Ineke Phaf-Rheinberger – författare

Dans la série déjà longue des études consacrées à l’histoire du travail, cet ouvrage met l’accent sur une approche comparée au niveau mondial. Les expériences rapportées d’Afrique et d’Amérique latine offrent ici un matériau riche et diversifié. Les auteurs rappellent que les sources pour cette histoire ne se trouvent pas exclusivement dans les archives ou les enquêtes, mais aussi dans l’étude des facteurs culturels du travail.Traitant de diverses formes du travail – les industries agricoles et mécaniques, le caractère « invisible » ou non reconnu de la main-d’œuvre, l’artisanat et le secteur informel –, le livre discute également de questions concernant les organisations, la manière d’écrire l’histoire, la résistance et la créativité, l’impact des cultures locales, ainsi que les attentes des jeunes.Ce volume est issu des présentations et des discussions qui ont eu lieu lors du symposium sur les « Changements dans les modèles culturels du travail en Afrique : une approche comparative », tenu à l’Université Cheikh Anta Diop de Dakar, du 5 au 7 décembre 2011. Si le Sénégal y fait l’objet d’une attention particulière, de nombreuses contributions y traitent d’autres parties du monde et jettent des regards croisés sur l’Afrique et l’Amérique latine.Babacar Fall enseigne à la Faculté des sciences et technologies de l’éducation et de la formation à l’Université Cheikh Anta Diop de Dakar.Ineke Phaf-Rheinberger est chercheuse associée à l’Institut pour les sciences africaines et asiatiques à l’Université Humboldt de Berlin.Andreas Eckert est directeur du Centre international de recherche « Work and Human Life Course in Global History (re:work) à Berlin.

This book contains close readings of contemporary literary texts and art work by Spanish- and Portuguese-speaking authors from Africa and Latin America. The readings reveal a critical debate that understands reflections on the slave trade and current migrations from Africa to Europe as continuity since early modern history. This part of cultural history is firmly rooted in the Black Atlantic, although the book’s primary concern is a discussion of situations in which water spirituality functions as a backdrop. This critical inquiry of social inequality and injustice is based on a theoretical framework that addresses migrations overseas and forced labor. Therefore, the readings are placed within the cultural tradition of seven countries: Brazil, Angola, Cuba, Equatorial Guinea, Cape Verde, São Tomé and Principe, and Guinea-Bissau.

The title of Beyond the Line refers to the imaginary "Line" drawn between North and South, a division established by the Peace Treaty of Cateau-Cambrésis in 1559. This is an early modern time and Eurocentric construction, according to which the southern oceanic world has long been taken as symbol of expansionist philosophies and practices.An obvious motivation for changing this "Line" division is the growing influence of the "Global South" in the contemporary economic and political setting. However, another motivation for changing opinions in regard to the "Line" is equally important. We observe an emergent consciousness of the pivotal role of the oceanic world for human life. This requires the reformulation of former views and raises numerous questions. A diversity of connections comes to the mind, which demands the composition of a catalogue of case studies with an oceanic horizon.Through this operation, different problems are being linked together. Which problems encounter historians with their research on fishes in the archives? How to trace records about pirates of non-European descent in the Indian Ocean? Which role play the Oceans as mediators for labor migrations, not only of the Black Atlantic but also of people moving from Asia to Africa and vice versa? What do we know about workers on the oceans and their routes? When considering oceans as "contact zones," with which criteria can their influence in different literary texts be analyzed? Is it possible to study nationalisms taking into account these transoceanic relationships? And how do artists address these questions in their use of the media?Against the background of this catalogue of oceanic questions, "old" stories are told anew. Sometimes, their cultural stereotypes are recycled to criticize political and social situations. Or, in other cases, they are adopted for elaborating alternative options. In this sense, the contributions concentrate on countries like India, Kenya, Angola, or Brazil and cover different academic fields. A variety of objects and situations are explored, which have been and still are determinant for the construction of cultural narratives in view of the modified relationship with the geographically southern oceanic regions.