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The novel's protagonist, Salie, is born out of wedlock into the rigidly traditional society of Niodior, a small Senegalese island. Salie experiences limitations based on her social status and, especially, her gender. These limitations, in turn, guide her need to define her identity and her role and purpose as a migrant to France. The protagonist's story marks an important contribution to immigration/exile discourses in that it exposes how gender, in general, and girlhood, in particular, can be powerful motivators leading to migration in addition to more frequently discussed causes such as finding (better) employment or pursuing educational opportunities.
Fatou Diome's first novel, Le ventre de l'Atlantique (The Belly of the Atlantic) was published in France in 2003 and became an instant success.1 The author, born in 1968 on the small Senegalese island Niodior, was raised by her grandmother, moved to the city of M'Bour to attend high school at age thirteen, and eventually began studies in Dakar. She migrated to France when, as a twenty-two-year-old, she married a French man. After her marriage ended, she relocated to Strasbourg where she studied to receive a doctorate in literature. Her first publication, La préférence nationale (The National Preference) is a collection of short stories that appeared in 2001. She still resides in Strasbourg and hosted a monthly cultural TV show (Sleepless Night) from fall 2004 to fall 2006.
It is tempting to see and emphasize the many parallels between the author's biography and events narrated in The Belly of the Atlantic and thus to treat it as an autobiographical novel.2 My emphasis here, however, is on the fictional work, and on exploring how the narrator's story - a girl's story - informs our thinking about emigration or migration from Senegal to France, about relations between the two countries, and about the challenges that the traditional society on Niodior faces in the twenty-first century. On the surface, Diome's novel emerges as a text that appears to be mostly about soccer.3 Indeed, soccer anchors the narrative in time and with reference to actual events: between June 29th, 2000 - the day Italy and Holland play to compete for the European Cup - and June 18th, 2002, when South Korea plays Italy in the World Cup. The performance of...