Culture

Nollywood and Hollywood
A Nollywood director has reached the dizzying heights of Hollywood, and all the famous names that come with it. What can happen?

How to feminise a tank
The Egyptian artist Nadine Hammam’s work maps out the social and psychological position of the female body through the dialectic of the naked and the nude.

Intellectual Property Propaganda
Intellectual property protection has never been shown to promote economic development in developing countries.


Salone Got Riddim
Short film about the rhythm of daily life in Sierra Leone, and the dancing talents of the country's women.

Die Antwoord Butchering Old Beats
Die Antwoord play the media game well. What they still do badly is "borrowing" from other people's work.

Very African and Very Modern
Congolese artists Konono N°1 and Baloji collaborated by merging “traditional” sounds from Africa's biggest country with hip hop.

Rapping in ‘Father Banana’s Country’
The challenge of creating anti-commercial rap in Angola: a market with bling, swag and surly sisters.

The First Black Woman to win Sundance Best Director
Aava DuVernay leads a movement to organize African-American film festivals and secure theatrical releases for black independent films.

Dubai could do with a lot more of this
Dubai can actually be a city of gems that might surprise you. Like soul musician Hamdan Al-Abri, who is of Zanzibari descent.

Shoutout Banlieue
Number 8 in our series, Paris Is a Continent, showcasing the music of the French capital, is about bragging rights and one song.

The Nordic Connection
Hip hop artists from Stockholm and Helsinki team up; also repping their ancestral lands of Congo and The Gambia.

Colonial Fantasies
Just a sample: A "Heart of Darkness"-themed ship, Tarzan in South Africa and a travelogue on the Congo River.

Africa is a Country is on Twitter and Facebook
We have a new @Africasacountry Twitter account. Follow us there and on Facebook too.

Thandie Newton is bi-racial, and not Igbo
Thandi Newton choice as a female lead in the screen adaptation of "Half of a Yellow Sun" has some people upset.

A photograph cannot give you concrete information
Despite her reluctance, Zarina Bhimji's work does engage with her personal history of Indians' expulsion from Uganda.