Georgia State University ScholarWorks @ Georgia State University Communication Dissertations Department of Communication Spring 5-7-2011 Webs of Resistance: The Citizen Online Journalism of the Nigerian Digital Diaspora Farooq A. Kperogi Georgia State University Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarworks.gsu.edu/communication_diss Part of the Communication Commons Recommended Citation Kperogi, Farooq A., "Webs of Resistance: The Citizen Online Journalism of the Nigerian Digital Diaspora." Dissertation, Georgia State University, 2011. https://scholarworks.gsu.edu/communication_diss/27 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the Department of Communication at ScholarWorks @ Georgia State University. It has been accepted for inclusion in Communication Dissertations by an authorized administrator of ScholarWorks @ Georgia State University. For more information, please contact [email protected]. WEBS OF RESISTANCE: THE CITIZEN ONLINE JOURNALISM OF THE NIGERIAN DIGITAL DIASPORA by FAROOQ ADAMU KPEROGI Under the Direction of Dr. Michael L. Bruner ABSTRACT The enhanced discursive opportunity structures that the Internet enables has inspired a momentous revolution in the Nigerian media landscape. This dissertation chronicles the emergence and flowering of the citizen and alternative online journalism of the Nigerian diasporic public sphere located primarily in the United States. Using case-study research, it profiles the major diasporan online citizen media outlets and highlights instances where these geographically distant citizen media sites shaped and influenced both the national politics and policies of the homeland and the media practices of the domestic media formation. The study makes the case that while it is customary in the scholarship on sovereignty, state-civil society relations, and diaspora studies to emphasize domination and one- dimensionality in cultural flows, the participation of members of the Nigerian digital diaspora in the politics and discourses of their homeland, from their exilic locations in the West through the instrumentality of online citizen media, illustrates that citizens, especially in the age of the Internet, are not mere powerless subjects and receivers of informational flows from the institutions of the state and corporate mass media but can be active consumers and producers of informational resources and even purveyors of political power in ways that amply exemplify trans-local reciprocality. It also argues that the Nigerian diaspora media might very well be a prototype of an evolving, Internet-enabled, trans-local, and mutual informational and cultural exchange between the educated deterritorialized ethnoscapes of peripheral nations whose exile in the West endues them with symbolic and cultural capital and the private institutions and governments of their homelands. The study recommends a comparative study of the online citizen journalism of Third World virtual diasporas in the West. INDEX WORDS: Alternative journalism, Alternative media, Citizen media, Deliberative democracy, Diasporic media, Guerilla journalism, Nigeria, Nigerian journalism, Online journalism, Public sphere WEBS OF RESISTANCE: THE CITIZEN ONLINE JOURNALISM OF THE NIGERIAN DIGITAL DIASPORA by FAROOQ ADAMU KPEROGI A Dissertation Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the College of Arts and Sciences Georgia State University 2011 Copyright by Farooq Adamu Kperogi 2011 WEBS OF RESISTANCE: THE CITIZEN ONLINE JOURNALISM OF THE NIGERIAN DIGITAL DIASPORA by FAROOQ ADAMU KPEROGI Committee Chair: Michael L. Bruner Committee: Leonard Teel Ted Friedman Svetlana Kulivova Debra Vidali Electronic Version Approved: Office of Graduate Studies College of Arts and Sciences Georgia State University May 2011 iv DEDICATION Dedicated to the memory of Zainab, my late wife who died in a car crash in Nigeria on June 4, 2010. May her soul rest in peace. v ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I am indebted to more people than I have space to acknowledge here. The first, of course, is my late wife, Zainab, who gave her all to make this dream materialize. She was my most important moral prop and motive force throughout my studies. She believed in me and supported me all the way. While I was away studying first at the University of Louisiana and later here at Georgia State, she took care of our children with uncommon dedication. She never wavered in her commitment and love for me in spite of the distance that stood between us and my extended absence from home. She had eagerly looked forward to this moment. Unfortunately, she hasn’t lived to witness the result of her perseverance. Without her, it would have been impossible for me to achieve this feat. In a way, this is a bitter-sweet crowning accomplishment. I also