ZOUGLOU, SOCIAL COMMUNICATION AND POLITICAL SATIRE IN COTE DIVOIRE: EXAMPLE WITH TU SAIS QUI JE SUIS, LE PEUPLE TE REGARDE AND ON DIT QUOI BY YODE AND SIRO

This studyfocuses on threesatiricalsongs - Tu sais qui je suis, Le peuple te regarde and On dit quoi - by the Zouglou singers Yode and Siro. Understood within a music-media framework, these songs are presented as vectors of social communication. The analysis of the three songs is thus of interest to both Information and Communication Sciences and musicology. From a methodological point of view, the study opts for qualitative content analysis and is based on a corpus composed of the songs mentioned above. At the theoretical level, it uses satire theory and hermeneutics. The results of the analysis of the corpus reveal that the songs have consistently and uncompromisingly satirized the regimes of the three elected presidents who have led the country since the first president Felix Houphouet-Boigny. These are Presidents Henri Konan Bedie, Laurent KoudouGbagbo and AlassaneDramaneOuattara. In a style that is their own, and that is specific to the zouglou musical genre, the two singers have vigorously and boldly told each president their truth, criticising Konan Bedie for his concept of Ivoirite (Ivorianness) and its shortcomings, speaking out against Laurent Gbagbos laxness towards the mismanagement and other misbehaviors of his collaborators, and questioning AlassaneOuattara, among others, on his policy of ethnic catching up and precarity. Clearly, in the three songs, Yode and Siro talk to challenge the three personalities, but also to raise peoples awareness.