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Paper short abstract:

Drawing on West African empirical perspectives both historical and contemporary, this paper frames an inquiry into the decolonial potential of urban cultural elites, as a field of research, which lies at the crossroads of international relations, cultural policy and management.

Paper long abstract:

Drawing on West African empirical perspectives both historical and contemporary, this paper frames an inquiry into the decolonial potential of distinctive 'people as infrastructure' that yet remain mostly off the map of Africanist scholarship: urban cultural elites. It suggests an incursion into a field of research, which lies at the crossroads of insights brought by international relations, cultural policy and management. Considering elites as 'powerful intermediaries' whose power rests on being able to forge connections and bridge gaps, it focuses on these cultural makers in relation to processes of urban cultural governance. It thus draws the contours and provides examples of these distinctive producers in relation to concepts and practices of the 'cultural polis' and urban creativity in African contexts.

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Paper short abstract:

In recent years contemporary dance in Africa has been fostered by Francophone patronage, yet choreographers have been critical of the postcolony. This contribution suggests that the creative process itself performs a radical critique of African governance and the global order.

Paper long abstract:

Contemporary dance in Africa has only recently become the focus of scholarly interest, even though choreographic experiments have long taken place throughout the cities of the continent. Since the early 1990s, new dance forms have emerged, which build on previous experiments while commenting more explicitly on the post-colonial predicament, and making more explicit reference to urban imaginaries as a subject matter. Paradoxically, these experiments have been largely fostered by French- and EU patronage through the funding of choreographic centres and the organization of a contemporary dance biennale in Africa. But what kind of critique do African contemporary choreographers offer, and to whom? And what visions of African futures do they project? How do choreographers deal with the paradox inherent in the fact that they wish to critique the very structures that support them?

Drawing on long-term fieldwork with Senegal-based dance people, participation in the African dance biennale in Johannesburg in 2012, and on the work of several choreographers across the continent, this contribution suggests that the creative process itself may perform a radical critique of both African governance and the global order.

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This paper investigates how Senegalese popular musicians affirm themselves as urban cultural elites among Dakaroise negotiating alternate forms of urban cultural governance.

Paper long abstract:

During and after the 2000 presidential elections in Dakar, Senegal, journalists and scholars often pointed to hip hop artists as the prime agents for shaping the political outcome. However, the hip hop culture of Dakar during this time was nascent with a limited technological infrastructure, political commentary restricted to live underground events, and an audience of mostly young men and teenagers. Alternatively, mbalax, the most popular urban dance music in Dakar commanded larger audiences across age, gender, religious, and ethnic lines. Mbalax, a popular music rooted in Wolof ethnic practices was able to affect social and political change during the elections not in spite of its ethnic roots but because them. How did mbalax musicians address political issues and topics without alienating audiences? What were the politics addressed during live performances, music videos, and recordings. If mbalax is a Wolof practice, then how were musicians able to garner support across ethnic groups? I argue that the wolofness practiced through mbalax was based on an indigenous cosmopolitanism that bridged gaps across generations, ethnic groups, and gender.

This paper investigates how mbalax musicians affirm themselves as urban cultural elites among Dakaroise negotiating alternate forms of urban cultural governance. Drawn on fieldwork carried out in Dakar between 1998-2001 I examine how musicians, producers, and fans created and navigated links across digital and analog technologies, social networks, street drumming events (sabar), and nightclub performances to challenge and engage state controlled media and infrastructure.

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Paper short abstract:

Geographically speaking, the Canary Islands are closer to Africa than any other continent. However, its cultural link with Africa raises much more controversy. Local cultural institutions have vindicated a common identity space with Africa that is substantiated in the concept of Tricontinentality.

Paper long abstract:

The concept of tri-continentality presents a cultural specificity of the Canarian archipelago, which links it with the continents of Europe, America and Africa.

The African cultural nexus has been, however, the worst studied. During the 1960s and the 1980s, an urban intellectual elite, constituted by political actors, cultural workers and artists -mostly engaged against Franco's regime- claimed the contemporary culture of the Canary Islands through the aboriginal's artistic expressions of the Canaries aborigines or Guanches, mostly made to disappear during the Spanish Conquest.

This review and its subsequent projection, which does not lack a good degree of romantic voluntarism, has also been key to understand certain cultural ideologies at the service of some current nationalist policies, widespread and strongly institutionalized.

