The recent* arrival of “fat pipes” in Kenya courtesy of the new SEACOM sub-marine fiber optic cables has me flashing back to an article from 1998 that fundamentally altered my world view. It was titled “Africa Rising” written by John Perry Barlow. The subtitle of the article was “Everything you know about Africa is Wrong”. The article appeared in Wired 6.01 during the pre-Conde Nast, Lou Rosetto, super-optimistic, neon-hurt-you-eyes-design era of the magazine. During that time the magazine prided itself on presenting “idees fortes” (powerful ideas) to challenge conventional thinking on an issue. This was Barlow’s idee forte:
Most Africans stayed out of the loop of the 20th century and were not homogenized into the generica that is now much of the Northern Hemisphere, or what they call the North. And thus their continent – so intensely different from the rest of the world, so vastly different within itself – represents a huge and still unconnected battery of stored potential. All it would take for Africa to leapfrog into the wonderland of an information economy would be to attach the electrodes – get it wired, in other words – and then watch its huge voltage zap the gap. Or so went my theory.
The idee forte created a “eureka” moment in me when a whole new set of possibilities opened up in thinking about how Africa can develop itself. The internet, techno-libertarian frontier that it was in those days, could help individuals route around the sclerosis, incompetence and plain lack of resources of African instituitions and find ways to better themselves. Harness the power of the individual, and step out of the way.
It sounds like pan-glossian optimism to think that a continent that has so little (unreliable) electricity, a place so full of people who are hungry, sick and/or fleeing conflict should divert resources away from alleviating such chronic needs to build something for people to “surf” on. What attracted me so powerfully to his idea was that John Perry Barlow saw the enormous untapped potential in Africans themselves, while most (including Africans themselves) just see a continent full of basket cases in need of charity. I don’t think anyone would have predicted the explosive growth of mobile phone technology around Africa when it was first introduced. The launch of the Seacom fiber optic cables is a next phase in Barlow’s wiring of Africa; who knows yet what the impact of that will be?
The problems on the continent are so complex and intractible that institutions, government or otherwise, can’t possibly even conceive of solutions to them all. Development will best come from the bottom up. From individuals, families and communities thinking through how to solve their own problems, how to grow themselves, how to connect themselves to the world at large without physically leaving their communities. Connectivity harnessed to the wild innovation and creativity that one sees in the informal (jua kali) sector in particular and in African culture in general is one way Africa is going to lift herself up.
Each day The Black Snapper presents a different photographer selected by one of the many guest curators, who switch places on a weekly basis. Visitors of the online magazine can expect to see a new series of some eight to twenty photos each day.
The Black Snapper aims to create an online community that will inspire professionals and photography lovers worldwide and expose new talent. In addition, the online magazine emphatically supports the emancipation and promotion of photographers from Asia, Africa and South America.
Site went live on August 1st. Looks like an interesting avenue to get young African photographers to get their work out there now that Kenya has fat pipes and it is less of a chore to post images online.
Posted: March 22nd, 2009 | Author:kamau | Filed under:internet, video | Comments Off
COLOPHON: Struggling to get my blogging mojo back; new job, life have curtailed um, research time.
TECH/CULTURE: The blackboard blogger of Monrovia, Liberia Xeni Jardin (who posted great tweets from a West Africa visit recently) links to an interview of Alfred Sirleaf “an analog blogger” recorded by Eric Hersman aka White African. More here.
PHOTO ESSAY: Festival au Desert Peter DiCampo covers a Tuareg music festival that takes place annually outside Timbuktu, Mali. [kofia tip: sci-cultura.twitter]
Posted: February 21st, 2009 | Author:kamau | Filed under:internet, music | Comments Off
Sean Jacobs of Africa is a Country is doing an ongoing series inviting fellow bloggers, friends, etc to submit a 10 song playlist. It can be what they are currently listening to, all time favorites, whatever. I was very honored that he requested me to create a playlist, so I sent him a list of the stuff that is on heavy rotation on my iPod (downloads and iTunes purchases). Check out the post here (Sean managed to wangle a picture out me, no easy feat given how camera shy I usually am). And definitely look around “Africa is a Country” when you are done. There is a lot of afromedia goodness, commented on with Sean’s wry humor.
