Journal of African Cinemas - Volume 6, Issue 1, 2014

This article outlines and examines the genesis of a pan-African research project on Nollywood that sought to widen current research on the topic to include distribution, exhibition and reception in a variety of African regions, including Nigeria, Ghana, Uganda, Kenya, South Africa and Zimbabwe. ‘South-North Conversations’ was devised by the overarching project to frame analysis. The role of key African satellite distributor, MultiChoice, is briefly discussed as a background to the project.

There are three reasons for this study. The Africa Magic audience is significant – because Africa Magic remains the most significant distributor of the Nollywood film. Another reason is the significance of television and its audience in the growth of the Nollywood film – and M-Net’s Africa Magic channels/audience offer, perhaps, the best platform on which to investigate this. The third reason is the dearth of empirical studies on the Nollywood audience. This study on the perception/reception of DSTV/Multichoice’s Africa Magic channels by selected Nigerian audiences has necessarily adopted various reception theories as the major theoretical framework. Also adopted are both the stratified and convenient sampling techniques based on the tripodal structure of the Nollywood market/audience-blocs: Kano (Hausa); Onitsha/Aba (Igbo); and Idumota/Lagos (Yoruba). Data obtained from the samples were analysed, using frequency tables and simple percentages. Central to the findings here is the overwhelming popularity of the Africa Magic brand; and, in particular, a heavy preference for Africa Magic Yoruba.

Nigerian video films are distinct for the way in which they have apparently revolutionized – and then standardized – the portrayal of everyday social worlds. Many scripts routinely place ordinary men and women at the centre of the unfolding of everyday-world stories. However, the character of the gateman – as that of the okada rider and the market woman, among others – in ‘generic’ Nigerian movies is surprisingly underdeveloped. Gatemen in Nigerian video films are constantly not shown. Their recurring function is to open and close gates, allowed here and there to say a few words in response to the oga or madam’s questions. They seldom speak when not spoken to. This article draws attention to the aporetic structured absences in Nollywood films and Nollywood film criticism, specifically the parts played and not played by gate-men. It argues that the non-portrayal of the everyday worlds of gatemen – beyond opening and closing gates – suggests that Nollywood movies and Nollywood theorists are yet to fully evolve a ‘thinking’ and re-thinking of everyday social worlds in terms that specifically call into question hierarchy and what-is. The article uses the figure of the gateman to present semi-theoretical reflections by a non-Nigerian African, reflecting on the reading of gaps in the generic Nollywood film. Its purpose is less an exploration of Nigerian socio-politics as a polemical theoretical reflection on exigencies of method.

This article explores the distinctively heuristic approach to Nollywood video-films used by a Bukusu-speaking audience community in Chwele Market, Western Kenya. As this audience views video-films on witchcraft in particular – which tend to be very popular – the reception process becomes remarkably dialogic. The process illuminates the audience’s adaptation of the video-films into their sociocultural world. Most important is that this audience seems to not only relish, but speak back to, representations of magical power, especially as it is symbolized by snakes and women. I have argued that as they speak back to the visual images and narrative representations they not only reflect on and ‘speak back’ to critical aspects of their society and culture but also illuminate the cultural assumptions and ideological positions informing the iconography and social imagination of the video-films. Furthermore, this ‘speaking back’ takes the form of storytelling, in which the audience spontaneously generates oral narratives that sometimes diverge from and other times converge with the video-film’s content. I have further argued that the reception experience can be perceived as a medium of oral performance, and in this light I have explored the use of various formal characteristics of oral performance such as the use of symbolism, imagery, irony and hyperbole during a screening of Snake Girl I (Umeasor, 2008). It is significant that these formal stylistic features are appropriated from the visual and narrative form of the video-film and reconstructed in a manner that creates an exchange between, on the one hand, their screen representation and, on the other, the way in which the audience uses them in their reception stories. Also significant is the ‘dialogue’ at the level of imagery and symbolism between what is represented in the video-film and the one that the audiences have been socialized into. In the end, I have argued that the process of Nollywood video-film audience reception I observed at Chwele Market of Western Kenya can be read as the adaptation of the audience reception experience to fit in the frame of an oral performance.

Since the mid 1990s, Nigerian movies have become part of the entertainment media across Africa and beyond. In this article I assess the popularity of Nigerian movies as reflected in the weekly TV programming in Uganda, and in recent years, its dominance in ‘video halls’. Nollywood’s popularity has continued despite competing TV serials and soaps from Latin America, the Philippines and Hollywood. The comparative popularity of this genre, in the context of Uganda, is due to the interventions of the video jockeys (VJs), who appropriate and ‘rewrite’ the films as they simultaneously translate them into local languages for the benefit of non-English-speaking audiences in specific contexts of viewing the movies. As I analyse the reasons for the continued longevity and popularity of Nollywood, I focus on the demographic features of the audiences. Focus group discussions and keynote interviews were used to understand the popularity patterns among the various social groups. Participant observation was also crucial in my interpretation of audience viewing strategies. Notwithstanding competition from other genres, Nigerian movies continue to strike a strong cord with Ugandan audiences, especially among the lower income brackets. These committed audiences have appropriated and ‘owned’ Nollywood enough to challenge it to get better to ensure their continued adherence to it. I use, in synergy, the ‘active audience’ idea espoused in Uses and Gratifications theory, Alessandro Jedlowski’s concept of Nollywood as a dynamic hybrid between cinema and television and Joseph Straubhaar’s idea of cultural proximity as one of the principles guiding audience’s preference of media.

The popularity of Nigerian video films, also known as Nollywood, is growing across Africa and beyond. Ghana is one such country that has witnessed the growing popularity of Nigerian films on its local scene. ‘Nigerianization of Ghanaian eyes’ refers to the increasing presence of Nollywood in Ghana in the everyday lives of Ghanaians. This Nigerianization is expressed through regular screenings on local television, peddling of video discs on the streets and in shops, and through cross-border activities of film producers and actors with exchange of acting and film-making styles. It is also expressed through discourses of fondness for, and phobia (and protectionism) against, Nollywood. Generally, the phenomenon is seen to affect local ‘equilibrium’ in one way or another. This article therefore proposes that the Nollywood ‘invasion’ of Ghana has brought about some local transformations evident in the social responses of Ghanaians generally and in aesthetic and economic effects on the movie industry in particular. The article traces ‘Nigerianization’ through selective post-screening focus group discussions, university students’ responses, survey of media reports, interviews with industry players and readings of selected literature and movies.