(waves crashing) - Africa, one of the fastest growing parts of the world with the youngest population, where six in every 10 people are under 25.

With hundreds of different ethnicities and some 2,000 languages Africa is the most culturally diverse place on earth.

I'm Afua Hirsch, I've been lucky enough to work across Africa as a journalist.

Now I'm exploring how young Africans are re-imagining the past through art, music, and culture in three very different countries: Ethiopia, Senegal, and Kenya.

This is an Africa we don't usually see, Africa on its own terms.

These African countries are reasserting their identities, gaining new recognition for their role as cultural powerhouses.

I'm interested in how that's happened and how the struggles for liberation in the past have helped shape today's African renaissance.

In this episode, Senegal, a French speaking country of 15 million people in the far west of Africa.

It has a cultural influence far beyond its size, with a dynamic film, fashion and hip hop scene.

(NuNu speaking in a foreign language) - [Afua] Here the struggles for liberation from the slave trade, and from French rule in the 20th century, created heroes and leaders who redefined what Africa is.

(Germaine speaking in a foreign language) - [Afua] A country of exuberant murals and street culture responding to the past.

(gentle music) - So many people forgot their past, where they come from.

The Griot is here to tell you who you are.

(gentle music) - When I was growing up in 1980s Britain, Africa was depicted as a dark continent without hope.

Trying to make sense of my own African heritage I was determined to see the other side to the story and I came here to Senegal to find it.

And what I found was a country that's had its problems, its suffering and oppression, but to be here is to experience the resilience of an African people's culture.

In Senegal art gives expression to the suffering of the past, but it does much more than that, it's the very thing that's powering Senegal's future.

(upbeat music) (upbeat music continues) (upbeat music continues) (gentle music) (gentle music continues) This story starts with a statement piece.

Standing high above Senegal's capital, Dakar, at the very western tip of Africa, is a striking 49 meter sculpture.

This is the African Renaissance Monument.

It was unveiled in 2010 to commemorate Senegal's 50 years of independence.

Despite a bombastic style, reminiscent perhaps more of North Korea than West Africa, it's an imposing and assertive work.

It depicts a strong, African family, a mother, father, and child, a symbol of an independent continent striding forth into its future.

This is a monument to Africans all over the continent, and in the diaspora.

A signal to the world that the African Renaissance has arrived, with Senegal at its center.

This is an African Statue of Liberty.

To understand why it's been erected here, what makes Senegal so confident about its place in African culture, we have to understand Senegal's struggle for liberation, and further back, in earlier centuries, how the country was formed in the clash of empires.

(gentle music) (gentle music continues) Long before Europeans arrived in Senegal great empires fought bitterly to control the West African coastline.

(gentle music) The Mali Empire flourished here in the early middle ages, rich from trading copper, ivory, salt and gold.

Mali was reputed to be the source of almost half of the old world's gold.

Gradually, during the 14th century, the Malians were superseded by the Wolof Empire, whose people today make up two fifths of Senegal's population, the largest single ethnic group.

(gentle music) In it quest for power the Wolof Empire established trading networks across West Africa, along which people, ideas, and crucially materials flowed.

(gentle music) (gentle music continues) When Europeans came to this West African coastline they weren't really interested in engaging with this rich history of tradition, culture, and art.

They saw it as a place that could make them rich, and they did that by taking things, gold, land, and for hundreds of years enslaved people.

This is Goree Island, just two miles off the coast of modern day Dakar, and only half a mile long.

Goree was first settled by the Portuguese, as far back as the mid 15th century.

But then the Dutch, English, and finally the French took their turns.

(gentle music) The House of Slaves was built in the 18th century for a wealthy French slave trading family.

The architecture is immediately unsettling.

Above, airy verandas.

Below, grim cells.

(gentle music) This isn't the only place on the West African coast where slaves were kept in dark, overcrowded rooms like this would've been, before being shipped across the Atlantic.

But every time I come to one of these sites I find it chilling to the core.

It's impossible not to stand in a dungeon like this and imagine the squalor, the overcrowding, the violence, the death, the uncertainty of being sent across the ocean to a lifetime of enslavement.

