Cutting across countries, genres, and time periods, this volume explores topics ranging from hip hop’s influence on Maasai identity in current day Tanzania to jazz in Bulawayo during the interwar years, using music to tell a larger story about the cultures and societies of Africa.

Introduction Tyler Fleming and Toyin Falola Part One: Contemporary Music and Its Wider Social Impacts 1. Inventing East African Hip-Hop: Youth and Musical Convergence in East Africa George Gathigi 2. Rap, Cartoon and Rap Cartoon: Representations of the Maasai in Contemporary Tanzanian Popular Culture Katrina Daly Thompson 3. An Emulating Beat: The Takiboronse Effect in Burkina Faso Popular Culture Batamaka Somé 4. Infectious Beats: Urban Grooves Music’s Collusion with the Zimbabwean State Farai Wonderful Bere Part Two: Transnational Projections and Performances 5. Popular Culture in Senegal: Blending the Secular and the Religious Fallou Ngom 6. Blackface in America and Africa: Popular Arts and Diaspora Consciousness in Cape Town and the Gold Coast Benjamin Brühwiler 7. The South Africanization of Tanzanian Christian Popular Music Mathayo B. Ndomondo Part Three: Historical Reflections on Music 8. Representations of Sophiatown in Kwaito Music: Mafikizolo and Musical Memory Xavier Livermon 9. Stars of Song and Cinema: The Impact of Film on 1950s Johannesburg’s Black Music Scene Tyler Fleming 10. Performing and Contesting Modernity: Zimbabwean Urban Musicians and Cultural Self-Constructions, 1930s-70s Moses Chikowero 11. Revisiting Country Music in Zimbabwe to Reflect Upon the History of the Study of African Popular Culture Jonathan Zilberg Part Four: Cultural and Political Meanings in African Music 12. Things Fall Apart: What Troubles Hath Hip Hop In Kenya? George Nyabuga 13. Speaking the Unspeakable Through Hiplife: A Discursive Construction of Ghanaian Political Discourse Samuel Gyasi Obeng 14. Popular Music in Cape Verde: Resistance or Conciliation? Juliana Braz Dias

"Fleming and Falola must be commended for bringing together in one volume a wide range of topics and methods that probe the social dynamics of modern performance traditions in Africa." -- Bode Omojola, African Studies Review