Aissata G. Sidikou is Assistant Professor of French and Francophone Studies in the Department of Languages and Cultures at the United States Naval Academy. She is author of Recreating Words, Reshaping Worlds: The Verbal Art of Women from Niger, Mali, and Senegal . Thomas A. Hale is Edwin Erle Sparks Professor of African, French, and Comparative Literature in the Department of French and Francophone Studies and the Department of Comparative Literature at The Pennsylvania State University. He is author of Griots and Griottes: Masters of Words and Music (IUP, 1999) and editor (with John William Johnson and Stephen Belcher) of Oral Epics from Africa (IUP, 1997).