Hausa Cinema of Northern Nigeria: Cultural Imperialism and Censorship

This historical account of cinema in Nigeria explores the transcultural transfer of media from India to Africa through films. Hausa Cinema of Northern Nigeria examines how the Hindi Cinema of India became the template for storytelling in the Hausa regional cinema of Northern Nigeria and explores the emergence of Indigenous language within cinema in this region. Such emergence created points of divergence with the Islamic public culture leading to censorship both within the entertainment industry and the newly re-introduced Shari’a government of Kano. Throughout this book, Abdalla Uba Adamu explores the tension between Islamic society and the intrusion of transglobal media influences in cinema in Kano. He provides a deeper understanding of global media transnationalism and its impact on Muslim African popular culture. This book also discusses how the Muslim Hausa youth used the agencies of transglobal media technologies to transform the Hausa narrative style from a linear and didactic format to a complex configuration. By examining the Hausa film industry’ s history, Adamu challenges the notion of cultural and media imperialism and the dominance of media consumption in contemporary African societies.