Full Description
How religion, gender, and urban sociality are expressed in and mediated via television drama in Kinshasa is the focus of this ethnographic study. Influenced by Nigerian films and intimately related to the emergence of a charismatic Christian scene, these teleserials integrate melodrama, conversion narratives, Christian songs, sermons, testimonies, and deliverance rituals to produce commentaries on what it means to be an inhabitant of Kinshasa.
Contents
Illustrations
Acknowledgements
On Language
Chapter 1. The First Episode
Religion, Media and Kinshasa's Public Sphere
Working with Cultural Producers
Mediation and Remediation
Research Methodologies
Structure of the Text
Chapter 2. Cursing the City. The Ethnographic Field and the Pentecostal Imagination
The Heat of Kinshasa
Competing Christianities
Signs of the Apocalypse
Witchcraft, or the Extraction of Life
A Christian Key Scenario
To Conclude: (Re-)Presenting the Apocalypse
Chapter 3. Of Fathers and Names. Social Dynamics in an Evangelising Drama Group
Bienvenu Toukebana: Setting up and Managing a Drama Group
Fiston 'Chapy' Muzama: From Rapper to Pastor
The Pastor and Maman Pasteur
Clovis Ikala: Setting up a New Theatre Company
Cinarc versus the Group of Muyombe Gauche: Rivalries among Troupes
Mamy Moke and her Lover
Ance Luzolo: Boasting with a Contact
Conclusion
Chapter 4. Variations on Divine Afflatus. Artistic Inspiration, Special Effects, and Sermons
The Christian Artist
The Pastor
Special Effects as Visual Evidence
Conclusion: Special Effects, Dreams and Melodrama
Chapter 5. Mimesis in Motion. Embodied Experiences of Performers and Spectators
Going into Seclusion
Mimesis and Possession
Spectators and the Sacred
Visuality and the Senses
Framing to Protect
Closing Notes: Mediating Performances
Chapter 6. The Right Road. Moral Movements, Confessions and the Christian Subject
'I am a Sinner'
The Moral Movement
A Modern Purification?
To Conclude I: Mediation by the Holy Spirit: Transformation from Evil to Purity
To Conclude II: Melodrama and Rituals
Chapter 7. Opening up the Country. Christian Popular Culture, the Generation Trouble and Time
The Difference between Existing and Living
The Generation Trouble
The Healing Power of Narrative
Past, Present and Future
To Conclude: Youth, Christianity and Development
Chapter 8. Marriage comes from God. Negotiating Matrimony and Sexuality (Part I)
Against Ethnic Endogamous Marriages: Mayimona
Incest Reconsidered: The Devouring Fire
Negotiating Adultery: The Open Tomb
Concluding Notes: Playing the Games
Chapter 9. The Danger of Sex. Negotiating Matrimony and Urban Sexuality (Part II)
Kindumba: Deviations from Accepted Sexual Practices
God's Men Making Meaning of Sex
Opposing Messages
Women and Social Power: The Moziki Women and Vedettes
Conclusion I: Negotiations about Matrimony and Sexuality
Conclusion II: The Melodrama and the Feminine
Chapter 10. Closure, Subplots and Cliffhanger
The Melodrama on and beyond the Screen
Cultural Producers in an Apocalyptic Society
The Recovery of the Salon
The Next Episode
Bibliography
Index
