Cultural netizenship as platformization of popular culture in Nigeria

Abstract

The Instagram content of Nigerian digital creator Olalekan Olaleye illustrates how cultural netizenship stresses the centrality of platformization to the articulation of new genres of African popular representations. This article develops the argument by examining how platform aesthetics shape the trajectories and performative acts of cultural producers, something Olaleye's Nigerian context also modulates. By lingering on the digital and aesthetic labors of the cultural netizen, the article pinpoints the interactions between creative adaptations and social media texts. Olaleye's Instagram content demonstrates the way digital platforms have become integral to the production and circulation of popular forms and genres and the artistic responses everyday digital subjects make to institutions of the state.