Public Readings in Rural Niger : What Place for the Illiterate ?

The illiterate, the overwhelming majority of the population in Niger, as elsewhere, are excluded from libraries. The author suggests that these libraries maintain a collection of traditions which they can use to enliven and support development projects, and which can be backed up with audiovisual material, a medium more accessible to the people than writing. Once the difficult linguistic problem has been surmounted, the library becomes a point of contact for the two cultures (written and oral), and will be a real tool for democratization and development.
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