A paper presented to the department of Mass Communication, Bayero University Kano, for continuous assessment

1. BAYERO UNIVERSITY KANO
FACULTY OF COMMUNICATION
DEPARTMENT OF MASS COMMUNICATION
COURSE TITLE: POPULAR CULTURE
COURSE CODE: 8311
QUESTIONS
MAJOR CRITICISM OF POPULAR CULTURE BY RELIGIOUS AND COUNTER
CULTURAL GROUPS.
BY
FATIMA MURITALA
SPS/18/MMC/00014
COURSE FACILITATOR:
HASSAN ALHAJI Ya’U, PhD.
JUNE, 2019

2. KEY TERMS
Popular culture, popular, culture, religion, criticism.
ABSTRACT:
This paper discusses the criticism of popular culture by religious and cultural scholars. The
paper made a clear difference between popular culture and other culture (Hausa culture),
why popular culture is a threat to African culture, how popular culture has being used to
show segregation between cultures and religion, which wouldn’t have exist naturally and
how it has made changes in culture, from the mode of dressing, music and interaction in the
society. The paper also identifies from the religious view, how sin is being imitated from the
popular culture, how people are enlightened on things which might lead to the eradication of
their belief on religion. It also criticizes the media for the excessive display of popular
culture without control and consideration of dominant cultures and religions of other
societies, having the fear that continuous display of popular culture may lead to eradication
of cultures and beliefs.

3. Brief History of Popular Culture
In understanding the intricacy of the term "popular culture", it is necessary to trace the
background of each of its component words, "culture" and "popular". Arnold and MacDonald, in
the mid-eighteen hundreds, reacting to twin processes of industrialization and urbanization,
Mathew Arnold proposed that culture was a pursuit of human perfection and therefore a
civilizing agent. Arnold included both knowledge and moral goals in the pursuit of culture and
perfection. In Arnold's vision Culture that is, elite culture was held up as exemplary of that
which is best in any given time, and popular culture was denigrated as that which is produced
and consumed by those who do not know better. Contemporary examples would be opera as
opposed to rap. The Arnoldian formulation actually juxtaposed "culture" to "popular". Arnold
saw culture as the civilizing agent of the masses who tended to engage with things such as
popular literature. In Arnold's framework of analysis the concept of "popular culture" would
have been an oxymoron. This definition of popular culture is often supported by claims that
popular culture is mass-produced commercial culture, whereas high culture is the result of an
individual act of creation. The later, therefore, deserves only a moral and aesthetic response, the
former requires only a fleeting sociological inspection to unlock what little it has to offer.
INTRODUCTION:
The term "popular culture" was coined in the 19th century or earlier, traditionally, popular
culture was associated with poor education and the lower classes, as opposed to the "official
culture" and higher education of the upper classes. Popular culture is always defined, implicitly
or explicitly, in contrast to other conceptual categories: folk culture, mass culture, dominant
culture, working-class culture, etc. Popular culture is in effect an empty conceptual category one
that can be filled in a wide variety of often conflicting ways, depending on the context of use.
Popular culture (also called pop culture) is generally recognized by members of a society as a set
of the practices, beliefs and objects that are dominant or ubiquitous in a society at a given point
in time. Williams (1983) suggests current meanings: to support class distinctions, taste is a
deeply ideological category, it functions as a marker of ‘class’ (using the term in a double sense
to mean both a social economic category and the suggestion of a particular level of quality).

