Dakar. We are at Cheikh Anta Diop University to meet Professor El Hadji Dieye, specialist in African linguistics.

With El Hadji we discuss national and indigenous languages in Senegal, as well as the burning question of disappearing idioms and grassroots initiatives to protect them. We also consider the links between words and forms of life, the question of opacity and the power of spirituality as forces of resistance to Western domination. He tells us how they are compiling dictionaries as collective spaces of resilience.

Thank you El Hadji!

Recorded, edited and mixed by Silvia Maglioni and Graeme Thomson, in musical conversation with "Ears of the People: Ekonting Songs from Senegal and The Gambia".

*with the precious support of Ecoversities