On the blackness of the panther, interrogating an afrofuturistic reality in a diasporan fantasy

Abstract

Media sell both products and worldviews and in contemporary times, films have become a standard target to vend such products and worldviews. Some scholars have argued that media texts have ideological contents embedded in them for the reason that these media texts articulate either overtly or covertly the maker's attitudes, beliefs, political and socio cultural stances. This study through the lens of postcolonial theory, stereotype theory and theory of hegemony, and a qualitative content analysis design critically examined how the Black Panther (2018) film depicted Africa. It also probed into how the film was used to address stereotypes in Western media representations of Africa and outlined the dominant ideologies embedded in the film. The study revealed that the Black Panther (2018) film used the following themes to depict Africa: advanced society, primordial society, cultural hybridity and cultural appropriation. The study also showed that while the film addressed some common stereotypes on Africa in Western media through science and technology, economic independence and gender equity, it also reinforced the cultural homogenisation stereotype. As a result, the study emphasised that although the film projected ideologies such as Afrofuturism, Pan-Africanism, there were some neo-liberal ideals such as open borders and free trade embedded in the film. The study therefore, concluded that while the Black Panther (2018) film depicted Africa in the manner that subverted some colonial legacies, it also reinforced other colonial legacies.