Scales of cultural influence: Malawian consumption of foreign media

Abstract

This article draws from qualitative and ethnographic work conducted in Malawi to interrogate anew questions of cultural influence by foreign media. Malawi presents a fascinating case for examining such questions, given the almost complete lack of local film or television production and an imperiled music industry, which combine to suffuse film, television, and radio with foreign content. In recent years, moreover, concerns about cultural influence have bubbled up in Malawi. Respondents were therefore asked to discuss their feelings regarding the foreign media presence in the country. Responses suggest the importance of third and subsequent parties to an understanding of cultural influence, as the article examines how Nigerian and American film and television compete with each other, and then examines how minority Tumbuka listeners suspiciously regard Zambian music sung in Malawi’s national and majority language, Chichewa. The article aims to complicate theories of cultural influence first by illustrating how multiple cultures jostle for influence, and second by arguing that the often-unitary focus on nation as unit of reception for culture obscures the equal importance of both supranational and subnational cultural units as sites of reception and meaning-making.