Why do I blog about Africa? Two words. Chinese film. Wait, let me explain. I grew up a very westernized kid in Kenya. I am in the second generation of people that grew up with the world view that was distilled as follows: “Modernity (Europe + Christianity) = good. Backwardness (Africa + tradition) = bad”. I believe Fela Kuti called it “Colomentality”. Don’t get me wrong, I am intensely proud to be Kenyan; I just felt no real compulsion to learn more about my culture beyond a reasonable competence in my mother tongue.
The Chinese art film I discovered in the 90’s (I’m a huge fan of Zhang Yimou and Wong Kar Wai) was a window into Chinese culture and through that to one central insight. Modernization is not Westernization. For all of us non-Westerners, our challenge is to balance African-ness/Asian-ness/Eskimo-ness/whatever-ness with the best of what the modern world has to offer in science, technology, philosophy, art, culture. That is the promise of globalization.
I blog mostly for myself, filling in the blanks in my own knowledge of the culture of the African diaspora, a lot of which already navigates that space between old and new, tradition and modernity, Africa and Europe. Film, photography, and other visual arts are critical tools to communicate the stories people tell themselves about their place in the world. Like Zhang Yimou’s films which were (are) motivated in part to portray China differently after the shame and chaos of the Cultural Revolution, I hope this obscure little part of the blogosphere and the visual media it highlights becomes part of the the new story we Africans tell about us and our place in this globalizing community.
… these looks are the sole creation of the Surma and Mursi tribes of East Africa’s Omo Valley. Inspired by the wild trees, exotic flowers and lush vegetation of the area bordering Ethiopia, Kenya and Sudan, these tribal people have created looks that put the most outlandish creations of Western catwalk couturiers to shame.
Ory Okolloh’s talk at TEDGlobal 2007 in Arusha Tanzania, 2007
TECHNO-ACTIVISM: Ory Okolloh: The Making of an Activist. Ory’s site Kenyan Pundit was the site of record for information on the post-election fracas in Kenya, she practically live blogged the events on the ground. In her talk she makes a great point about Africans creating original content or forfeiting the right to complain about how others portray us (a big reason that blog exists). She discusses how she became an activist as well as her work with the site Mzalendo that monitors the doings in Kenya’s parliament. More on TEDGlobal 2007: Africa the Next Chapter including writer Chris Abani’s talk on the importance of storytelling in rethinking the African narrative.
Trailer for Jerusalema directed by Ralph Ziman
FILM:Jerusalema. Tsotsi’s Rapulana Seiphemo switches sides from outraged middle class husband/dad to gangland boss ala Scarface in post-apartheid Hillbrow in Johannesburg. Mines the same themes of urban poverty and its repercussions as Fernando Meirelles’ Cidade de Deus Gavin Hood’s Tsotsi, Jose Padilha’s Tropa de Elite. Can’t wait to see this, will keep eyes peeled for Stateside release. [via afripop!]
See also: Johannesburg Series by South African Guy Tillim, a great photo essay on the decaying center of Jozi that forms the main location and is a central part of the plot in Jerusalema.
French online magazine purpose has a great Africa issue, which features the work of African photographers, not just photographs of Africa. There is some new (to me) studio work from Malick Sidibe (the man seems to have a bottomless archive) and vintage photography from Nigeria. Personal favorite: Sidi Sidibe’s “Modeles”, pictures of the work of tailors in Bamako, catalog style.
Creole. The result of the collision of Africa and Europe. In music, that collision has created what John Ryle called the soundtrack of modernity, which links the Swedish middle-aged man who loves Miles Davis with the Japanese youth who wants to be a b-boy. The result of that collision along with the almighty dollar now form part of the DNA of this thing we call global culture.