Goree was just one of dozens of similar bases along the West African coast from which slavery continued until it was finally abolished here in 1848.

There's ongoing debates about how many people actually left via Goree Island, but this site has become a potent symbol of the transatlantic slave trade as a whole, and a place of pilgrimage for Africans and the diaspora.

I think it's so important that this Island, and the House of Slaves that still stands here, has been preserved as a World Heritage Site, and it's good to see people coming here and engaging with that.

At the same time, I can't help but feel a bit uneasy at the ways tourists have this experience, seeing Goree Island as a nice day out, a bit of shopping, some fun.

There's a frivolity that I can't imagine at other equivalent sites of past atrocities, like concentration camps or scenes of genocide.

(gentle music) Competing European powers clawed their way along the west coast of Africa, inflicting cruelty upon the people here.

But it was the French who succeeded in claiming Senegal as theirs, and it's the French whose legacy is most felt today.

(dramatic music) (dramatic music continues) This is Saint-Louis.

In 1659, the French established a trading base here at the mouth of the Senegal River.

For centuries the city was the epicenter of the whole French-African Empire, the base from which they spread into the Sahara.

(gentle music) The French legacy lingers in Senegal today in language, architecture, but also in the people themselves.

(gentle music) France turned Saint-Louis into a grand experiment, seeding a hybrid Creole culture, like that of Havana and New Orleans.

And it created a new caste who bolstered their rule.

French traders had children with local African women, creating a new mixed race population called the Metis.

The Metis became an elite merchant class, wielding significant power within the colonial structure.

Saint-Louis is still renowned for its Metis culture.

Metis women, called signares, became known for their extravagant gold jewelry and French style clothes, which they wore in procession to church in their adopted Catholic faith.

(gentle music) Today their descendants continue to show off that exuberant heritage.

(Ariane speaking in a foreign language) (Ariane continues speaking in a foreign language) (Ariane continues speaking in a foreign language) (Ariane continues speaking in a foreign language) (Afua speaking in a foreign language) (Marie speaking in a foreign language) (Marie continues speaking in a foreign language) (Marie continues speaking in a foreign language) (Marie continues speaking in a foreign language) (gentle music) (gentle music continues) (gentle music continues) (gentle music continues) (Ariane speaking in a foreign language) (gentle music) (Ariane speaking in a foreign language) (gentle music) (Ariane speaking in a foreign language) (Ariane continues speaking in a foreign language) (Ariane continues speaking in a foreign language) - How did having European heritage make a difference to their status, and also how other Africans saw them?

(Ariane speaking in a foreign language) (Ariane continues speaking in a foreign language) (Afua speaking in a foreign language) (Ariane speaking in a foreign language) (Ariane continues speaking in a foreign language) - In some ways I want to smile along with these signare women.

On the face of it theirs seems to be an empowering, multicultural story of mixed race people unusually respected, of black women wielding economic power at a time in history when that was not common anywhere in the world.

On the other hand, they were complicit in the colonial system, profiting from it, even buying and owning their own slaves.

That's a complicated history.

Saint-Louis, with its Metis overlords, was Senegal's most important city until 1902 when power transferred to Dakar in the south.

There the French faced a major challenge.

(gentle music) (gentle music continues) (adhan playing) Sufi Islam had taken root in West Africa in the 11th century, but in the 19th century it became a formidable rival for power.

Sufi preachers saw the potential for revolution.

Organizations known as Brotherhoods sprang up across the country, radicalizing followers against the French rule.

This is Touba, site of the Great Mosque of the Mouride Brotherhood.

(gentle music) Laid out in classic Islamic style, it was begun in 1887 and only finished in 1963.

A vast projection of religious power.

This is an absolutely amazing mosque, and it's huge.

One of the biggest in Africa.

It can hold around 7,000 worshipers.

Its sheer scale feels like a rebuke to French Catholicism.

It has five minarets.

The tallest looks like a lighthouse, calling the faithful to prayer.

An Islamic version of Notre Dame Touba Mosque is emblematic of the failure of the French to fully colonize Senegal.

Even the way they practice their faith here shows that this is a culture that has always done things its own way, that has always fought back.

