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1989-2009: French and American media coverage of sub-Saharan Africa from the end of the Cold War to the Obama Presidency Thursday, November 5 Using examples from French and American sources, Diane Seligsohn takes stock of Western news media portrayals of sub-Saharan Africa over a twenty year period, from the end of the Cold War to the beginning of the Obama presidency. The end of the Cold War marked a transition in the way the Western media treated the continent. In the aftermath of World War Two until 1989, coverage of Africa was largely confined to an East-West framework, mirroring the struggle for power and influence between the Western nations and the Soviet Union. With the demise of the Soviet Union, Africa lost much of its strategic importance to the West; its media coverage declined and changed focus accordingly. Since then, the limited coverage has been largely negative and sterotypical, generally presenting an image of a hopeless continent plagued by poverty, conflict, corruption and HIV/AIDS. A major exception was the positive coverage of the “new” South Africa from the abolishment of apartheid through the election of Nelson Mandela as President. However, recent developments including the role of some African countries in fighting terrorism, competition with China for resources and business in Africa, and the election of a US president of African heritage have been changing the perspective of Western news coverage of the continent. Ms Seligsohn will also examine the contrasts between French and American media portrayals of Africa, resulting from different historical and linguistic ties, foreign policy goals and immigrant populations. Diane Seligsohn is an American journalist and university lecturer who has lived in Paris for the past 3 decades. She first visited Africa in 1997, when as Head of Media Relations for the French doctor's group Médecins du Monde, she led a press trip to visit the organization's AIDS prevention and care programs in Uganda and Tanzania. Her work as a reporter for Radio France International and freelance journalism trainer has since taken her to 17 countries across the African continent,. She currently teaches Masters-level courses on the images of Africa in the Western media at tthe Sorbonne's journalism School, CELSA and at Sciences-Po Paris. The pilot episode of her educational documentary film series, The African Slave Trades: Across the Indian Ocean, was shown at last year's New York African Film Festival.
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