The health of our students, members and friends and the well-being of our community are top priories for the Alliance Française Mpls/St Paul. We are working to offer an online meeting for this panel discussion so you can join in the conversation from home!
If you are interested in joining online, this is very simple!
- Make sure you have an internet connection at home and a device with microphone and webcam
- Watch this: https://support.zoom.us/hc/en-us/articles/201362193-Joining-a-Meeting
- Join us HERE
- Enjoy the discussion
Panelists will discuss economic impacts of the Cameroonian diaspora, linguistic impacts of social and political structures, and the cultural diversity of language in Cameroon.
Meet your panelists!
Funwi Vitalis Tita is from Cameroon and have lived here in the United States since 2001. He holds a bachelor’s degree in Economics and a Master’s degree in Healthcare Administration. He founded and runs a nonprofit organization called Making a Difference International Inc. that helps children go to school in Africa, provide assistance to orphans and transitional housing to children abused, neglected, and abandoned. He is also an entrepreneur at heart and currently runs businesses in Uganda to try and create employment as well as spur business creation amongst the youths. He and his wife started a produce business that grow vegetables that are consumed by people from Africa here in the United States. He loves to share his life’s story and weave that to inspire and motivate personal leadership development he teaches youths how be effective in their area of gifting. His target audience is focus on African immigrants and any other organization that work with or is passionate about Africans, the social, political, economic and cultural issues regarding Africa, Africans and Africans in diaspora.
Fidele Ghislain Tchoffo is a French Instructor in the French and Italian Department of the University of Minnesota Twin Cities. He is deeply concerned by all related to humanism and human rights. When it comes to analyse African contemporary situations, he takes a distance away from africanism or from "afrophilia", in order to have an universalist approach. This is due to his desire to ensure the guaranty of his objective reasoning.
Dumont Doumbe is a co-founder of Douala Soul Collective, a project engaging community around music and culture of the world with a focus on his home country of Cameroon. He is a leader in technology services, construction labor and community engagement as well as a creative entrepreneurship. Beyond spinning records and creating an inclusive community vibe, Dumont is an avid gardener and hot sauce creator. He is a board member and volunteer at Our Revolution, a nonprofit supporting active civic engagement. Music and histories feed the soul, Dumont is influenced by dozens of genres from indigenous folk to contemporary style as much as he is an avid African’s histories listener.
Pamela Feldman-Savelsberg is the Broom Professor of Social Demography and Anthropology at Carleton College, in Northfield, MN. She first went to Cameroon in 1980-81 as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Health Education in what was then the Center-South Province (now Centre). She has returned many times since for collaborative anthropological research in Bangangté (West Region) and Yaoundé, and has conducted research on transnational Cameroonian families in Germany, France, and South Africa. Her publications include the books Plundered Kitchens, Empty Wombs: Threatened Reproduction and Identity in the Cameroon Grassfields and Mothers on the Move: Reproducing Belonging between Africa and Europe.
Phoebe Chastain lived 3 years as a Peace Corps volunteer in the Adamaoua region from 2015-2018, and now works in community health education with WellShare International.
Moderator
Joëlle Vitiello is Professor of French and Francophone Studies at Macalester College where she teaches courses on French, North African, Caribbean and Immigration and Border-crossing cinema and literature. She also specializes in Haitian culture and has published on the cinema of director Raoul Peck.