4. Popular culture also encompasses the activities and feelings produced as a result of interaction
with these dominant objects heavily influenced in modern times by mass media. Popular culture
has a way of influencing an individual's attitude towards certain ideas, the most common pop-
culture categories are music, movie, video games, sports, news, politics, fashion
clothes, technology, and slang etc. Popular culture encompasses the most immediate and
contemporary aspects of our lives, these aspects are often subject to rapid change, especially in a
highly technological world in which people are together by media.
Popular culture is constantly evolving and occurs uniquely in place and time and it represents a
mutual interdependent perspectives and values that influence society and its institutions in
various ways. For example, certain currents of pop culture may originate from, a subculture,
representing perspectives with which the mainstream popular culture has only limited familiarity.
Popular culture is sometimes viewed by many people as being monetized and dumped down in
order to find consensual acceptance from (or to attract attention amongst) the mainstream. As a
result, it comes under heavy criticism from various non-mainstream sources which
include religious groups and counter-cultural groups, since popular culture as become the
authentic culture of the people
POPULAR CULTURE AND RELIGION PERCEPTION
Bourdieu (1984), the consumption of culture is predisposed, consciously and deliberately or not,
to fulfill a social function of legitimating social differences. Definitions of popular culture by
individuals depend on status in politics, ideology and the cultural groups they belong to. The
elite classes define the terms differently than those from the working classes, (Bennett, 1980: 20–
1): A second way of defining popular culture is to suggest that it is the culture that is leftover
after we have decided what high culture is. Popular culture, in this definition, is a residual
category, there to accommodate texts and practices that fail to meet the required standards to
qualify as high culture. Therefore we inherit historically competing definitions of the concept of
culture. The attention to the popular is quite recent as is the academic study of popular culture,
though critiques of it date back to the nineteenth century. Technological and cultural forms
which enable the creation and circulation of popular culture globally and, makes the current
situation different from that of the past, when there was more of a possibility of local production,
creation and consumption with spatial and technological barriers to circulation and

5. transportation. Contemporary analyses, especially in post-industrial, information economy
countries and regions, locate popular culture at the center of the economy and of identity
construction. William Shakespeare is now seen as the epitome of high culture, yet as late as the
nineteenth century his work was very much a part of popular theatre. The same point can also be
made about Charles Dickens’s work, similarly, film noir can be seen to have crossed the border
supposedly separating popular and high culture, in other words, what started as popular cinema is
now the preserve of academics and film clubs.
Popular culture allows large heterogeneous masses of people to identify collectively, it serves an
inclusionary role in society as it unites the masses on ideals of acceptable forms of behavior,
along with forging a sense of identity which binds individuals to the greater society, consuming
pop culture items often enhances an individual’s prestige in their peer group. Further, popular
culture, unlike folk or high culture, provides individuals with a chance to change the prevailing
sentiments and norms of behavior. Popular culture appeals to people because it provides
opportunities for both individual happiness and communal bonding. Examples of popular culture
come from a wide array of genres, including popular music, print, cyber culture, sports,
entertainment, leisure, fads, advertising and television.
Sports and television are arguably two of the most widely consumed examples of popular
culture, and they also represent two examples of popular culture with great power. Sport has a
huge popularity and it is also a means of self-identification in the world. Some sporting events,
such as the World Cup and the Olympics, are consumed by a world community and sports are
pervasive in most societies and represent a major part of many people’s lives, showing allegiance
to a team, many people watch numerous hours of television every day. Individuals in a society
spends more time watching TV series, TV shows and programs, and majority get influence by
what they see on screens e.g The simpson
PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION
Ideally, a guide to the nature and history of philosophy of religion would begin with an analysis
or definition of religion. Unfortunately, there is no current consensus on a precise identification
of the necessary and sufficient conditions of what counts as a religion. But while consensus in

