Ananya Jahanara Kabir
The hit song Calm Down by Nigerian music star Rema (Divine Ikubor) continues to make headlines after its release in February 2022. The song, featuring US singer and actress Selena Gomez, became the first African-led track to reach a billion clicks on music streaming service Spotify in the same week as it won an MTV Video Music Award in the inaugural Best Afrobeats category.
But its impact has been about more than just entertainment, it’s also been political. And that has a lot to do with an online dance video for the song going viral, the Calm Down Dance Challenge choreographed by Cameroonian dancer Loïc Reyel.
On 8 March 2023, five teenage girls uploaded on social media a video of themselves performing the challenge, which features choreography for the first verse of the Afrobeats hit.
The girls were following people across the world who’ve made this dance
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