Introduction -- Bars, music, gender and politics -- Exchange, music, patronage -- Potlatch migrants : travelling to Europe, arriving in Kinshasa -- Rights, piracy and producers -- The president as gatekeeper, patronage as a class relationship. Elders and cadets Rey reproduced now -- Mikiliste economies -- Love and money -- Charismatic fetishism -- Conclusion.
Summary:
Based on fieldwork in Kinshasa and Paris, "Breaking Rocks" examines patronage payments within Congolese popular music, where a love song dedication can cost 6,000 dollars and a simple name check can trade for 500 or 600 dollars. Tracing this system of prestige through networks of musicians and patrons - who include gangsters based in Europe, kleptocratic politicians in Congo, and lawless diamond dealers in northern Angola - this book offers insights into ideologies of power and value in central Africa's troubled post-colonial political economy, as well as a glimpse into the economic flows that make up the hidden side of the globalization.
This resource is supported by the Institute of Museum and Library Services under the provisions of the Library Services and Technology Act as administered by State Library of Iowa.