significance of the island. As a central location for the memorialization of the Atlantic slave trade, Gorée has attracted a stream of tourists and prominent international visitors. As such, it provides a fascinating case study into the politics of national, international and transnational memory that allows us to understand how the island has been progressively represented, instrumentalized, politicized and memorialized. This heavily over-determined and iconic site of memory thus remains deeply ambivalent. It reflects both the past traumas with which Gorée is associated, and the ambiguities inherent in a site whose undeniable symbolic power overshadows its historical functions, not least through the historiographic controversies it has provoked.
Keywords: Slavery, Memory, Slave trade, Gorée Island, Senegal, Joseph Ndiaye
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