JEAN ROUCH, « Saluts d’irrémédiable ! » & autres saluts, hommages & portraits

An anthology of texts compiled and presented by Andrea Paganini

13.9 x 20.3 cm / 416 pages / May 2021

isbn 978-2-35137-304-0

In French only

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In the Songhay-Zarma culture of Niger, fo nda tilas is the name given to the ‘irredeemable greetings’ made on the occasion of the death of a loved one. Having adopted this mode of greeting and homage, and extended it from the outset to the living, Jean Rouch made it one of his most regular practices. As a poet, the ethnographer-filmmaker was constantly nourished by what others had to offer, and never hesitated to make this known. Written or spoken for people he knew and loved, these texts form portraits of close friends and companions, and snapshots of their careers in the fields of cinema and anthropology, visual culture and art, fundamental research and traditional knowledge, exploration and politics.

Bringing together these writings (many of them previously unpublished) for the first time highlights not only a kind of self-portrait of the author, but also some of the less discussed aspects of his work, first and foremost a fine art of portraiture, which naturally accompanies the practice of homage and the exercise of admiration, particularly sensitive at the end of his long and rich career.

Here is an anthology of singular texts by a scientist and an artist, a scholar and a poet, a man with a network of activities and friends.