ABSTRACT
This chapter analyzes a Kenyan television called Nairobi Diaries. It argues that local media allow for an examination of the intricate ways in which local cultural productions both shape and are shaped by global interfaces and interactions. It shows how a local television production, in the age of globalization, engages and re-articulates everyday narratives of femininity in Kenya, in ways that are located and specific to this African nation. The chapter argues that, linguistically and referentially, Nairobi Diaries signals local cultural practices around femininity and the aspirational desires of those who participate in specific urban cultures. The analysis also maps out how local practices of class and desire are encompassed within narratives of femininity within an African city and, in the case of this chapter, a space to re-examine the idea of agency within the context of heteronormative media practices.
