AfricaIs aCountry

Found Objects No.20

Africa Is a Country Podcast
African Five-a-Side Podcast

Found Objects No.20

By
Sean Jacobs

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A8Q10g_Mov4&w=600&h=349]

From an episode of American comedian Drew Carey’s sketch comedy show, “Whose Line is it Anyway.” In the video from the show, Carey introduces a regular feature, “African Chant” (the sketch involves the actors making up “an African chant” based on the name of an audience member. Some of you may recognize Wayne Brady in the clip.)

Carey inadvertently blurts out that Africa “is a big country.”

The edited clip (above) highlights how throughout the rest of the episode cast member Greg basically reminds Carey of his gaffe. Carey gets him back by the show’s end.

Here are two more instances of the “African chant” from the show: examples one and two.

Further Reading

Slow death by food

Illegal gold mining is poisoning Ghana’s soil and rivers, seeping into its crops and seafood, and turning the national food system into a long-term public health crisis.

A sick health system

The suspension of three doctors following the death of Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s son has renewed scrutiny of a health-care system plagued by impunity, underfunding, and a mass exodus of medical professionals.

Afrobeats after Fela

Wizkid’s dispute with Seun Kuti and the release of his latest EP with Asake highlight the widening gap between Afrobeats’ commercial triumph and Fela Kuti’s political inheritance

Progress is exhausting

Pedro Pinho’s latest film follows a Portuguese engineer in Guinea-Bissau, exposing how empire survives through bureaucracy, intimacy, and the language of “development.”

The rubble of empire

Built by Italian Fascists in 1928, Mogadishu Cathedral was meant to symbolize “peaceful conquest.” Today its ruins force Somalis to confront the uneasy afterlife of colonial power and religious authority.

Atayese

Honored in Yorubaland as “one who repairs the world,” Jesse Jackson’s life bridged civil rights, pan-Africanism, empire, and contradiction—leaving behind a legacy as expansive as it was imperfect.

Bread or Messi?

Angola’s golden jubilee culminated in a multimillion-dollar match against Argentina. The price tag—and the secrecy around it—divided a nation already grappling with inequality.