The political economy of video marketing in Ogbomọṣọ, Nigeria

Abstract

This article examines the character of Yoruba video viewers, the style of marketing and the politics of choice in Ogbomọṣọ, a Nigerian town on the northern fringe of Ọyọ State. As an itinerant trading community Ogbomọṣọ is a place where production is not the source of wealth; instead, big wealth is always repatriated from outside, raising a doubt, stemming from its largely invisible productive base, about human ability and achievements. The vocation of selling videos is growing, even if it is not successful yet as a money-making enterprise. But the business itself, by the attractiveness of its market culture, seems to be inviting gradual, systematic and progressive patronage. The business attracts customers, especially the young, by its guarantee of choice and a promise of negotiable power. Consumers can pick and choose among a variety of goods. They are free to collect or construct their relationships with the marketers, depending on what emphasis they place on cost, quality and quantity of goods. For the people of Ogbomọṣọ, whose craving for freedom and success have taken them far afield into other countries, the market enacts a self that can play many roles. The argument is that a local ideology of marketing promotes the sale of videos in their productive contexts and that those who buy them within those contexts act within the framework of the same ideology. Videos deal with knowledge and the various levels of its acquisition. The producers, the marketers and the consumers are engaged in a consideration of the political economy of their time. And, as a form of brokerage, the videos merge all expectations into a conception of history seen from a moralistic standpoint. They are also an illusion for sale when in the Nigerian context they talk about progress.