(adhan playing) The man behind the building of the mosque was Cheikh Amadou Bamba.

Bamba inspired his supporters to non-violent protest and passive resistance against French rule.

Like the British against Gandhi in India, the French struggled to contain it.

This is the only surviving picture of Bamba, taken by the French authorities in 1913.

Bamba wears a flowing white robe, and his face is almost entirely covered.

It's a cryptic, almost mythic image.

(gentle music) The French exiled Bamba twice, then allowed him back, but tried to keep him quiet.

But it was too late, Bamba's image had in itself become a powerful symbol of resistance.

It's still daubed all over Senegal today.

(gentle music) (gentle music continues) (gentle music continues) Like the iconography of Che Guevara, or Lord Kitchener, the power of the image has transcended the real person it's meant to represent.

(gentle music) (gentle music continues) (Charles speaking in a foreign language) (Charles continues speaking in a foreign language) - When you see the image of Cheikh Amadou Bamba, what does it do to you?

What does it mean to you?

(Charles speaking in a foreign language) (group singing in a foreign language) (group continues singing in a foreign language) - [Afua] Members of the Baye Fall sect, particularly devout vocal followers of Bamba within the Mouride Brotherhood, come to celebrate the new mural of their hero.

(group singing in a foreign language) - It's hard to overstate how much a part of everyday life Bamba's legacy is here in Senegal.

And painting his image is a way for people to connect with him.

It's also a blessing for those who walk past and see it, and a way of asking for divine help.

(group singing in a foreign language) (Charles speaking in a foreign language) (Charles continues speaking in a foreign language) (group singing in a foreign language) (group continues singing in a foreign language) (Charles speaking in a foreign language) (group singing in a foreign language) (group continues singing in a foreign language) (Charles speaking in a foreign language) (Charles continues speaking in a foreign language) (Charles continues speaking in a foreign language) - [Afua] The French Empire failed to win hearts and minds in its campaign against Bamba and Islam.

By the time he died in 1926 many Senegalese revered him as a prophet and a saint.

French power was weakening and what would now push it to the brink was war.

(gentle music) 200,000 young men from French West Africa were enlisted to fight for France during the First World War.

30,000 were killed.

And those who survived experienced vile racism and abuse.

When Senegalese troops occupied the Rhineland area of Germany, the Nazis stoked fear about the mixing of white women with black African soldiers.

The children born from these relationships, labeled the Rhineland Bastards, were forcibly sterilized after the Nazis took power in Germany.

Worse was to follow.

During World War II, many Senegalese troops, captured fighting for France, were summarily executed by the SS, simply because they were black.

France's defeat in 1940, and the Vichy government's collaboration with the Nazis, also proved to Senegalese soldiers that the French Empire was rotten.

In November, 1944, when Senegalese troops protested against conditions they were kept in at Camp Thiaroye, near Dakar, things turned violent.

At least 35 Senegalese were killed by white French troops.

The massacre galvanized the generation, and in particular the life of one 21-year-old Senegalese soldier called Ousmane Sembene.

Sembene is hailed today as the father of African film.

Originally a novelist he turned to cinema to get his message across when he realized its far greater reach and power for Africans.

"The Wagoner," made in 1963, was the first ever film made by a black African.

But Sembene's most famous and controversial film came two decades later when he revisited the trauma of the Thiaroye Massacre.

The film was released in 1988 in Senegal, but banned for 10 years in France.

Clarence Delgado was Ousmane Sembene's assistant director who worked with him on most of his films, including "Camp de Thiaroye."

(Clarence speaking in a foreign language) (Clarence continues speaking in a foreign language) (Clarence continues speaking in a foreign language) (Clarence continues speaking in a foreign language) (Clarence continues speaking in a foreign language) (Clarence continues speaking in a foreign language) (Clarence continues speaking in a foreign language) (tank engines rumbling) (tank engines continue rumbling) (tanks firing) (people clamoring) (tanks firing) (Clarence speaking in a foreign language) - Mm-hmm.

What was he like as a person, and what was he like to work with?

