Afropolitanizing the local: how cultural imperialism is rewriting the narratives of African entertainment industries

Abstract

In the last few years, Africa has emerged as a resurging force in global pop culture with artists from the continent and the diaspora working to bring African entertainment media to the rest of the world. While the rest of the world is now catching on, Africa and much of her diaspora were already plugged in to music, fashion, food, film and other cultural products and trends from the continent. Despite this growth in the globalizing force of African pop culture, there is not much research on what this means for Africa’s culture industries in the domestic and global front. Using postcolonial theory, I present analyses on the attention that Ghanaian and Nigerian entertainment media are getting globally. I argue that although African pop culture and entertainment media is being globalized rapidly than ever before, it is imperative to pay attention to the way that this trend is coloured by the Western Gaze, cultural imperialism, afropolitan logics and the displacement of African continental consumers and audiences of these culture industries. I draw attention to the broad trends in these influences while using specific examples to illustrate how this trend is unfolding.