Kesiena's mind

  When I first looked at Peter Obi’s campaign poster, I was struck by how bold and clean it looked. At first glance, it may seem simple, but after studying it closely, I realized that it is carefully designed to communicate more than just a name. Political posters are never just images. Every detail, from the color scheme to the fonts, image placement, and symbols, carries meaning. These choices are made to shape how we see the candidate, how we feel about the message, and whether we are persuaded to support the vision being offered. By looking at the visual elements in Peter Obi’s poster, I began to understand how the design reflects his political values, his identity as a leader, and his desire to bring Nigerians together. The most dominant feature of the poster is the use of color. Green, red, and white take center stage. Green is especially powerful because it immediately connects to Nigeria’s national identity. It is a color that represents agriculture, growth, and the environ...

When I first watched Chief Daddy, I saw it as a funny and colorful Nollywood film filled with chaos and family drama. The characters were loud, stylish, and full of personality, and at first it felt like a simple comedy. But after I gave it more thought, I realized that this movie says a lot about class, money, and power in Nigerian society. Looking at the story through a Marxist lens helped me see the deeper message behind the laughs. Marxist theory focuses on the struggles between different social groups, especially the rich and the poor, and how power is often tied to wealth and ownership. Right from the beginning, the presence of wealth is everywhere. The movie opens with large homes, flashy cars, and rich people living in luxury. Chief Daddy himself is clearly a man of great influence, and everyone around him depends on him financially. When he suddenly dies, everything falls apart. People begin to panic, not because they are sad about losing him, but because they are unsure about...

When I first sat down to watch CNN’s report on the Lekki Toll Gate shooting during the EndSARS protests, I did not expect it to stay with me for so long. It was not just the images or the facts they presented that affected me; it was how the story was told. From the very first moment, I felt a wave of emotions building. There was shock from the sound of gunshots, sadness seeing people scream and run for their lives, and deep confusion because it felt like the truth was being hidden or twisted. I began to ask myself questions. What was I supposed to take away from this? What was CNN trying to show me? That is when I remembered something from my media studies. Stuart Hall’s theory of Encoding and Decoding came to mind. It gave me a clearer way to understand not just what I saw, but how I saw it, and why others might see it differently depending on their own perspectives. CNN’s video did not feel like just a neutral report. From the start, the tone was very serious and emotional. The back...

When I watched Tiwa Savage’s Koroba music video, I could not help but feel a bit conflicted. On one hand, she looks bold, confident, and fully in charge of her performance. But on the other hand, the way the camera moves around her body made me uncomfortable at times. It got me thinking. Is Tiwa really the one controlling her image here, or is she being framed in a way that mostly pleases male viewers? Is this video empowering, or is it just another example of how women, especially Black women, are turned into visual objects in pop culture? That is what led me to look at this video through two powerful theories I have learned about. Laura Mulvey’s Male Gaze and bell hooks’ Oppositional Gaze. These two ways of seeing helped me unpack my mixed feelings and understand why this video is so layered and thought-provoking. One of the first things I noticed while watching Koroba is how the camera behaves like it is admiring Tiwa’s body. There are so many slow pans and close up shots, especiall...

 Bell hooks pushes the critique further by emphasizing how race, class, and gender intersect to shape the way Black women are represented—or excluded—in media. hooks argues that simply showing Black women on screen is not enough; representation must be meaningful, complex, and reflective of their realities. From this perspective, the Glo Feliz Navidad Nigeria ad falls short, despite its colorful portrayal of Nigerian women and culture. At first glance, the ad appears culturally inclusive. Women are dressed in traditional Nigerian attire—vibrant Ankara fabrics, elaborate geles, and detailed beadwork. These visual cues suggest a celebration of heritage and identity. However, hooks would caution against equating cultural aesthetics with empowerment. Although these women are seen, they are not heard. None of the female figures deliver any form of dialogue, nor are they given space to express opinions, emotions, or stories. Their presence is limited to non-verbal celebration: dancing, l...

 To be honest, when I first watched this ad, it made me smile. The energy, the joy, the colours everything felt warm and festive, like a familiar Christmas in my hometown. But after sitting with it for a bit and looking at it through Laura Mulvey’s concept of the male gaze, I started noticing things I didn’t see at first glance. Mulvey argued that in many films and media, women are often shown not as full subjects, but as objects meant to be looked at beautiful, pleasing, and passive. And while this Glo ad doesn’t exactly scream exploitation, there are quiet moments where that dynamic creeps in. For example, in several scenes, the camera lingers sometimes a little too long on women dancing, swaying, and twirling in traditional attire. The fabrics and movements are lovely, no doubt, but why do we get these soft, sweeping close-ups of the women’s bodies while the men, like Timini, are presented in bold, steady, confident angles? The women become more of a visual rhythm, while the men...

  The partnership of Gucci and Dapper Dan, featured in the behind-the-scenes video “Made in Harlem A:W ‘18 – ‘19,” stands as a rich example for Marxist criticism, particularly in discussing culture on the intersection between its economics and politics. This analysis seeks to explore the societal relations of the Gucci Dapper Dan venture in terms of how the campaign advances or contests capitalism by employing the Marxist paradigm base/superstructure, class struggle, commodity fetishism, ideology/false consciousness, and reification. Each of these put forward distinct but interlocking accounts of what lies beneath the glamour and pageantry of fashion production and consumption, encapsulating conflicts of more profound and ideological significance beyond its economic appearance. First, the video demonstrates the Marxist theory of Base and superstructure by Gucci's economic strategies (the base) and the fashion shoot’s culture (the superstructure) both supporting and being shaped by...

 Speaking of the vibrant cultural celebration in the behind-the-scenes video, which showcases aftereffects, revenge, and ultimately partnership, Stuart Hall’s encoding and decoding model offers a fitting lens for understanding its deeper meaning. The dominant reading of this campaign aligns fully with Gucci’s intended message: the brand is embracing Harlem’s fashion voice and giving credit to one of its most significant cultural architects, Dapper Dan. He is portrayed not only as a creative visionary but as a symbol of Harlem’s ongoing influence on global fashion. The campaign frames Harlem not as a style reference, but as a source of fashion legitimacy. Gucci, once criticized for appropriation, now recasts itself as a respectful partner. For those who decode this preferred message, the collaboration is seen as reconciliation, a creative renaissance, and a new model for inclusive innovation in the fashion industry. This narrative begins with the repositioning of Dapper Dan from a ...

 David Fincher’s 2010 film The Social Network tells the story of Facebook and its complicated founder, Mark Zuckerberg. It takes us back to the early 2000s at Harvard, a time when betrayal and ambition were just starting to create new kinds of ethical dilemmas in our digital world. Watching Jesse Eisenberg’s Zuckerberg, I couldn’t help but notice how often he sacrifices friendships—and maybe even his own sense of right and wrong—as he tries to balance building something huge with connecting to the people around him. To better understand these encoded meanings, it’s important to unpack how the film’s uses of narrative structure, editing, and mise-en-scène work together to communicate ideas about ambition in the early tech world The movie shines a light on the early tech culture, where chasing status and power often comes before building real relationships. Using Stuart Hall’s encoding/decoding model helps me see the film as more than just a story; it’s a sharp critique of ...