6. precise details is elusive, the following general depiction of what counts as a religion may be
helpful:
A religion involves a communal, transmittable body of teachings and prescribed practices about
an ultimate, sacred reality or state of being that calls for reverence or awe, a body which guides
its practitioners into what it describes as a saving, illuminating or emancipatory relationship to
this reality through a personally transformative life of prayer, ritualized meditation, and/or moral
practices like repentance and personal regeneration. (Dictionary of Philosophy of Religion,
Taliaferro & Marty 2010: 196–197; 2018, 240). Religions include Islam, Christianity Hinduism,
Buddhism, Daoism, Confucianism, Judaism, and others. The roots of what we call philosophy of
religion stretch back to the earliest forms of philosophy. From the outset, philosophers in Asia,
the Near and Middle East, North Africa, and Europe reflected on the gods or God, duties to the
divine, the origin and nature of the cosmos, an afterlife, the nature of happiness and obligations,
whether there are sacred duties to family or rulers, and so on. As with each of what would come
to be considered sub-fields of philosophy today (like philosophy of science, philosophy of art),
philosophers in the Ancient world addressed religiously significant themes (just as they took up
reflections on what we call science and art) in the course of their overall practice of philosophy.
While from time to time in the medieval era, some Jewish, Christian, and Islamic philosophers
sought to demarcate philosophy from theology or religion, the evident role of philosophy of
religion as a distinct field of philosophy does not seem apparent until the mid-twentieth century.
However there is some hint of the emergence of philosophy of religion in the seventeenth
century philosophical movement Cambridge Platonism. Ralph Cudworth (1617–1688), Henry
More (1614–1687).
Most social research on religion supports the view that the majority of the world’s population is
either part of a religion or influenced by religion. One other aspect of religious populations that
may motivate philosophy of religion is that philosophy is a tool that may be used when persons
compare different religious traditions. Philosophy of religion can play an important role in
helping persons understand and evaluate different religious traditions and their alternatives.

7. POPULAR CULTURE AND SIN: RELIGIOUS BELIEF
Popular culture is seen as a gateway to sin, most of it categories such as television, movies,
music exposed people to immorality, deviating their attention from the norms of religion to a
popular life style practiced by majority, without considering its impact on religion and society .
Some evangelical Christians reacted to the dominant strain of American popular culture, it has to
do partly with the sense of alarm that parent’s feelings in observing the popular cultural texts
become more and more shocking and permissive in terms of sexual content and violence.
“Quake,” one of many ultra-violent computer games, seems light years away from “Pong” (an
early video ping-pong game). So, Christian parents are understandably fearful, there is another
underlying reason that many evangelicals have withdrawn from popular culture. It is a
theological reason that works in concert with their fear, the evangelical doctrine of sin. Many
evangelicals seem to be guided by a semi-Pelagian heritage that views sin as discrete acts that
can be, in a sense, isolated from the person. When someone becomes a Christian, he or she turns
from his or her sinful acts. Even evangelicals who appropriate popular cultural forms, such as
contemporary Christian music, have practiced this cultural strategy of withdrawal. Such
appropriation often is a substitute for real engagement by using popular cultural genre and
cleansing them of dubious content and rendering them safe for evangelical listeners. Sin can be
managed by creation of a subculture, and the reasons for withdrawal are essentially the same,
which include avoiding contamination by the sinful dominant popular culture, sin can be
identified and avoided too easily. People can choose a life style, which will straighten their
personal holiness, sin is so powerful and inescapable that we desperately need God’s intervening
grace. Richard Lovelace, following this deformational strain of thought, sees sin not as isolated
acts of disobedience but as something more like a “psychological complex.” Sin is “an organic
network of compulsive attitudes, beliefs and behavior deeply rooted in our alienation from God”
(cf. Rom. 7:7-25, Gal. 5:17).
History does not give us a pattern of human struggle towards a just and fair political, social and
economic setup as described by Marx. Kant also did not tell when we will be able to say that we
are living in an enlightened age. Muslim world provided a socially, economically and politically
just system to the world for at least 50 years in the rule of caliphates too, Muslim world provided
most things Kant asked for in an enlightened age.