Is it the need to reconcile the technological and the human, tradition vs. modernity, civilization vs. primitivism, the seemingly mutually exclusive past and present that gives the culture created by africans all over the diaspora its vitality (soul) and its universality? Whatever, but as the sampling of the media i have been consuming in the last couple of weeks shows, the results are always interesting.
Q (”Interviewer”): Do you consider yourself a painter or a Black painter?
A (Jean-Michel Basquiat): Oh, I use a lot of colors, not just black …. It’s more a Creole, you know … what I mean by Creole is that … it’s a mix of Africa and Europe … you know in much the same way an African in Haiti speaks French.
cover of “BEYOND DESIRE” exhibition catalog
Inherent in all desire is a measure of fantasy, which guides our eye and forms or deforms our image of the ‘other’. Here fashion is a superb gauge. It is accessible, driven by unlimited fantasy, free from any form of politically correct thinking, decorative and superficial, yet, at the same time, it is deeply rooted in our cultural and social subconscious. BEYOND DESIRE shows how two cultures can each adopt the visual language of the other as their own and how their respective longings are projected through fashion and clothing in their fantasy image of this ‘other’.
gnarls barkley: going on
the styling of this video is a kind of “DRUM/soweto” meets “london working class/punk” aesthetic. the look was actually inspired by an, um, inspired fashion spread created by brooklyn photographer clayton cubitt and stylist rene garza called lagos calling
there is an non-pixelated/cleaner version of the video here.
jorge ben: ponta de lanca africano
Jorge Ben drew from the sambas of the hillside slums of Rio de Janeiro and American rhythm and blues to create an original style. He created the most organic fusion of North and South American forms of African music. This affinity is being demonstrated again by the enormous popularity of rap music in the slums, and only in the slums, of Rio. Jorge Ben was also a highly original lyricist who combined street language with images drawn from African and Christian mythology and esoteric literature.
Arto Lindsay in liner notes for “Beleza Tropical”.
screenshot of landing page of hector mediavilla’s photo essay on ZoneZero web site
Stunning photo essay The Congolose Sape by hector mediavilla. back in the day, it was easy to spot a congolose man on the streets in nairobi. they were fashionable and elegant in a way we kenyans just weren’t. we loved to contrast them with the stereotype of the rich kikuyu farmer with muddy safari boots and suit jacket with the funky hems that turned inward, pockets bulging with papers and money.
i now know that their style was influenced by the sapeurs of congo brazzaville whose style, elegance and manners were then popularized in congo kinshasa and eventually all over east and central africa by papa wemba (and other congolese musicians) who sang about them and emulated their fashion sense.
from mediavilla’s statement:
Sape is French slang for “dressing with class”. The French often use the expression “il est bien sape” to talk about a sharp dressed man. The term “sapeur” is a new African word that refers to someone that is dressed with great elegance.
However, the Congolese sapeurs are not only concerned about elegance, but also with good manners, politeness and morality. Generally, they only dress up on weekends and special occasions. Designer brands of suits and accessories are a big deal to Sapeurs. Complete attire can cost up to 1500 euros, although ironically, many of them don have a job. To get the whole outfit that can get them the sought-after prestige can take several years. Most of them start up with suits borrowed from established sapeurs that initiate them in the secrets of the Sape.The Congolese Sape, except for very rare exceptions, is a man thing, which sometimes is inherited whereas most of the times is acquired by choice.
see also: brief history of les sapeurs on sapeur supreme papa wemba’s site. it shows how the sape style started out as imitation of parisian style and elegance and a desire to escape congo mentally and physically. it was driven underground and became a rebellious fashion expression by the youth in the 70’s in response to mobutu sese seko’s repressive “authenticity” decree that changed congo to zaire, rochereau to tabu ley and banned the wearing of imported/western clothing styles.
more:
photos: sapeure shot by liz johnson-artur in paris. here is the fader article [PDF], where johnson-artur’s images appeared.
documentary: today the sapeur perspective has evolved to more of a competitive, brand worshipping form of expression somewhat like the hip hop bling scene as highlighted by a 2003 documentary the importance of being elegant.
