The (dis)simulation of African languages

African literatures written in French language translated, especially in their beginnings, the existential suffering caused by the colonial history, by the influence of French culture and by the predominance of the French language in their societies. It is, however, with the help of this European language, the language of the colonizer, that African writers from the French colonies "hide" or dissimulate their mother tongue. Their main characters or narrators of their stories, speaking in their fictional world an African language, are described in novels in French. This use of the foreign language predetermines all the African literatures of the colonies of the Hexagon until today. In this work, we will analyze the use of African languages in the novels written by African francophone writers between 1950 and the present day. We will focus on phrases or expressions explained in the footnotes. This use not only supports local colour for the European reader, emphasizing the exotic character of the text, but also defines the character who expresses himself in this way, i.e. the indigenous. We will also define the evolution of this practice. It should be emphasized that the use of sentences formulated in African languages is not a common practice in these literatures. Our analysis will therefore focus on authors from different colonies and different African countries, in order to demonstrate that this tendency to the (dis)simulation of African languages is common to many authors on the continent.

Keywords: French language; African language; simulation; dissimulation; African literatures