8. However, one clear difference has to be appreciated between Muslims and Islam. Islam was not
invented or created by Muhammad (P.B.U.H), it was the message of God and it remained pure.
However, Muslims as all other human beings have not been and are not perfect in their act and
systems, but the acts of Muslims cannot be said to be representative of what Islam is, as Islam
was not invented by Muslims.
Therefore, a distinction is to be made between the Muslims and Islam, Muslims may or may be
acting truly on Islam, due to living in a civilized and competitive world, where everyone doesn’t
want to feel inferior, everyone wants to be in the trend, some Muslims adapt the popular culture
and not the teachings of Islam and hence their action do not determine what Islam is. When we
study the ‘pure Islam’ we will find that there is not a single thing in Islam that is irrational or
unjust. Islam is the word of God and not how Muslims act and live their lives
CRITICISM OF THE MEDIA AS A TOOL USE IN PROMOTING POPULAR
CULTURE
The power of the media lies with the responsibility of choosing what to tell us, how to tell us and
what not to tell us. The interaction between the society and the media imposes an enormous
obligation on the media to function with awareness and responsibility. Omosis takes place
between the society and media, each influencing and reflecting the other in a steady interaction.
The media define what is of economic importance, political concern and cultural interest to us.
The media has become the greatest simple catalyst of our mind shift. The media have made an
alien life style apart from our daily life, they have not only glamourized such lifestyle but
validated it. All organs of mass communication are social institutions, they are all agencies of
social control. Our homes are invaded by satellites television and the danger of this invasion is
that we are beginning to focus more on what is shown to us using the media, majority only see
the point of this from the media, without digging dip to find out, if that was all about a situation,
event, happenings etc. although media is supposed to be a tool of enlightment, promotion of
culture, beliefs, etc, now media is use to enlighten people about event and happenings around the
world, given little attention to culture and religion, and when they report, they focus more on
conflicting stories, not given priority on portraying of culture, religion and other societal needs.

9. POPULAR CULTURE AND CULTURAL CRITICISM: PERCEPTION OF POPULAR
NORTHERN NIGERIA
Raymond Williams (1983) calls culture ‘one of the two or three most complicated words in the
English language’ ‘87’. Williams suggests three broad definitions first, culture can be used to
refer to ‘a general process of intellectual, spiritual and aesthetic development’. We could, for
example, speak about the cultural development of Western Europe. Culture might be to suggest a
particular way of life, whether of a people, a period or a group. And the other products of media
culture provide materials which we forge our very identities, our sense of selfhood, our notion of
what it means to be male or female; our sense of class, of ethnicity and race, of nationality, of
sexuality; and of "us" and" them."
Media spectacles classify power, showing who has power and who is power, who is allowed to
exercise force and violence, and who is not. They contribute to educating us how to behave and
what to think, feel, believe, fear, and desire and what not to. The media teaches us how to be men
and women. They show us how to dress, look and consume, how to react to members of different
social groups, how to be popular and successful and how to avoid failure, and how to conform to
values, practices, and institutions. Furthermore, the media doesn’t pay attention to ones feelings,
but rather decide for you, shapes the human reasoning because most of its content is popular
culture and one is to accept them the way they are. Objectivity of the media, has failed to work
in practice.
Consequently, the gaining of critical media literacy is an important resource for individuals and
citizens in learning how to cope with a seductive cultural environment. Learning how to read,
criticize, and resist socio-cultural manipulation can help empower oneself in relation to dominant
forms of media and culture and power over cultural environment. For some cultural critics
working within the mass culture paradigm, mass culture is not just an imposed and impoverished
culture, it is in a clear identifiable sense an imported American culture: ‘If popular culture in its
modern form was invented in any place, it was, in the great cities of the United States, and above
all in New York’( Maltby, 1989: 11). The claim that popular culture is American culture has a
long history within the theoretical mapping of popular culture. It operates under the term

