Minor infrastructures: genre and petroleum politics in the music of Grace Chang and Fela Kuti

Abstract

This article explores the intersections of global energy infrastructures and musical genre formation, focusing on the careers of Grace Chang and Fela Kuti. The transition from coal to petroleum reshaped political and social landscapes globally. This transition influenced various industries, including music and film, by changing the material conditions that underpinned cultural production. This article argues that the concept of genre itself functions as an infrastructure, a symbolic object that encapsulates social, economic, and political conditions. Genres like jazz, mambo, and Afro-Beat, though rooted in the Black Atlantic’s history of resource extraction and slavery, evolved through local adaptations and responses to global changes. The cases of Chang and Kuti highlight the importance of examining these “minor infrastructures” to understand the broader processes of musical globalization. By focusing on the meso-level – between global macro-processes and local micro-histories – the article seeks to provide a nuanced understanding of how genres develop and transform. It critiques monolithic narratives of global music history, emphasizing the complex entanglements of material conditions and cultural practices. This article calls for an approach that considers the multifaceted and dynamic nature of genre formation, shaped by both global energy politics and local cultural contexts.

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