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China in the African Mediascape: A Critical Injection

Journal of African Media Studies, volume 1, issue 3 (2009), pp. 343-361
"This study sets out to historically contextualize Chinese support to the African mediascape, arguing that contemporary Chinese media interventions in Africa must be seen as part of China's long history of anti-colonial and anti-imperial struggle in its project of national and international identification. The study concludes that current Chinese support to Africa's media takes the tripartite form of infrastructural realignment, ideological expurgation and cultural reproduction. It ends with a call for a critical-theoretical trajectory for understanding Sino-African media relations, suggesting a triangulated theoretical approach that draws on a critical cultural studies tradition. Key to this theoretical project is the need to study China in Africa's mediascape in terms of how its influence will, if at all, reconfigure African media production, representation, identity, consumption and regulation." (Abstract)