„Afrika-Paradies. Eine alternativgeschichtliche Gestaltung der Migration nach Afrika in ausgewählten deutsch- und anderssprachigen Filmen und Romanen“

Abstract

By examining two films, Africa Paradis (2006, in French) and Usoni (2012, in English) as well as two novels, Alex Capus’ Munzinger Pascha published in 1997 in German and In the United States of Africa by Abdourahman Wabéri published in French in 2006, this paper investigates how they contribute to current debates on migration by presenting counterfactual storylines as in their alternative worlds the direction of migration is changed from Europe to Africa. This paper thus interrogates the political and aesthetic function these alternative writings have in the context of presenting postcolonial asymmetries between Europe and Africa and argues that they convey a message by employing a counterfactual discourse: If Europeans learn to view migration as an event in which they are involved, not as passive and happy spectators, but rather as active witnesses and sufferers, the debate about it could be more humane.