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TV's Forgotten Continent: Why Television Refuses To Depict The Real Africa

TV's Forgotten Continent: Why Television Refuses To Depict The Real Africa
By 

Editorial Fellow, HuffPost

Former Liberian President Charles Taylor appears on January 22, 2013 before Sierra Leone's UN-backed special court in Leidschendam, The Netherlands. The former Liberian warlord began his appeal at the Special Court for Sierre Leone's against his 50-year prison sentence for fuelling the west African nation's savage civil war. Appeals judges are to hear arguments from prosecutors demanding a heavier sentence and from the former strongman's lawyers calling for his 50-year sentence to be quashed or reduced. Judges said he aided and abetted rebel forces fighting against Freetown during Sierra Leone's 10-year civil war, known for its mutilations, drugged child soldiers and sex slaves.AFP PHOTO / POOL / PETER DEJONG - netherlands out - (Photo credit should read PETER DEJONG/AFP/Getty Images)
Former Liberian President Charles Taylor appears on January 22, 2013 before Sierra Leone's UN-backed special court in Leidschendam, The Netherlands. The former Liberian warlord began his appeal at the Special Court for Sierre Leone's against his 50-year prison sentence for fuelling the west African nation's savage civil war. Appeals judges are to hear arguments from prosecutors demanding a heavier sentence and from the former strongman's lawyers calling for his 50-year sentence to be quashed or reduced. Judges said he aided and abetted rebel forces fighting against Freetown during Sierra Leone's 10-year civil war, known for its mutilations, drugged child soldiers and sex slaves.AFP PHOTO / POOL / PETER DEJONG - netherlands out - (Photo credit should read PETER DEJONG/AFP/Getty Images)

If you only learned about the continent of Africa through television, you would be forgiven for thinking it was a dangerous, uncharted and possibly fictional land — along the lines of J.R.R. Tolkien’s Mordor or DC’s Gotham City. It’s not just how little it’s depicted — though that is precious little — but more how it’s talked about. Africa is where white American characters go to find themselves, as in “ER” and “The Newsroom”; it’s where outbreaks of epidemics come from, as depicted on the nightly news; it’s where Americans and Brits go to dismantle terror networks, as happens in “Strike Back” and “24.” And that’s if it’s mentioned at all; Africa is otherwise a vast continent with extraordinarily little said about it except what can fit in hushed, warning tones. As Mike Vago pointed out to me on Twitter, “Even ‘The Amazing Race’ doesn’t spend much time there.”

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