The Canary Islands' Prehispanic artistic legacy experienced a radical change of significance, redefined and adapted to nationalist political issues with more or less historical rigour. In that sense -and unlike the "discovery" of African art by the European avant-garde- the claim for a certain "African being" in the Canaries is going to constitute, some decades after, one of the key issues of the concept of Tricontinentality, which is nowadays highly present as a cultural dogma in local institutions. Despite understanding this relationship as a falsification of History but following Estévez (2004) -who denies the racial foundation of the connection- we will consider a new prospective analysis of the concept of Tricontinentality.

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Paper short abstract:

This paper explores the role of Koyo Kouoh, Bisi Silva and Abdellah Karroum, three international curators who respectively founded independent art spaces in Dakar, Lagos and Rabat, in the development of a recognition of contemporary African art in these cities.

Paper long abstract:

Since the beginning of the 21st Century, Contemporary African art has gained in importance in the West. African curators, mostly Western-based, are active agent of this development and become advocates for the whole continent despite themselves. They occupy a position of authority, having the power to advance artists careers or to break them if we consider a curator as a "culture broker who mediate the value of artworks in economic and critical discourse" (Ogbechie, 2010). Therefore, when they operate from outside the African continent, and tend to promote essentially artists from the Diaspora, their curatorship is sometimes interpreted as "harmful and detrimental to the growth of contemporary art on the mother continent" (Wemega-Kwawu, 2011) because they are seen as the West's vassals.

Facing the problem, some curators try to decolonize African curatorship and to give contemporary African art a possibility to grow on the continent by establishing new independent contemporary art spaces that are working both on a local and on an international level in order to raise awareness, educate and promote contemporary African art as an actual cultural practice. Amongst them, Abdellah Karroum founded L'Appartement 22 in Rabat in 2002, Bisi Silva founded the CCA Lagos in 2007 and Koyo Kouoh founded RAW Material Company in Dakar in 2008. If these spaces are internationally praised, what is their impact on a local scale? Established by a certain urban elite, how these art centers are interacting with local audiences? Are they changing the urban cultural economy?

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Paper short abstract:

A dynamic fashion scene in Lagos is developing as young designers create new spaces and collectives. Inspired by the energy of the city, they explore identity and challenge social values through their practice. In the process they are re-imagining how the city works in a post-colonial context.

Paper long abstract:

Despite the lack of infrastructure, transport and government support, a dynamic fashion scene in Lagos is developing as young designers create new spaces and hubs. In the process they craft self-organised creative communities. The players are from moneyed or educated backgrounds since an education abroad is a key asset in terms of forging a designer identity, and acquiring cultural capital. Many designers continue to split their time between centres in Europe and the US, and Lagos. Designer labels such as Maki Oh, Orange Culture and Daola Segoe have received recognition on the international fashion map. Others such as Adeju Thompson and Bubu Osigo are in the process of establishing their brands. Entrepreneur Igwe Ukpe has set up 'Stranger' which is a concept store, café and events space for progressive designers. The use of artisanal textiles and locally made products is a feature in some designer's work in opposition to the dominant forces of global capitalism. Designers frequent concept stores, music events and fashion parties. The experience of living in the city is commonly cited as vital for their fashion practice. They comb the vast fabric markets for fabrics and ideas and are inspired by the colour and vitality of the city. They are re-imagining social worlds and work in the city, and self-defining what being Nigerian means. Despite the challenges of production, the scene may offer a glimpse into a sustainable African fashion future and creative economy, moving beyond traditional notions of urban development.

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Paper short abstract:

This text will explore the possibilities of urban elites using their power and risk capacity to employ non-conventional social practices to create alternative infrastructures for design production in Lagos, Nigeria.

Paper long abstract:

Although much work has been done exploring the effects of lack of infrastructure in Lagos Nigeria, fewer researchers have explored the social practices that work around these issues. Still fewer have explored the way that the socially mobile play a role in attempting in this creation of new infrastructures.Through a focus on design production and a case study of a luxury accessories company in Lagos Nigeria, I will explore the possibility of the socially mobile playing a key role in creating extra-governmental infrastructures.

This text will explore the issue in two parts. First, using Star's The Ethnography of Infrastructure, I will explore the inherently political nature of the lack of design infrastructure in Lagos Nigeria, and how this negatively affects the possibility of creating luxury goods for the urban elite.

