Dancing to the rhythm of Léopoldville: nostalgia, urban critique and generational difference in Kinshasa’s TV music shows

Abstract

ABSTRACTThis article addresses social and symbolic differences in contemporary Kinshasa as these are expressed in and mediated via widely watched music television shows such as Bana Léo (‘The Children of Léo[poldville]’) and Sentiment Lipopo (‘The Feeling of Lipopo’), both of which have become extremely popular in Kinshasa (‘Léopoldville’ as the city was called during colonial times, or affectionately ‘Lipopo’) since the early 2000s. Recorded in local nightclubs, these programmes show elderly people performing cha cha cha, merengue, polka piquée, bolero, rumba, and other international dance styles to Congolese rumba music dating from the late colonial and early postcolonial periods. Intimately tied to the emergence of a new category of elderly people in Kinshasa, these shows clarify the boundaries between the ‘urban elderly’ and (a) the younger generations and (b) the ‘elders from the village’. A ‘practical nostalgia’ is performed that aims at restoring value to, and the esteem of, elders in the African city. The Bana Léo genre thus illustrates the ambiguity of the production of difference in the cultural domain. While generational differences may be expressed in the space of this genre, it simultaneously articulates a cultural attempt to overcome that distance and to create conviviality among the generations.