Hiplife in the Hood: Roots and Mobility of West African Contemporary Popular Music.

The article examines the roots, translocal mobility, and evolving trends of West African hiplife music, a genre that fuses Ghanaian and Nigerian highlife with American hip hop influences. Originating in Ghana in the 1990s, hiplife developed as artists incorporated indigenous languages and local musical elements into hip hop, while Nigerian musicians simultaneously engaged in similar indigenization processes, creating a parallel "Nigerian hiplife." The study highlights longstanding cross-border collaborations among artists from Ghana, Nigeria, and Sierra Leone, facilitated by shared colonial histories, English language use, and digital media, which sustain hiplife's cultural exchange and popularity. Contemporary hiplife continues to evolve through progressive incorporation of diverse styles and languages, reflecting generational shifts and globalization's impact on West African popular music.