‘Digital Tongues’ is a series of conversations with four Africans from across the continent, hosted by Zimbabwean Tendai Marima. This week’s discussion focuses on African politicians and social media and nationalism and identity. Readers are invited to participate in the dialogue by posting a comment on the story.

Commenting on the Western media’s preference towards coverage of particular uprisings across North Africa, Tendai Marima asks ‘what makes Burkina Faso's crisis so un-newsworthy that it is easily swept under the news pile?'

Although the UK government’s new

cc Disappointed by Barack Obama's Ghana speech, Tendai Marima says the US president's failure to acknowledge the role America has played in African affairs reflects its 'political historical aphasia'. By glossing over 'how African wars and dictatorships are made', Obama reinforces the image of Africa as the 'black hole of war and corruption', Marima argues. The US media may have hailed the speech as a turning point in US–Africa relations, but says Marima, so far 'Obama's foreign policy has not reflected a politics of change but more of the same'.

Brian Chikwava's comedic new novel and An Elegy for Easterly, Petina Gappah's courageous collection of short stories, confirm that Zimbabwe is still a literary powerhouse, writes Tendai Marima.