Africa Is a Country

Young warriors of light

Africa Is a Country Podcast
African Five-a-Side Podcast

Young warriors of light

By
Tom Devriendt

What is with the increasing use of sci-fi and horror elements in fairly recent music videos and films by African artists.

A still from "Woklow."

Malinese rapper Amkoullel gets some help from Pap G and Young Keitch in his “battle between good and evil.” The track itself is so-so, but it did remind us we should soon try and properly make sense of the increasing use of sci-fi and horror elements in (fairly) recent music videos and films – which would include Matthew Jankes’s Umkhungo, Niyi Akinmolayan’s Kajola and Jean-Pierre Bekolo’s Les Saignants, amongst others.

Further Reading

After the uprising

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In search of Saadia

Who was Saadia, and why has she been forgotten? A search for one woman’s story opens up bigger questions about race, migration, belonging, and the gaps history leaves behind.

Binti, revisited

More than two decades after its release, Lady Jaydee’s debut album still resonates—offering a window into Tanzanian pop, gender politics, and the sound of a generation coming into its own.

The bones beneath our feet

A powerful new documentary follows Evelyn Wanjugu Kimathi’s personal and political journey to recover her father’s remains—and to reckon with Kenya’s unfinished struggle for land, justice, and historical memory.

What comes after liberation?

In this wide-ranging conversation, the freedom fighter and former Constitutional Court justice Albie Sachs reflects on law, liberation, and the unfinished work of building a just South Africa.

The cost of care

In Africa’s migration economy, women’s labor fuels households abroad while their own needs are sidelined at home. What does freedom look like when care itself becomes a form of exile?

The memory keepers

A new documentary follows two women’s mission to decolonize Nairobi’s libraries, revealing how good intentions collide with bureaucracy, donor politics, and the ghosts of colonialism.

Making films against amnesia

The director of the Oscar-nominated film ‘Soundtrack to a Coup d’Etat’ reflects on imperial violence, corporate warfare, and how cinema can disrupt the official record—and help us remember differently.