(Clarence speaking in a foreign language) (Clarence continues speaking in a foreign language) (Clarence continues speaking in a foreign language) (Clarence continues speaking in a foreign language) (Clarence continues speaking in a foreign language) (Clarence continues speaking in a foreign language) (Clarence continues speaking in a foreign language) - Ousmane Sembene was not the only former soldier transformed by war.

The Thiaroye Massacre, and the French coverup, helped turn another towards nationalist politics, leading Senegal to independence.

(upbeat music) Leopold Senghor is one of the most intriguing and significant figures in 20th century African history.

He was the architect for Senegal's peaceful breakaway from French rule, and his country's first president in 1960.

(upbeat music) Both a Francophile intellectual and a man steeped in Senegalese culture, neither a pro-western capitalist nor a hard line socialist.

Perhaps the secret for Senghor's success was that he was something of a go-between, operating in different cultures.

He wanted to rejuvenate Senegal and assert its independence after years of French Colonial rule, not by displays of force, but by displays of art and culture.

(group singing in a foreign language) (group continues singing in a foreign language) (group continues singing in a foreign language) (group continues singing in a foreign language) - [Afua] Senghor was from Joal Fadiout, south of Dakar, a member of a minority ethnic group known as the Serer, Christians within a country that's 95% Muslim.

(group singing in a foreign language) (group continues singing in a foreign language) - [Afua] Senghor never lost touch with his roots, even as President he came back regularly to visit his home village.

(group singing in a foreign language) - [Afua] Many of these women sang praise songs for him, and do so again today in his honor at the village baobab tree.

(upbeat music) (group singing in a foreign language) (upbeat music) (group singing in a foreign language) - As the father of this village, and the father of this nation, and this is how they used to show their respect to him, and they still show their respect to him this way today.

(upbeat music) (upbeat music continues) (upbeat music continues) (upbeat music continues) (Therese speaking in a foreign language) (Therese continues speaking in a foreign language) (singing in a foreign language) (Therese speaking in a foreign language) (Therese continues speaking in a foreign language) (Therese continues speaking in a foreign language) (Therese continues speaking in a foreign language) - You really feel connected to the African story here in this village.

And even though he was an intellectual writer, a politician, he was absolutely grounded in his spiritual heritage as a proud African, and a member of this community, Senghor wanted to project a confident new vision of African culture.

His philosophy centered on an idea he called Negritude.

Negritude rejected western labels of tribal art as primitive and envisaged African identity being rebuilt through pride in traditional culture.

So after independence the poet President pumped state money into the arts.

He showed off his country's progress to the world with the first World Festival of Negro Arts.

- [Announcer] Let joy fill the streets.

Gather round.

Gather around.

Let young and old join in, a festival is born.

- [Afua] For three weeks in April, 1966, Dakar was alive with thousands of people attending performances and exhibitions.

Senghor opened the festival.

Ethiopia's Emperor, Haile Selassie, mixed with African-American jazz pioneer Duke Ellington, there were steel drum musicians from the Caribbean, and traditional dancers from Benin were on the same bill as contemporary dancers from New York.

Negritude came of age in the 1960s, when African decolonization was at its height and the consciousness raised by the American Civil Rights Movement was sweeping across the world.

(gentle music) So this was an extraordinary celebration for Africans and the diaspora.

(group singing in a foreign language) (group continues singing in a foreign language) - [Afua] Senghor didn't let up.

In the 1970s Negritude was a policy that affected every aspect of Senegalese culture.

(upbeat music) (upbeat music continues) (upbeat music continues) This is the Ecole des Sables, an African dance school, and it's a direct legacy of Senghor's push for Negritude.

This school is the successor to the Mudra Afrique, founded by Senghor in 1977.

He wanted to find out what Negritude would look like in dance.

(Germaine speaking in a foreign language) - [Afua] And he put Senegal's most influential dancer and choreographer, Germaine Acogny, in charge.

The result was a unique fusion of traditional African movement in music with European forms.

The best of both worlds.

(Germaine speaking in a foreign language) (Germaine continues speaking in a foreign language) (Germaine continues speaking in a foreign language) (Germaine continues speaking in a foreign language) (Germaine continues speaking in a foreign language) - Can you tell me more about what the philosophy at Mudra Afrique was, and what the legacy of that school has been?

