Journal of African Media Studies - Online First

While most researchers in the field of China–Africa media studies concentrate on the one-dimensional flow from China to Africa, this research aims to unfold the historical dynamics of how African Indigenous films were promoted in China in the 1950s and 1960s when an eliciting wave of independence movements bound the Third World countries. This research indicates that the first media coverage of African cinema in China appeared in the 1950s in the national newspaper People’s Daily and several movie magazines such as Popular Movies, World Cinema (世界电影; Shijie Dianying), Film Art and World Cinema (电影艺术译丛; Dianying Yishu Yicong). Based on these precious and understudied archives, this research examines the political agenda and ideological motivation of Chinese media’s publicity of African cinema. The media coverage of African movies laid the groundwork for the subsequent Film Weeks and the officials’ visits between China and Africa. The researchers argue that such promotion was a strategy to deconstruct the then-prevailing western cultural hegemony and to clarify the heterogenized development of Chinese cinema compared to the western world. The cultural and media interaction between China and Africa back then was part of the internationalist envision of cultural decolonization of the developing countries. This study’s retrospective review and analyses are expected to cast light on the historical foundation of Sino-Africa relations that underpin the South–South cooperation today.