26 african appropriations
through alleged parodist sculptures, as Julius Lips assumed in his study
The Savage Hits Back (19 37).
In chapter 8, I discuss the work of three white musicians who appropri-
ate African popular culture to differing degrees: Mzungu Kichaa (Crazy
W hite Man), a Dane who grew up in East Africa, performs Tanzanian
pop music and sings in Swahili; W hite Nigerian, a Nigerian national with
Levantine roots who has built his career as both a musician and come-
dian on his ability to speak Hausa and pidgin English; and EES, or Nam-
boy, a German Namibian who performs Nam-Flava, a Namibian version
of Kwaito music. W hat sets the performances of these musicians apart
from mimicry is not only that they address their audiences in Tanzania,
Nigeria, and Namibia, respectively, but also the pastiche-like nature of
their artistic work. I view their performances as deliberate plays on dif-
ference and sameness. W hile their skin color makes them stand out from
the masses of other musicians in Africa, their conduct and command of
African languages signify just the opposite: sameness. Thus, they thrive
on the (un)doing of difference, and I argue that it is exactly this feature
that accounts for their popularity among African audiences. Paying spe-
cial attention to technologies of mediation is important here, as I argue
that their popularity is ver y much linked to visibility and therefore to the
emergence of digital visual media and the recent rise of the video clip
in African music. With this chapter, the book comes full circle: while it
begins with a discussion of Africans imitating European conduct and
technology in rituals of spirit possession during the colonial era, it ends
with a chapter about postcolonial imitations of African performances by
white men who are disseminating their mimetic appropriations via digital
media and the internet.
I conclude this introduction with a cautionary note: the phenomena
under discussion in this book touch on practices, discussed under the
terms of appropriation, mimesis, and media, which I deem crucial for any
k i nd of c u lt u ra l produc t ion—not just A f r ica n. The fac t t hat I have l i m ited
myself to a discussion of exclusively African examples can only be ac-
counted for by the contingencies of my biography and the place anthropol-
ogy holds in the disciplinary rubrics of the academic system. The products
of the anthropologist’s profession, ethnographic texts and films—mimetic
interpretations of other life-worlds—are perhaps appropriate examples for