(Germaine speaking in a foreign language) (upbeat music) (Germaine speaking in a foreign language) (Germaine continues speaking in a foreign language) (Germaine continues speaking in a foreign language) (Germaine continues speaking in a foreign language) (upbeat music) (Germaine speaking in a foreign language) (Germaine continues speaking in a foreign language) - What is it about African art and African dance that captivates the world?

What is the spirit here that that makes our art so powerful?

(Germaine speaking in a foreign language) (Germaine continues speaking in a foreign language) (Germaine continues speaking in a foreign language) (upbeat music) - I found meeting Germaine truly inspiring.

A lot of people talk about Negritude but she's taken those ideas and put them into practice, creating new forms of artistic self-expression.

And for me that's a really powerful reminder of the fact that art can change the way we think about ourselves and our identities, and it can change the way we imagine the future.

(upbeat music) Not everyone in Senegal saw Negritude as that future.

While Senghor tried to redefine Senegal's culture, many ordinary Senegalese found his state-sponsored vision too prescriptive and top down.

They accused him of using the arts to inflate his own status and power and they responded with an explosion of creativity from below, with art that expressed the voice of the people and of the streets.

The legacy can be seen across the country.

The very walls of Dakar are evidence of people challenging prevailing ideas and expressing their cultural freedom.

Murals began appearing in Senegal in huge numbers in the 1980s as part of a movement called Set/Setal from the Wolof, "To clean up."

This was a mass act of urban renewal by largely untrained artists fed up with the decay of Senegal cities.

But this was also about metaphorically cleansing Senegal cities with positive social messages of renewal and change.

(upbeat music) Dakar's streets have become a canvas on which Senegal's people told their own story in their own way.

(upbeat music) And it's not just on the walls.

(upbeat music) Spontaneous expression erupts from the people asserting their identity and pride in their own past.

(group singing in a foreign language) (group continues singing in a foreign language) (group continues singing in a foreign language) (group continues singing in a foreign language) - [Afua] This dance is performed by the Jola people, migrants to the city from southern Senegal.

(group singing in a foreign language) - [Afua] They're an ethnic group who believe that when the dancers wear masks they're transformed into spirits.

(group singing in a foreign language) (group continues singing in a foreign language) - This dance is incredible to watch, but it's more than just a performance, and the dancer's doing more than just representing the character whose mask he's wearing.

While he's dancing he's embodying the spirit of the mask, becoming a medium between the spiritual and the physical realm.

It's so amazing to see.

(upbeat music) (group singing in a foreign language) - [Afua] The dancers play evil ghosts, or demons, that need exorcizing out of this community.

(upbeat music) That's why this dance is so urgent and exuberant.

(upbeat music) (upbeat music continues) (upbeat music continues) Mask ceremonies are cathartic and healing, a way for minority people to assert control over an ever-changing world.

(upbeat music) (group singing in a foreign language) (gentle music) - [Afua] The freedom and confidence you see on Senegal's streets has deep roots.

(gentle music) To understand the country's strong sense of national identity and story we have to understand a caste of people here known as Griots.

(gentle music) For centuries Griots have been guardians of Senegal's popular culture, storytellers of song, music, and dance.

A living repository of a community's traditions.

(Diabel humming) (gentle music) (gentle music continues) - [Afua] Many Griots, like Diabel Cissokho, play the kora, a traditional 21 string harp.

(gentle music) (gentle music continues) - The Griot is a messenger, we are a story and we keep story and we tell a story.

(gentle music) So many people forgot their past, where they come from, and the Griot always have this with them.

The Griot is here to tell you who you are.

- How did you become a Griot?

- I become a Griot because my dad is a Griot.

So that's how you become Griot.

- [Afua] How did your dad become a Griot?

- He's become a Griot because his dad is a Griot.

You know, so... And so that means my granddad also used to be Griot.

His dad used to be Griot.

So it's been passed to generation to generation.

- [Afua] Do you know how many generations of your family are Griot?

- Yeah, because I can say we are 200- - [Afua] 200 generations?

- From my family.

from the past, even now, Griot is here for everybody, to share and then to make peace.

