Culture of Mali

While the current state does not include areas in the southwest, and is expanded far to the east and northeast, the dominant roles of the Mandé people is shared by the modern Mali, and the empire from which its name originates from.

The interaction of these communities (along with dozens of other smaller ethnicities) have created a Malian culture, marked by heterogeneity, as well as syntheses where these traditions intermix Mande people share a caste system in which certain skills (metalworking, fishing, history-keeping) are passed down through families.

The Fula traditions of nomadic cattle herding has bequeathed values of mobility and independence, and at the same time created networks of mutual dependence between certain communities and cultures.

All along the edge of the Sahara, and far into the dry land of isolated oases live the nomadic Berber Tuareg and the (in the northwest) Maures (or Moors), of Arab-o-Berber origins.

While today, griots are often seen as praise singers at local weddings or civic events, where historically they served as court historians, advisors, and diplomats.

The music of Mali is best known outside of Africa for the kora virtuosos Toumani Diabaté and Ballaké Sissoko, the late roots and blues guitarist Ali Farka Touré, and his successors Afel Bocoum and Vieux Farka Touré, the Tuareg band Tinariwen, and several Afro-pop artists such as Salif Keita, the duo Amadou et Mariam, and Oumou Sangaré.

[4][5] Amadou Hampâté Bâ, Mali's best-known historian, spent much of his life recording the oral traditions of his own Fula teachers, as well as those of Bambara and other Mande neighbors.

[5] The best-known novel by a Malian writer is Yambo Ouologuem's Le devoir de violence, which won the 1968 Prix Renaudot but whose legacy was marred by accusations of plagiarism.

[4][5] Massa Makan Diabaté, a descendant of griots, is known in the Francophone world for his work on The Epic of Sundiata as well as his "Kouta trilogy," a series of realist novels loosely based on contemporary life in his hometown of Kita.

Other well-known Malian writers include Baba Traoré, Modibo Sounkalo Keita, Maryse Condé (a native of the French Antilles, has made a career writing about the Bamabara people from whom she descends), Moussa Konaté, and Fily Dabo Sissoko.