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 "Wildest Dreams," a love story filmed against a backdrop of
giraffes, lions, waterfalls and stunning sunsets, has been
viewed more than 15 million times since it was released on
Monday to accompany the American pop superstar's latest single.
Although Swift is donating all proceeds to the African Parks
Foundation of America, critics have seized on the video as
portraying a stereotyped colonial-era view of Africa.
"So thank you, Taylor Swift, for proving once again that African
stereotypes are safe atop the pinnacle of American pop culture,"
wrote Matt Carotenuto, who teaches African studies at New York
state's St. Lawrence University, in an article on Wednesday on
Salon.com.
Director Joseph Kahn said the "Wildest Dreams" video depicted a
love story on the set of a period film in Africa in 1950.
Kahn said there were black Africans in the video in background
shots but that it would have been "historically inaccurate to
load the crew with more black actors as the video would have
been accused of rewriting history." He also noted that the
video's producer, Jil Hardin, and editor Chancler Haynes are
both African-American.
"There is no political agenda in the video. Our only goal was to
tell a tragic love story in classic Hollywood iconography," Kahn
said in a statement.
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Swift, who has some 62 million Twitter followers and whose "1989"
album has sold more than 8 million copies worldwide, has not
responded to the criticism.
In an article for National Public Radio's website, James Kaaga
Arinaitwe and Viviane Rutabingwa, who have both lived and worked in
several African countries, said Swift was not the first person to
use the continent as a backdrop for romantic tales.
"We are shocked to think that in 2015, Taylor Swift, her record
label and her video production group would think it was OK to film a
video that presents a glamorous version of the white colonial
fantasy of Africa," they added.
(Reporting by Jill Serjeant; Editing by Sandra Maler and Peter
Cooney)
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