Tuesday, Dec. 8 @ 6:00PM - Cowin Center (Teachers College, Columbia University)

STAMBALI

Stambali is an annual tribute that the disciples of Sidi Saad pay to their master during an initiatory journey and rite of purification that lasts three days. This Tunisian religious ritual, brought into the country by Sub-Saharan Africans, is a healing ceremony led by musicians who are also healers as they enter into a trance to the mesmerizing rhythm of the "gombri" and "chkackek" and incarnate a deity that takes possession of their body. In Stambali, the camera follows the rhythm of the possessions and dances of the healing ceremony as it develops into an individual and collective hypnosis and takes the audience into the trance of eroticism that is released by this physical and spiritual representation. By Nawfel Saheb-Ettaba, Tunisia, 1999, 52min, documentary in English and Arabic with English subtitles.Shown with All the World's a Stage

PART OF AFRICAN SYNCRETISM IN TUNISIA AND INDIA PROGRAM