Not even in the community but to the country.

You know, he's the one who's two people that has problems, the Griot is always there.

- What's it like being a full-time Griot?

- Full-time Griot is very nice, honestly.

So full-time Griot, I feel like you talk a lot, you play a lot, you know, you share a lot.

So I'm lucky to be Griot, honestly.

- What kind of things do you sing about?

- We are in the society, living with everybody, living with rich, we living with poor, living with happy, living with none happy.

You take everywhere to share with everybody and also to explain everybody's story.

For example, for me now, I had a very big inspiration today talking to you.

I can write that, as a Griot.

(gentle music) (Diabel humming) (Diabel singing in a foreign language) (Diabel continues singing in a foreign language) (upbeat music) (upbeat music continues) - That was gorgeous.

What were you singing about?

- I was singing, see what is around us today.

- [Afua] I knew... I was blushing.

(Afusa laughing) - You know, I was singing what is around us.

Today I'm very happy to welcome my friends here, come from England to come and see the Griot.

(gentle music) - Griots are just part of everyday life here as musicians, storytellers, giving a voice to Senegalese people.

And that voice has been a very stabilizing force in Senegal.

As eras, regimes, and individual politicians have come and gone, Griots have always been there.

Some people even say it's because of Griots that Senegal has been such a stable country.

(gentle music) The French branded Dakar, the Paris of Africa, for its style and sophistication.

(gentle music) (gentle music continues) The Dakar Biennale and the Dakar Fashion Week draw international artists, designers and buyers.

(gentle music) NuNu is one of Dakar's top young designers, finding success by combining traditional Senegalese styles with international ideas.

(NuNu speaking in a foreign language) (NuNu continues speaking in a foreign language) (NuNu continues speaking in a foreign language) (NuNu continues speaking in a foreign language) (NuNu continues speaking in a foreign language) (NuNu continues speaking in a foreign language) (NuNu continues speaking in a foreign language) (gentle music) (NuNu speaking in a foreign language) (NuNu continues speaking in a foreign language) (gentle music) (gentle music continues) - In the 21st century, the world is looking at Africa and Senegal is leading the way as a top destination, (gentle music) particularly for the African diaspora from Europe, the Caribbean, and America, the very descendants of those who were shipped out centuries ago from places like Goree Island.

(gentle music) Now they're coming back to reconnect with their African heritage.

Some even make Senegal their home, the place for them to fulfill a dream of repatriation back to Africa.

As somebody who's lived in America, do you feel that people in the diaspora understand what it's really like living in an African country?

Do you think they know what a country like Senegal is about?

- No.

A lot of people that I've talked to, they didn't even know Senegal.

Unfortunately for a lot of our media they only show starving children, right?

Starving children, and they show the poverty, or they'll hear about like police corruption, and things like that.

Those are the images that our media in the United States portrays of Africa.

And it's not true.

- You get the weirdest questions from people, you know, they're asking you, "Do you have to shower outside?

Does your house have a roof, or is it like hay on the top?"

You know?

And so that's when we were like, "Okay, we're gonna just have to take a lot of photos and videos and show people."

- [Afua] R.J.

Mahdi moved from Georgia, USA, five years ago to live in Senegal.

He's set up a business helping other African Americans to do the same.

- We wanna have a positive impact on the economic future of not just Senegal or West Africa, but the continent.

We wanna create home, we want it to be here for our children.

And I think that's what we've got to look forward to right now.

- Gigi, you have been here a few weeks?

- [Gigi] Yes.

- So of this group you're the most recent arrival.

- I am the new one.

- Can you see this becoming a more permanent home for you?

- I definitely see the potential for this becoming home for me.

I'm slowly falling in love.

- We're returning and we're finding that parts of us never left.

And we're not in a place where we even feel foreign.

These are cousins.

They're just cousins that you haven't met yet.

(gentle music) - [Afua] Senegal has emerged from its centuries of history as a country that's stable, tolerant, and welcoming, with vibrant art and culture.

A place where people are used to expressing themselves and their politics.

Where clashes of ideas have fed a unique creativity.

(gentle music) (gentle music continues) (gentle music continues) (gentle music continues)