10. ‘Americanization’ approach. Furthermore, one can choose what to believe and engage in, but
since popular culture is consume at a large range, individuals have no choice than to engage in it,
so as not to feel inferior in the society.
In contemporary times, when everybody living in a world ,is not only supposed to have arrived,
but has taken seat, in the global village, talking about concept such as Northern Nigeria, it is one
of the many paradoxes of the realities of globalization that has some local identities get sub-
merged, others re-emerge to prominence. As Jega (2003) rightly notes: what many used to
dismiss a primordial sentiments are fast becoming significant elements of political organizations
in the contemporary world’. Thinking of the great potentials of the multitude of audiences,
advertising revenues and a myriad of cultural varieties that lay the dormant and unexplored in the
North, given the vast communication , media and cultural potentials of the Northern region.
Tremendous progress has been made in the areas of communication networks, mobile
communication technologies, press band broadcast system, home videos etc. Yet the North still
remains what Hajiya Bilkisu Yusuf call “media giant in slumber” (Yusuf 2002).
The Northern Nigeria is no stranger to formal written communication and some form of
journalism, for as Adamu (2004) notes; since its contact with the Islamic World, dating back to
1320, and even earlier, the North had been exposed to literary polemics and activities of the
Muslim World at large. Thus while most Nigerian communities glorified their literary
antecedents through extensive collection of oral traditions and folklores. Muslim Hausa in
addiction to extensive collection of similar oral traditions had the instrument to write down their
literature through the medium of the Arabic language earlier than all the other groups.
Some form of journalism was being practiced in the region as exemplified by the monthly
production of the kano chronicles ( palmer 1967). That is why Golding referred to it as the first
attempt to non-commercial newspaper publishing in what later came to be known as Nigeria
(Ahmad: 2006).
The advent of colonialism brought with it new techniques of communication, media and culture
to the North. Thus, with the first set of western educated persons in the North who learnt the
whites man language, its writings method and its Hausa version, known as Ajamin Boko -Hausa
–Roman characters - the need was felt by the colonialist to set up indigenous language papers ,

11. that would help to achieve two main objectives . There were as Ahmed (1989) notes;
‘proselytization, as typified in the Townsend’s Iwe Irohin and the colonizers’ ‘political motives’
as typified in the Gaskiya Ta Fi Kwabo. Hence, both English and other indigenous newspaper,
available record shows that about 120 titles were founded since early 1930s (Gidan-Daino 2004).
Most of these are now defunct with only a few appearing regularly while others appear
epileptically (Ahmad 2006).
Home video, popularly known as Hausa Film, itself is another product of yet another new
culture known as ‘Littattafan Soyayya’ or Hausa novel (Adamu 2004). The Hausa novel together
with some cross-cultural influences of the Hollywood and Bollywood has mid-wife yet another
‘child’ the Kannywood (Adamu 2004). It has also literally transformed the concept of
entertainment and above all, in Hausa society. For example, using modern musical instruments
such as pianos and keyboards, some of which are computerized, this Hausa film music is now the
vogue among the youth. Radio and television and other advertisers are now finding such music
very appealing as one hardly hears Hausa radio commercials these days without such music and
lyrics. And such music is now becoming very popular in some religious activities, even some of
those groups that hitherto detested music in their religious activities, such as Tijjaniyya Tariq,
now seem to be gradually tolerating, if not accepting it.
The same musical form is being used for political communication and democratization. An
example here is the song by Haruna Ningi in which he opposed the aborted tenure elongation
attempts. Ningi’s song became so popular in the North that in almost all public places in taxis
and buses etc., one hears those records being played. It must have made such profound impact in
mobilizing the talakawa, (the masses) in their attitude against president Obasanjo’s alleged
attempt to stay in office 2007. In addition to this, technology causes changes in how people
think, in how society is structured, and in the forms of culture, that are created.
An interesting aspect here is how a local culture can sometimes effectively customize an
otherwise alien media programme here we talk of how the Hausa culture has been to effectively
customize the Radio Request Programme, popularly known as Zabi Sonki. This is probably the
most popular and participatory radio programme in the North. Not only has it nearly fit into the
Hausa concept of greeting friends and other loved ones, it has also given birth to many social

