Returning to Our Roots: Look at Date My Family Through an African Conceptual Lens

Abstract

Viewers of reality dating shows on television have found a platform on Twitter to change the manner in which they consume the content of the shows. Audiences of the South African show Date My Family (DMF) use this social media platform to express their views and value judgements about the show and in particular about the performances of those seeking love on the show. The traditionally private act of courtship in an African context is reimagined in the manner in which audiences in these shows have brought the scrutiny of a private act into the public realm. Through an analysis of what was arguably one of the most noteworthy episodes of DMF (featuring Mdu Nyoni), and subsequent value judgements by viewers on Twitter, this article argues that there is nothing inherently surprising about the seeming shift of power to the audience in authenticating contestant performance on South African reality dating shows, and that is in essence an act of a traditional village digitally re-imagined.

Exploring the Virtual Culture of Reality Television Communities: Lessons From #Date My Family

“…The data suggests minimal use of abstractions to describe what community members would do in a situation and a leaning toward collaborative-ritualistic behaviors that serve as customs of the #Datemyfamily virtual community. This may be linked to a strong affinity in the African cultural context toward communitarian behavior rather than individualism (Eze 2008; Gyekye 2003; Ngcongo and Fekisi 2019). Therefore, virtual communities may avoid abstractions because they put more emphasis on the individual communicator rather than the collective consciousness.…”

“…Although reality TV’s rise to power has inevitably drawn the interest of many scholars from various disciplines (Deller 2016; Ouellette 2014; Tavernaro-Haidarian 2020; Vertoont 2018), there remains much to be done in terms of investigating the gap between RTV and the culture of engagement through social media. Indeed, audiences have found social media such as Twitter to be an excellent venue through which to interact with RTV content as a second screen (Deery 2015; Harrington et al 2013; Ngcongo and Fekisi 2019). The use of Twitter by reality television audiences to gather before, during, and after their favorite shows to engage about the content, presents an interesting place to study the intersections of communication and culture (Buschow et al 2014).…”

Black Twitter and Digital Counterpublics in South Africa

“…Black Twitter emerged as one of these hashtags. Black Twitter can be understood as a virtual community through convergences around user-generated hashtags on topics of interest (Ngcongo and Fekesi (2019). Mpofu (2019) considers Black Twitter to be a networked cultural identity that began in the United States of America (USA).…”