Published online by Cambridge University Press: 09 March 2016
In the opening sequence of a 2008 documentary, Ni Sauvage, Ni Barbare (Neither Savage Nor Barbaric), co-produced by Québecois and Moroccan television, the director Roger Cantin introduces his subjects over images of art, ritual, and nature that alternate between northern Canada and northern Africa:
Fouad Lahbib is a painter from Morocco. He is Berber, he is Amazigh, he is an autochthon from North Africa. Florent Valiant is a singer from Quebec. He is Innu, he is Amerindian, he is an autochthon from North America. At first glance, they come from completely different cultures. Their ancestral lands are far apart, separated by an ocean; they don’t look at all alike. One people travels by rivers and through immense forests. The other lives with heat and drought. What do these two men, Fouad Lahbib and Florent Vallant, have in common? They belong to marginalized cultures whose extinction was precipitated, whose assimilation was desired, and whose language and customs were silenced. Were they really savages and barbarians? Or simply people who approach the world with a spirit of harmony, sharing, and solidarity? Meeting each other for the first time, Fouad Lahbib and Florent Vallant will learn with us how much all men are alike, wherever they may live.