Digital media, development and political creativity – between Utopia and digital disruption in urban Nairobi

Abstract

This article explores the concept of digital political creativity in urban East Africa, a context where the dominant articulation of ‘digital media’ has assumed an uncritical relationship with narratives of Africa’s social and economic development. It posits that thinking about the politics of the digital in Africa, we should allow ourselves to simultaneously think through issues of the digital mediation of social action and human communication, as well as the art and aesthetics of digital sensory experience. Exploring a case study from Nairobi, Kenya, I propose that the developmental appropriation of digital technology might not be quite as linear as development’s narrative logic suggests.