wish to thank my precious and lovely children—Sinani, Maryam, and Adam—who have had to put up with my absence for several years. I hope they will understand why daddy was away when they grow older. My first daughter, Sinani, who came to live with me in Atlanta during the final phase of my dissertation writing, gave me courage and peace of mind in the face of the emotional dislocation that my wife’s sudden death has caused me—and her. She and her siblings also share in the credit for this achievement. My parents deserve commendation for always being there for me from the beginning and for bringing me up to cherish the virtues of hard work and critical inquiry. I thank them from the bottom of my heart for all their support and unquestioning love. My dad had always said that his greatest desire was for me to get the Ph.D. I am glad that I have not disappointed him. Were it not for the sincere friendship and emotional support I got from many of my Nigerian compatriots in the United States, my experience here would have been a lot less exciting than it turned out. They kept me in good cheer even in moments of despair. I am talking vi of Moses Ochonu of Vanderbilt University and Abubakar Alhassan, formerly of the University of Florida, who has returned to Bayero University Kano, our alma mater, after his doctoral studies. I particularly want to thank Moses for his unfailing friendship, companionship, and intellectually stimulating telephone conversations throughout the course of my studies. Of course, many of colleagues here at Georgia State University made my studies very exciting. I particularly want to thank James Schiffman, Nneka Logan, Tami Morris, Theresa Morales, Rick Herder, Anna Hajiyev, Matt Duffy, Monica Waugh-Benton, and Melany Chambers. I will continue to cherish their friendship and support. I must not fail to acknowledge John Brown and his wife, Delilah, who have adopted me and my daughter as members of their own family; who simultaneously became my parents, siblings, and friends. I thank them immensely for making their home my second home in Atlanta. Lastly, I want to express my deep gratitude to my dissertation adviser, Dr. Michael Bruner, who has become the most important intellectual mentor in my academic career. I have taken more classes with him than I have with any professor in my post-secondary academic career and have benefitted in more ways than I can acknowledge from his meticulousness and contagious passion for critical scholarship. I also want to thank my committee members—Dr. Leonard Teel, Dr. Ted Friedman, Dr. Svetlana Kulikova, and Dr. Debra Vidali of Emory University—for their invaluable contributions and suggestions toward making this dissertation what it turned out. I particularly thank Dr. Teel for availing me with his personal library in the course of this research. vii TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS…………………………………………………………….v 1. CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION……………....................................................1 1.1 Significance of the Study……………………………………………………….6 1.2 Research Questions……………………………………………………………16 1.3 Methodology…………………………………………………………………...17 1.4 The Design of the Study……………………………………………………….22 1.5 Outline of Chapters……………………………………………………………28 2. CHAPTER TWO: CITIZEN AND ALTERNATIVE JOURNALISM: WHAT IS THE DIFFERENCE?................................................................................................31 2.1 Problematizing the Binary Opposition of Alternative and Mainstream Media…………………………………………………………………………...43 2.2 Alternative Media in the Age of the Internet………………………………...47 2.3 Citizen Journalism and Resistance to Traditional Journalism……………..50 2.4 Understanding the Public Sphere…………………………………………….60 2.5 Criticism of Habermas’ Public Sphere………………………………………66 3. CHAPTER THREE: THE NIGERIAN PRESS: FROM COLONIAL EVANGELISM TO GUERILLA JOURNALISM………………………………70 3.1 A Brief Political Background of Nigeria…………………………………….72 3.2 The Nigerian Press and the Colonial Public Sphere of Debate…………….76 3.3 Contested Provenance: The Rise of the Press in Northern Nigeria………...79 3.4 Iwe Irohin and the First Southern Nigerian Public Sphere…………………83 viii 3.5 The Emergence of the Nationalist Press……………………………………...89 3.6 The Post-Independence Press: From Nationalism to Regionalism…………94 3.7 The Birth of the Independent Press…………………………………………100 3.8 The Rise of Guerilla Journalism…………………………………………….106 3.9 The Nigerian Diaspora in America………………………………………….112 4. CHAPTER FOUR: THE BEGINNINGS OF ONLINE JOURNALISM IN NIGERIA…………………………………………………………………………..120 4.1 Profiles of the Nigerian Diaspora Online Media…………………………...128 4.2 Elendu Reports……………………………………………………………….129 4.3 SaharaReporters……………………………………………………………..136 4.4 The Times of Nigeria…………………………………………………………146