Moral Publics: Human Trafficking, Video Films and the Responsibility of the Postcolonial Subject

Abstract

This article analyzes the ways in which a Nigerian video film about human trafficking is received by Nigerian women who have themselves experienced trafficking in their migration to Italy. This contextualized case study is used as a methodological “lockpick” to open up new lines of enquiry into the relationship that southern Nigerian video films create with their audiences. The essay argues that, by virtue of their specific “addressivity,” the genre of Nigerian video films that focus on female migration and prostitution participates in the creation of moral publics that are concerned with the definition of the postcolonial subject’s responsibility in shaping his/her own destiny.

Notes

1 Here and throughout this essay, when speaking of “Nigerian video films” and “Nollywood,” I refer to the production taking place in southern Nigeria, which circulates mostly in this region of the country, as well as in several other African countries and across the diaspora. Films are also produced in the northern part of Nigeria, in cities like Kano and Kaduna, but the economy of their production, the networks of their circulation, their contents, and their target audience are profoundly different [McCain 2013].

2 A short, non-exhaustive list includes Glamour Girls–The Italian Connection [1996], Outkast [2001], Akpegi Boys [2009], Streets of Italy [2011] and Trip to Italy [2016].

3 It is important to emphasize here that, when talking of Nigerian video films in this article, I am mainly referring to video films circulated along the straight-to-video distribution networks that characterized what has come to be known as the “old Nollywood.” This has been the dominant form of film production and circulation in Nigeria throughout the 1990s and the first decade of the 2000s, and it still constitutes a large part of the video films produced and distributed there today; but a new branch of the industry has appeared which produces films that follow different patterns of circulation. These “new” Nollywood films circulate mostly via television and theaters and are watched in ways that differ profoundly from the modes of film consumption that characterized “Old” Nollywood [Jedlowski 2013]. The analysis of their relationship with audiences would probably require a quite different analytical framework, closer to the one deployed, for instance, by Connor Ryan [2015] in his analysis of Nigerian multiplexes.

4 The content of this section is based on the fieldnotes prepared by Alejandra Carreño-Calderon, Alessandro Jedlowski and Simona Taliani. The sentences that I quote in this section are thus not a literal transcription of the dialogues that took place during the screening, which were not recorded, but come from a transcription of the notes, which summarize the content of what was discussed. I warmly thank Simona Taliani, Roberto Beneduce and Alejandra Carreño-Calderon for sharing their notes and their thoughts about this experience.

5 The real names and surnames of the four women who participated to the experience have been substituted with pseudonyms to preserve their privacy.

6 According to the existing reports, the family and relatives of the women who migrate normally pay a significant amount of money to the traffickers in order to sponsor the trip to Europe. This amount is progressively augmented throughout the trip, and reaches an average total of around €40–50,000. In most cases, the women have their passports seized on arrival and these are not returned until they pay the traffickers back, which can take from one to three years. Those who try to run away without paying are threatened with physical violence, occult rituals and retaliation against family members [Carling 2006; Taliani 2012].

7 As Ruth Marshall has underlined, “Born-Again discourse and practice engage with the ‘history of the present,’ questioning the social, political and cultural forms that they see as the historical ground for the present crisis. This questioning focuses not on external interventions such as colonialism or capitalism, but rather focuses on the local, on the practices of local agents: ‘What is basically wrong with us as a people?' The fierce rejection of all forms of socio-cultural practice which are seen as particularly 'Nigerian', 'traditional' and 'local', expresses not only a form of sociopolitical critique that emphasizes individual agency—it is individual sin and the personal rejection of Christ that open up the space in which the failure of the nation is manifested—but also stages the Born Again project of 'making a complete break with the past' as the condition for renewal and redemption” [2009: 91].

8 I borrow this expression from the title of a workshop I co-organized with Benjamin Rubbers at the University of Liège in September 2015: “Régimes de responsabilité en Afrique: Généalogies, rationalités et conflits.” An earlier version of this essay was presented on that occasion, and I thank the participants for their comments and remarks.

9 More recent examples of Nigerian novels focusing on migration and prostitution include Akachi Adimora-Ezeigbo’s Trafficked [2009], Chika Unigwe’s On Black Sisters’ Street [2009], and Abidemi Sanusi’s Eyo [2009].

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by Fonds de la Recherche Scientifique – FNRS.