Secondly, it will explore how the founder of the luxury brand explored in this text, navigates a complex combination of social elite position (vis-a-vis dual citizenship) and works outside of traditional capitalist models of production including training and teaching practices, while still operating as a for-profit company. Using Lave and Wenger's text "Situated Learning: Peripheral Participation" I will commit to an analysis of the alternative social practices used to subvert existing infrastructures. I conclude the importance of the culture elite using their power to take risk via non conventional structures lies not in some benevolent benefit to the marginalized, but as one of their only limited ways to benefit economically despite the existing dysfunction.

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Paper short abstract:

This paper explores endogenous bottom-up processes of policy-making focusing on cultural intermediaries in Lagos who through collective interests are effectively influencing public cultural policy in Nigeria.

Paper long abstract:

The present century has seen considerable change in the way Africa is viewed on the global stage. Over time many african states have posted rapid economic growth rates which, in part, has been attributed to the continent's booming entertainment, telecoms and e-commerce industries. Unsurprisingly, in a country like Nigeria the unprecedented growth of the film industry, Nollywood, has brought to attention the potential for the cultural and creative industry to contribute significantly to economic growth despite a lack of institutional frameworks guiding the sector. It would seem that there are endogenous participatory processes shaping cultural and social transformation in Nigeria's creative sector.

These informal governance structures could be as a result of contemporary cultural policy shifting from being led by public to private agents, and the emphasis of the policy-making process being driven by local interests. This article explores a network of intermediaries who are setting the rules of engagement for the cultural economy in Lagos - a bolstering urban and cultural center. These actors, who organize themselves through relatively independent institutions, rely on pluralist notions of public policy-making and utilise unstructured models governed by collective interests and values to effectively influence the direction and growth of public cultural policy in Nigeria.

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Paper short abstract:

Accra’s new arts scene is characterized by a renewed sense of social conscience, manifesting in active attempts to circumvent or disrupt colonial assumptions and institutions. Their success in doing so has implications for cultural diplomacy and how civil society is defined.

Paper long abstract:

Residents of Ghana's capital city Accra witness a mushrooming of art and new culture in the public space.

This follows years of decline under military rule, during which many creatives migrated or went underground. Within this period there was an ossification of political engagement within local youth culture.

As both an intellectual and a DJ who has been an active practitioner in the Accra creative scene over the past decade, my cursory observations reveal that this recent resurgence is characterized by increasing political commentary, and active attempts to circumvent or disrupt colonial assumptions and institutions.

These observations pushed me to investigate this phenomenon through interviews with key participants in these creative communities (for example, those in digital media, visual arts, and the performing arts).

Drawing from these interviews, it is clear that participants in Accra's arts scene actively bridge, for example, 'traditional' African cultural practices with their new realities. In doing so, they move away from 'art on walls' towards art as a social transformative tool.

Without much support from the State, these 'youth creatives' combine consistent production with social media mastery to form a networked community that spills over from the virtual into the material world, furthering arguments for a bottom-up definition of civil society (Von Lieres, 2014). This cultural economy leverages the goodwill and services of creatives, audiences and communities - both local and foreign - to actively convince local society, the Diaspora and the broader international community of the social relevance and transformative potential of their work.

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Paper short abstract:

In our paper/presentation, we will explore who is allowed to create cultural utopias, and how these interact with the mainstream.

Paper long abstract:

Who are the cultural elite: The definition of "elite" reflects boundaries of power, influence and positioning - which then dictates the objectives and motives of any cultural projects. How do the ideas of transitional Afropolitan internationals and Diaspora citizens interact with the ideas (and lived realities) of cultural practitioners resident in the Continent?

How do the cultural elite see the city: If colonization was about repression, decolonization must be about building the self esteem and confidence of diverse subcultures, allowing them to express themselves autonomously in their space and time. Are cities designed for holistic cultural expression - or to even allow people to gather? What forms does "gathering" take - around an idea (for instance the Ankara Revolution in contemporary African fashion) or even digitally? What is the expression of authentic urbanness: the experience of a city's dynamism and aspiration outside geographic limits?

How does the city allow the cultural elite to map onto its multidimensional spaces: If, for instance, a city bans loud music and graffiti, does it create lines of class, privilege and acceptance around whose idea of cultural expression is acceptable within its boundaries? The city, aside from allowing people to access it as a transitional and aspirational space, is also a political and economic space in which the vagaries of power play out. However, as long as cultural influence is labeled "entertainment" to diminish and separate it from political and economic power, significant contributions will be hard to have on urban design, governance and policy.