Tau(n)tology: Tannie Evita’s stewardship of South Africa’s national transitions

Abstract

ABSTRACT In this essay, I describe how white South African drag queen Evita Bezuidenhout uses multiple performance platforms – a television series, a cookbook, and a political party to queer the temporality of national political transition. She does so by combining elements of tautological reasoning with her performance persona as an Afrikaner tannie, or aunty. I call this formation tau(n)tology to name the temporal and performative logics of aunties that assert an alternative reality, one that might often be deemed “needless,” redundant, excessive. At various moments of political transition, Tannie Evita’s aunty performances establish a particular relationship to time that reflect the sociopolitical context and teach her audience, particularly white South Africans, how to navigate shifting race, gender, and class politics.