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| Title: | Music Videos and the Effeminate Voices of Urban Culture in Mali |
| Author: | Schulz, Dorothea E. |
| Year: | 2001 |
| Periodical: | Africa: Journal of the International African Institute |
| Volume: | 71 |
| Issue: | 3 |
| Pages: | 345-372 |
| Language: | English |
| Geographic term: | Mali |
| Subjects: | women writers popular music cinema Peoples of Africa (Ethnic Groups) Architecture and the Arts Literature, Mass Media and the Press Women's Issues mass media arts Cultural Roles |
| External link: | https://www.jstor.org/stable/1161542 |
| Abstract: | This article focuses on a number of highly successful female pop singers in Mali whose video music clips and music shows make up a major share of urban people's daily broadcast consumption. Many of these pop stars belong to a group of professional speakers and praise singers, the 'jeliw' (griots), who, in the nineteenth century and until late colonial rule, praised and exhorted their successful patrons on public occasions. In contrast to the overwhelmingly positive response by local audiences and Western scholars, a number of Malian scholars see the recent success of the pop singers in a less favourable light. They argue that most of the women who entered national radio and television since the 1970s do not have the thorough historical and musical training from which 'jeliw' of their parents' generation benefited. With broadcast media bringing the musical and visual dimensions to the fore, the spoken word and its message have declined in importance. This article examines how oral genres, their properties, social relevance and aesthetic perception change once they are recorded and broadcast on radio, television and video cassette. Furthermore, it explores the reasons for the astonishing success of the singers. Bibliogr., notes, ref., sum. in English and French. |