12. club nationwide It is also now used as a form of political communication and a commercial
construct. (karaye 1997)
Radio has also made many a northerner newsholics. Whether at home, market place, at farm or
rearing cattle/animals. Ordinary people are seen carrying along their transistor radio sets. They
almost religiously tune to news and other programmes in both local and foreign stations. They
might have partly informed the Federal Government’s decision about two years ago, to ban
direct transmission of news from foreign radio or television by local stations, contestable though,
the decision was: now with each state of the federating units of the nation having at least two
media organs to put across its view in the intensely contested power resources (Ahmad 1985)
and other forms of authoritative allocation of values, how does the North stand? But even more
importantly, given the few number of print media in the region, their fatality rate, the quality of
their staff and equipment, the level of funding and professional freedom, can the North really
cope with the daunting challenges posed by new realities brought about by the new information
and communication technologies and globalization? What are the issues? What are the
problems?
Further to the argument above, due to the exposure of individuals to popular categories such as
Television, music, movies etc. popular ideas which includes global influences, National flows:
The influence of Hindi film music on Hausa traditional music and video film, exist already.
All those change the Hausa film and its by-products brought to the society, as identified suggest
that they have not been generally acceptable to all social classes. Indeed, there are those who
thought and still think that the phenomenon of Hausa film is a dangerous threat to Hausa culture
CRITICISM OF A CATEGORY OF POPULR CULTURE: HINDI FILM MUSIC
INFLUENCE ON HAUSA TRADITIONAL MUSIC AND VIDEO FILM
An essential tension exists between Muslim Hausa public culture and popular culture, public
culture reflects the quintessential Hausa social makeup with its agreed boundaries defined by
cultural specificity such as dress code, language and rules of social discourse. Popular culture, on

13. the other hand, is seen as the realm of the un-sophisticated working class. Music, in all its form,
belongs to the class.
Hausa society, being structured occupational hierarchical often considers music a low art form.
Musical appreciation can however be both low and high. For instance, the existence of complete
orchestras in places of Hausa emirs from Zaria to Damagaram indicates the acceptance of music
as an entertainment genre within the conventional establishment. However, it is not acceptable
for the ruling class to engage in the same music- thus prince cannot be a musician.
But perhaps the biggest ripple in Hausa concept of highbrow musical genre was the media
intrusion on Hindi film soundtracks from popular Hindi films. The Soundtrack, introduced via
radio and cinema houses from 1960 when Nigeria became independent from Britain, leapt from
the screen to the street, first via children’s playground songs patterned on the most popular Hindi
film music track. This was almost immediately taken up by ‘lowbrow’ bar and club circuit
musicians such as Abdu Yaron Goge who picked up Raati Suhani from the film, Rani Rupmati
(1957) , and Ali Makaho with his rendition of Kahbie Khabie from Khabie (1975), and
popularized not just the soundtracks, but also the adaptive process they introduced.
However the most preserve influence the Hindi film soundtrack on Hausa musical genre was the
emergence of Hausa home video from 1990. These are video dramas shot with a VHS camera
(although they are now increasingly using digital camcorders) to record a 3 hour drama (although
often split into two parts). It is an invariable article of faith of the Hausa video dramatists to
include a series of songs and dance routines in their video dramas. As much 80% of the Hausa
home videos are directly ripped-off Hindi films in one form or another, including the music
soundtrack, which is Hausanized.
The Hausa music as the transformation of a traditional genre of popular culture specifically
focuses attention on the catalytic influence of Hindi film music on the transformation of a
traditional genre of music in an African society. It pays homage to the structural characteristics
of Hausa traditional music in order to provide a template for understanding how radically
different the Hindi film soundtrack is from Hausa entertainment mindset.
Blakely (2001) has argued that due to changes in technology and media infrastructure which
have implication for entertainment content, the academic community, which, hitherto had tended

