Panel 6A: Videogames, Narration, and War
Session 6 – July 3, 15:30 – 17:30
The Scramble for Africa In New Interpretations: Poetry, Video Game And Music
The episode “Scramble for Africa” remains in the imagination of mankind in a very striking way to express itself from different points of view and in many ways, whether in visual works such as paintings and installations, or in the form of poems, computer games and music. The present study presents two poems that express the resistance of Africans to the unfair division of their continent and, on the other hand, highlights strategies of dispute of the video game Civilization V that, in a way, reproduce the European offensive in conquering the continent. Also the music written by Geoff Knor for this video game, despite taking advantage of features that are part of African musical expression, especially those markedly recognized in Western ears, reveals the preponderance of European musical characteristics. The composer’s choices, among others, by traditional instruments of a large symphony orchestra, tuned according to the western reference for sound heights, contrasts with the musical diversity of the African continent, not only with respect to classical music perpetuated by the oral transmission of the members of the various African traditional societies, but also of their popular and urban music. The products created today to refer us to the episode of “Scramble for Africa”, as presented here, do not let us forget and, to some extent, reproduce the imposing and dominating attitudes that European countries have adopted on the peoples of the African continent.
Bio
Cecília Nazaré de Lima – cecilianl.ufmg.mus@gmail.com
Cecília Nazaré de Lima is a professor from the Departamento de Teoria Geral da Música at the Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais (UFMG), Brazil, master in Structuring of the musical language by the Arts Institute of the Universidade Estadual de Campinas – UNICAMP, and doctor in Creation and criticism of the moving image by the Escola de Belas Artes at the UFMG. Composer with musical scores avaiable at Sesc Partituras website. Researcher of the Resgate da Canção Brasileira (Rescue of the Brazilian Song) Group, working on reissue and analysis of scores. Also is developing works about relations of music and other arts as one of the Intermídia: estudos sobre intermidialidade (Intermídia: studies about intemidiality) researcher.
Thaïs Flores Nogueira Diniz – tfndiniz@terra.com.br
Thaïs Flores Nogueira Diniz is a retired professor of Literary Theory at the Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais (UFMG), Brazil, where she received her PhD in 1994 and where she presently collaborates as a visiting professor. She has carried out a postdoctoral research on Film Studies at the University of London in 2003. Her research interests are: studies of Intermediality with discussion of theoretical and methodological issues involving literature and the other arts and media in Shakespeare’s and other authors’s texts. Presently she coordinates the Research Group Intermidia.
Camila Augusta Pires de Figueiredo – Email: camilafig1@gmail.com
Camila Augusta Pires de Figueiredo holds a PhD in Comparative Literature/Literature, Arts and Media from Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais (UFMG), with a mobility period at the Technische Universität Braunschweig (Germany), and Master’s and Bachelor’s degrees in English Literature, both at UFMG. She was a CAPES/FIPSE scholarship holder at Wayne State University (Detroit/EUA). Her research focuses on intermedial studies, with an emphasis on transmediality and adaptations. She currently works at UFMG University Press, as Editorial Manager and Vice-Director. Research interests: publishing, transmedia and intermediality, literature and other media, adaptations, graphic novels, cinema, and television.