THE ‘AFRICA’ IN BIG BROTHER AFRICA: ‘REALITY’ TV AND AFRICAN IDENTITY

Big Brother is a ‘reality’ television show in which a group of people are brought together in a large house, isolated from the outside world, and made to live together while being continuously watched by television cameras – a concept borrowed from George Orwell’s fictional dystopia of Oceania, a world of never- ending surveillance in the novel 1984. The dictator who watches over the citizens of Oceania is Big Brother, whose terrifying slogan is ‘Big Brother is watching you’. In the Big Brother television show the house-confined contestants compete to avoid eviction so as to win the prize money. Helped by the growth of satellite television in Africa, Big Brother debuted on the continent in 2003. This paper problematises the meanings and uses of Big Brother to African audiences. Through analysis of discussions of the Big Brother Africa Amplified show on three sites [facebook, bigbrotherafrica.com and a focus group made up of University of Zimbabwe undergraduate students], the paper questions the normative label of Africa built into the name of the show. It argues that idealised notions of Africa and African identities are not sustainable given the contemporary influences on Africa such as globalisation. Key Words: Big Brother, Africa, African identities, Audiences, Globalisation JCMRJournal of Communication and Media Research, Vol. 4, No. 2, October 2012, 43 – 57. © Delmas Communications Ltd About the authors [1]Rosemary Chikafa is a Lecturer in the Department of English and Media Studies, University of Zimbabwe, Box MP167, Mt. Pleasant, Harare, Zimbabwe. ** Pauline Mateveke is a Lecturer in the Department of English and Media Studies, University of Zimbabwe, Box MP167, Mt. Pleasant, Harare, Zimbabwe.