14. to shut out studies of popular culture , has started taken a keen interest in the relationship
between the changes in social discourse and media entertainment technologies.
Additionally as Curran (2000) argues in his introduction to De-Westernizing Media Studies. Two
contrasting attitude towards globalization can be found. The first is expressed by cultural theorist
who welcomes globalization as the means for the reinforcement of international dialogue. It
enables minorities to gain attention beyond national borders. An opposing point of view stresses
the threat that globalization poses to democracies and international policies aiming at limiting the
influence of worldwide capitalism. Both this views at least concur a certain degree of witness in
recipient system as a result of the transnational flow of influences. What needs to be determined
is the extent to which the recipient system.
Indeed media and cultural studies theories of globalization tended to focus attention on the role
of mass media in the society (Beck and Rainer 2003, Appadurai 1996), how they are
communicated and perceived in transnational context. Another focus is on how people
appropriate media, and which identities they create with the new transformed media (see
particularly Sreberry-Mohammadi 1996, Schiller 1976, and Boyd- Barrett 1977).
Thus as Patterson (1994) argues, industrialization and modernization both entailed the speed of
common sets of behaviors and attitudes within the contexts of economic change. However, the
globalization of culture also takes place independent of whatever economic changes are
occurring in a particular region or society. Traditionally, the transmission of culture across
societies was facilitated by two main media: migration and literacy. People learned about other
culture either through travelling themselves or from traveler, or by reading about other cultures
and adopting or adapting what they learned. These traditional media could, under certain
circumstances, be effective means for the transmission of cultures across the globe.
Additional source of learning is media bombardment, which in the case of northern Nigeria,
created spaces for continuous broadcast of foreign media cultures, especially from India in the
form of Hindi films. This bombardment often comes in the way of cross-border free flow of
packaged media products that enable society to absorb (but not export) media re-enactment of
popular cultural forms of other societies. In this way, Hindi film music culture found its way into
Hausa popular musical culture and eventually supplanted it.

15. Following the argument above, the continuous exposure of the Hindi popular culture, led to the
imitation of the popular culture in Hausa films, since the early 80s to date. This is likely not to
change, since there is improvement on the Hindi popular films, the Hausa movies are likely to
change, so as to improve too.
Most Hausa women prefer watching Hindi movies to the Hausa movies, DSTV, satellites and so
on are found in most Hausa homes, whereby the favorite channel is Zee World and she watches
this movies with her children and if proper care is not taken, some years later, these children
would not want anything to do with the Hausa movies.
THE HAUSA SYSTEM OF CLASS DIVISION AND POPULAR CULTURE
The Hausa are predominantly Muslim group in northern Nigeria and formed the largest ethnic
group in the country. The Hausa language itself is widely spread from northern Nigeria to Niger
Republic and all the way to other parts of sub-Saharan Africa, stretching to Ghana, Cote d’Ivoire,
Gambia and Senegal. Due to their contact with Islam as early as 12th century, the Hausa have
acquired a considerable Arabic vocabulary in their language such that at least 1/5 of Hausa
words, from 1750-1960, are directly Arabic in origin. Despite this linguistic affinity, however
Arab popular culture – in the form of music, whether classical or contemporary, theater and
literature has never had wide appeal among the Muslim Hausa. Consequently, Arab sources were
not seen as a basis for inspirational adaptation for Hausa popular culture.
According to smith (1959), the Hausa system of social status has, three or four classes,
sometimes the higher officials and chiefs are regarded as constituting upper class by themselves,
and sometimes they are grouped with the Mallams and wealthier merchants into a larger upper
class. The lowest class generally distinguished includes the musicians, butchers, house-servant
and menial clients, potters, and the poorer farmers who mostly live in rural hamlets. The great
majority of the farmers, traders and other craftsmen would, therefore, belong to the Hausa
middle class.
This categorization, as imperfect as Smith himself identified it to be, nevertheless serves as a
rough guide to the position of a musician in Hausa society. The main reason for including

