Upon first arriving in East Africa I was surprised by the strong influence of Jamaican music on Ugandan culture. It seemed that about 3/4 of the songs being played on the radio could fit into the dancehall genre. It was evident that the embracing of North American, Western European and Jamaican culture has led to a loss of Uganda’s traditions in speech, music, dress, and visual art. Professor John Ssempeke voiced similar concerns with the loss of Ugandan culture. In conversation with him at Uganda’s National Museum the professor of traditional African music expressed “slowly our culture is being lost to Westernization. I believe that one day in the near future our precious culture will become totally lost, and people will long to have it back.”
While I tend to dislike the majority of Ugandan dancehall music, I thought this video offered an interesting perspective on this popular sub-culture of urban Uganda. I would love to open this topic up for dialogue and hear what other opinions are represented…feel free to add your comment to this post.
