Africa Is a Country

Rihanna: Back in Blackface?

Rihanna: Back in Blackface?

By
Sonja Sugira

In the music video for her latest single, "Rockstar 101," singer Rihanna appears in what looks like blackface.

A still from the music video for "Rockstar."

Apparently not content with her (failed) attempt at igniting controversy last year with her questionable spread in Italian Vogue, Rihanna has decided to try her hand yet again at the latest epidemic – that of blackface – sweeping the globe. This time through her new and, let’s be honest, particularly boring video for “Rockstar 101.” In it, she doesn’t wear much, she writhes around, she impersonates Guns N’ Roses drummer Slash, as well as someone who may or may not be Vogue editor Anna Wintour.  Oh, and in some scenes (perhaps as an ode to the pioneering work of Tyra Banks?), her entire body is covered in what looks to be black body paint or makeup … while she is wearing chains.

What is known as blackface.


So what is Rihanna doing in “Rockstar 101.” Good girl gone real bad or “fierceness out of control”? You decide. But, next time maybe she should have a look at what is Blackface before she proceeds next time.

 

 

Further Reading

Fuel’s errand

When Africa’s richest man announced the construction of the continent’s largest crude oil refinery, many were hopeful. But Aliko Dangote has not saved Nigeria. The Nigerian Scam returns to the Africa Is a Country Podcast to explain why.

Fragile state

Without an immediate change in approach, Somalia will remain a fragmented country populated by self-serving elites seeking foreign patrons.

Coming home

In 1991, acclaimed South African artist Helen Sebidi’s artworks were presumed stolen in Sweden. Three decades later, a caretaker at the residential college where they disappeared found them in a ceiling cupboard, still in their original packaging.

Imaginary homelands

A new biography of former apartheid homeland leader Lucas Mangope struggles to do more than arrange the actions of its subject into a neat chronology.

Business as usual?

This month, Algeria quietly held its second election since Abdelaziz Bouteflika was ousted in 2019. On the podcast, we ask what Abdelmadjid Tebboune’s second term means for the country.

The complexities of solidarity

Assassinated in 1978, Henri Curiel was a Jewish Egyptian Marxist whose likely killers include fascist French-Algerian colons, the apartheid South African Bureau of State Security, and the Abu Nidal Organization.