The book covers African communication systems, discussing modes and forms of communication across West, East and Southern Africa and comparing them with traditional and new media. African Communication Systems and the Digital Age contextualizes communication by bringing to the table African contributions to the field, examining the importance of African indigenous forms of communication and the intersection of African communication systems and the digital age. The book covers various concepts, models, theories and classifications of African communication systems, including instrumental communication, types of African music and their communication properties, indigenous writing systems, non-verbal communication, and mythological communication. Through careful analysis of communication in Africa, this book provides insights into the various modes of communication in use prior to the advent of traditional and new media as well as their continued relevance in the digital age. African Communication Systems and the Digital Age will be of interest to students and scholars of African communication.

This book argues that indigenous modes of communication - for example the oral tradition, drama, indigenous entertainment forms, cultural modes and local language radio - are essential to the societies within which they exist and which create them; and that coupled with newer, or modern forms of communication technology such as the internet and digitised information, endogenous modes of communication are paramount to the processes of human development in Africa.

Chapters: The concept of communication African communication systems and reasons for studying African communication systems -- African communication systems and mass communication compared -- Classification of the traditional channels of communication in Africa -- Verbal and non-verbal communication : introduction -- Verbal and Non-verbal communication compared -- Overview of visual channels of communication and pigmentation /colours as a group of visual channels -- Appearance: physical look and costume / facial marks and tattoos / records -- Iconographic channels of communication: objectified devices, florals, plants and crops -- The concept of instrumental communication -- Idiophones -- Membraneophones -- Membraneophones in south-west Nigeria -- Aerophones -- The concept of demonstrative communication -- Music -- Dance and song -- Poetry, charts and incantations -- Signals, signs and symbolography.