Constructing the African City Through Hip-hop in “Nai Ni Ya Who?” by Muthoni the Drummer Queen

Departing from the popular approach of reading hip-hop from a sociological and contextual perspective, this article considers it as a consciously created aesthetic text. It argues that hip-hop strategically constructs an effect of reality based on its own figurations that, although it may build on social reality, is not simply a mirror of it. My aim is to show through a close reading of one hip-hop song from Kenya how hip-hop creates a reality within its own semiotic space. To this end, I focus on how the urban African space is developed textually through different elements such as the rapper’s persona, language, and topoi within the text. By looking at how the artiste uses recurring leitmotifs, figures, and hip-hop discursive strategies, I show how the narrative of the city within the text is not simply a reflection of a context but rather an artistic construct.