Con City

Abstract

Abstract:In August 2020, Aliuane Thiam—better known as Akon, the Senegalese-American R&B crooner famous for his early 2000s Top 40 hits—placed the first stone on a site where he plans to build a $6 billion city. Surrounded by government officials, Akon promised that the city, audaciously named after himself, would bring tourism and jobs to Senegal—and that it would run on Akoin, his proposed cryptocurrency. Two years later, Akon City remains just a stone and a plaque in an empty field. Its ethos is similarly vacant. The city's official website provides few real answers about its purpose, and instead features 3D-rendered visuals of curvilinear, phallic buildings that droop and fold against a foreboding sunset.