Screengrab from the My Africa Is: Alternative Nairobi trailer
Since 2012, the documentary web series My Africa Is has introduced us to some of the most brilliant creative minds in Lagos, Dakar and across the diaspora. Now, the show is being adapted into a full television series.
My Africa Is executive producer Nosarieme Garrick was named one of four winners of the National Black Programming Consortium’s NBPC 360 competition. As a result, Garrick was awarded $100,000 in funding to produce a pilot to develop the then web-only project into a full series for television.
The show’s first season is currently in development, and its pilot episode, which they filmed in Nairobi, will air on the WORLD Channel on Monday, February 15. The episode follows three innovators in Nairobi and their work to resolve Kenya’s high unemployment rate and explore alternative careers.
"We're not trying to box the African continent into the ‘Africa rising’, narrative, however we're not selling a narrative of gloom and doom,” Garrick tells Okayafrica of the show's approach to storytelling. “As we highlight innovators regardless of industry, we take a real look at the context and issues that spur the need for innovation. In regards to the style, we not only make an emphasis in capturing various facets of life in whatever city is explored, but we also capture the uniqueness of each city, in another effort of displaying the vast diversity of cultures and life existing on the continent.”
Watch the trailer for My Africa Is: Alternative Nairobi below.
'My Africa Is' will make its television broadcast debut on the WORLD Channel on Monday, February 15 at 8 p.m. ET/5 p.m. PT. The episode, “Alternative Nairobi,” is part of the season finale of AfroPoP: The Ultimate Cultural Exchange. Keep up with the series on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
