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Abstract
In this paper, we consider that the world’s geopolitical configuration is actually determined by a new paradigm in the relationship between North and South. We are questioning the way North and South are built as macro-spaces in Chris Weitz’s A Better Life and Sylvestre Amoussou’s Africa Paradis. This questioning process permits us to analyze the symbolical and ideological meanings of both films on contemporary migration. Based on the theoretical approach established by Henri Mitterand and Jacques Soubeyroux, we organize this analytical process in three steps. After realizing a mimetic topography, we pay attention to the functioning of North and South as diegetic spaces, in order to highlight their signification in relation to the trajectory of migrant characters. The third step deals with the analysis of the ideological symbolism of spaces, determining the factors that rule that polarization. We conclude that nowadays, the north/south polarization does not obey anymore to the geographical logic of cardinal point, but and much more to a logic of hegemony.
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