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Kimani Njogu is Director of Twaweza Communications and former Associate Professor of African Languages at Kenyatta University, Kenya. John Middleton (1921-2009) was Professor Emeritus of Anthropology and Religious Studies at Yale University.Definitions of 'media' inexorably change as new technologies blur oral, visual, and movement-based modes of communication. This volume's introduction and eight overview chapters present African media contexts and critical issues of contemporary political economy; these are followed by 16 quick takes dealing with subjects such as health-related storytelling, African museums, cartooning, book prizes, proverb-bearing textiles, Kenyan diaspora Web sites, Muslim Hausa videos, and African intellectuals in a hostile media environment. Teasing tidbits reflect the impossibility of putting one's finger on what constitute 'media' in the first place. The essays were originally presented as papers at a Nairobi conference convened by African philosopher/professor/author Valentin Mudimbe (who provides an evocative epilogue) for the venerable International African Institute; contributors include many African scholars from the African continent and abroad. One of the volume's strong threads concerns music and religious videos, which are often created for specific audiences and follow specific aesthetics. Such effervescent vehicles are among the most 'African' of new media on the continent--i.e., they reflect and stimulate identity formation. Mbugua wa Mungai's contribution provides a telling snapshot: careening matatus (share taxis) blare rude rap in a 'traffic of cultural metaphors' constantly reinventing life in Nairobi... Summing Up: Recommended. Upper-division undergraduates through faculty; general readers. -- ChoiceA. F. Roberts, University of California, Los Angeles, September 2010 "This is a volume that will be regularly referenced for its individual studies and as a collective snapshot of the variety, complexity, embeddedness, and fecundity of African cultural production in diverse interlocking media." -Graham Furniss, University of London "This volume's introduction and eight overview chapters present African media contexts and critical issues of contemporary political economy... Teasing tidbits reflect the impossibility of putting one's finger on what constitute 'media' in the first place... Recommended." -Choice "Media and Identity in Africa contains important material on phenomena that will soon... disappear in the evanescent world of media discourse." -Bodil Folke Frederiksen, Roskilde University "Despite an increase in recent years, books dealing with issues of culture and media in Africa are still few and far between. Media and Identity in Africa is therefore a welcome addition. Its broad scope and wealth of individual case studies, written by many well-known names in African studies, ensure that it will be a leading text for years to come." -Jounal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development, Vol. 32, No. 4, July 2011 "The contributions are remarkable in their depth and breadth as they attempt to explain the media situation in Africa and what it means for the concept of identity and identity formation... [T]he volume has almost everything for everyone because of the range of variety in the contributors' disciplinary approach and density of style and language. For a book aimed at meeting the needs of academic and general audiences, Media in Africa is an invaluable acquisition." -African Studies Quarterly