Paper short abstract:

Audiovisuals shot in Yaoundé and Paris is what this presentation and reflection is based on. Two particular digitized narratives produced for one and the same musician will be presented to (re)think links in between the social imagination of the cities and the subjectivities involved.

Paper long abstract:

This paper aims to bring together audiovisuals shot in Yaoundé (2014) and Paris (2011). It draws on two particular digitized narratives - one produced in Yaoundé the other in Paris - by one and the same musician, Otu Bala, to compare some of the visible parts of the imageries of the two cities at play. Focusing on the interferences between the social imagination involved and the particular subjectivities with which these are addressed through the artistic work: The examples shown were directed for the musician itself - a Cameroonian reggae artist - conceptualized as gifts in return. The two products are analyzed in the framework of a University of Basel PhD project on the impact and use of the camera in the (ethnographic) research process. Therefore the analysis presented will be merely (self)referential and asks for:

How are these two clips shaped by mediated imagination and do they (re)shape this mediated imagination?

Answers to the question raised will be sought especially in regard to the applied montage and framing of the analyzed products/music videoclips. An analysis of footage shot around the productions of the official clips will be presented in relation to the published material in order to contextualize the artistic productions and refine more clearly the subjectivities implicit to the artistic and scientific positioning.