16. musicians in the lower level status is the client-focused nature of Hausa music. With its main
pre-occupation of appeasing specific clients, it thus becomes a non-art form –art for art’s sake,
but tailored towards a specific paying-client.
Further to the understanding of Smith argument, the Hausa song are practically for targeted
individuals, events, happenings and call for attention, about growth, changes and development in
its society. Initially the Hausa music was a Cultural tool of information, background learning,
customs and traditions to its citizen. Due to industrialization and technological changes, most of
the popular Hausa musicians don’t make use of their cultural instrument no more (kalangu) they
use the popular instrument for various beats in songs, films etc., they now use music for
competition, display of wealth, fashion, trending lifestyles instead of its primary aim, which was
to send message to the people. If the system is not revisited on time, might lead to the absence of
the Hausa cultural mode of music.
CATEGORIZATION OF HAUSA MUSIC
Mainstream popular traditional Hausa music is divided into two distinct categories, the
instrumental accompaniment, and the vocals. The division might seem trite; but it should be
pointed out that vocals form the main component of the music. It is very common for Hausa
musical groups to pay on one type of instrument, predominantly a percussion instrument such as
the kalangu of ‘Africa’ drum maintaining more or less the same beat throughout the song the
skills of the lead ‘musician’ are essentially in the philosophy and poetry of his songs.
About three distinct structures typify the Hausa music, even if it has no specific instruments, but
relying on the voice, it is called music, a single type of instrument, mainly a drum is used in a
variety of combinations, with the lyricist proving the focal point of the music, the words, with
which some musicians such as Muhammad Dahiru Daura, a blind beggar minstrel poet, can be in
the form of opera. Third is the gender dimension of Hausa music which sees a strict separation of
the sexes, in effect a reflection of the Hausa traditional society segregates the sexes. The Hausa
traditional music, like most musical forms around the world, is barely on a single gender voice,
either male or female, but rarely a combination of the two in the same composition.
Following the above, most cultural musicians don’t appear naked on screens or uses sensual
words, abusive words, in their songs. While in the monetized (popular culture) the listed above

17. are found in some of their songs. Which if a child is exposed to, at an early age, it can give the
child a different view of what music is all about.
CRITICISM OF POPULAR CULURE
Most religious scholars perceive popular culture as a gateway to sin. For non-Christian popular
culture has been seen either as dangerous to the children, sinful, trivial or deleterious to refined
aesthetics standard (or sometimes, all of these at once).
Popular culture (music, books, magazine, comics,) as potential contributors both to individual
crime and declining morality and also to rootlessness, impersonality and lack of attachment to
community (human socialize with each other using different social networks, abandoning
interpersonal communication, which is culture).
A form of idealism or mentalism concerning media also lies behind the view, that changes in
media forms and technology can change our way of gaining experience in essential ways and
even our relations with others (as in the theories of Mc Luhan 1962, 1964): since the owners of
popular culture/ ruling elites /producers of popular culture are aware of this weakness in the
masses, this gave the power in constant monetization of popular culture
CONCLUSION
Popular culture is marked by suspicion and a dismissive attitude, more reaction than reflection.
Christians believe that withdrawing from certain cultural texts and replacing them with others
will not render the audience less sinful.
Christians sees sin in popular culture as something that can be controlled, if only we are careful
enough. Christians believes sin can be identified and avoided too easily, that one can choose a
life style, which will straighten personal holiness.
Sin might be inborn, that one needs Gods intervention to escape sin, parents can guide their
children in a sinful environment, to the stage whereby the children can differentiate between
rights from wrong on their own.

18. African media practitioners must demonstrate the love of Africa in their communication, human
advancement depends on the human beings capacity to practice love, which has extremely
important practical implications. We are in a society where love is not a luxury but a condition
for the survival of a very large number of human beings. African media practitioners must work
together to foster the development of the common societal good.
This is the direction that must be taken in other reposition Africa, thereby restoring hope and
building a world that is more welcoming to the future generations. The media must open up a
new sphere of responsibilities to people’s consciousness.
The Africa media should avoid excessive display and disturbance of pop culture in the
normal human communication channels, they are not to jolt people into awareness and
consciousness of events of popular culture. All the organs of the mass media must be used
to achieve these goals.

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