Xala Lesson Plan

Senegal formally gained independence from France in 1960. Xala, a novel critiquing the newly emergent post-colonial bourgeoisie, came fourteen years later, in 1974. A film version of Xala was also released. Sources differ on exact release dates for both works, and whether the film or novel came out first, and the timeline is complicated by the fact that both were released later in the U.S. than in Sembène’s native Senegal. But according to Sembène’s biographer, Samba Gadjiga, Xala is unique within the author’s oeuvre because, unlike the vast majority of his other films, the novel came after the script. This information is interesting, considering the typical relationship between...