Paap Alsaan Sow teaches Wolof at UC Berkeley.

Borom Sarret is an early gem from Ousmane Sembène, who passed away last year. A poisoned love letter to the director's hometown of Dakar, Senegal, it follows a luckless cart driver on one eventful day spent lugging around an old woman, a man carrying his dead child, and a wealthy man whose promises prove costly. Sembène's Tauw is a portrait of a young Dakar man coping with unemployment, family conflicts, and changing social expectations. A traditional Ethiopian folk tale is brought to life in Daniel Taye Workou's engaging Menged, which won Best Short Film at the influential Ouagadougou Film Festival. A father, his son, and their nonplussed donkey voyage through the countryside to the market, but the real star of this parable is Ethiopia's landscape, a painter's palette of rolling hills, green fields, and vast blue skies. With music by Tlahoun Gessesse, a legend often featured on the influential Ethiopiques CD releases.