TY - JOUR AU - Michael, Matthew PY - 2021/07/13 Y2 - 2024/03/28 TI - Aliens, Monsters, and Beasts in the Cultural Mapping of Nollywood Cinematography JF - Humanities Bulletin JA - HB VL - 4 IS - 1 SE - Articles DO - UR - http://journals.lapub.co.uk/index.php/HB/article/view/1985 SP - 168-201 AB - <p>The emerging field of monster studies has witnessed significant contributions in the<br>functions of monsters in the representations of human stories. In spite of the different creative<br>discourses in this new field, the cultural aesthetics and the strategic polemics of monsters in African<br>stories have largely remained unengaged. Drawing from recent development in monster theories<br>and the cinematic presence of monsters in Nollywood movies, the paper interrogates the cultural<br>aesthetics, ethno-polemics, and the moral constructs of monsters in Nollywood movies.<br>Specifically, monsters in Nollywood movies are not only the cultural equivalents of the aliens and<br>extraterrestrial creatures of Hollywood movies, but they occupied strategic importance in the<br>mapping of deviant characters, ethics, theodicy and the constructs of the “ethnic other.” Through<br>explorative method, the paper engages common cinematic motifs, social characterizations, and<br>cultural polemics of monsters in Nollywood cinematography, thus providing new insights to the<br>new field of monster studies.</p> ER -