Pub Date : 2022-01-02DOI: 10.1080/00020184.2022.2060796
C. Nord, J. Ananias
ABSTRACT The number of African older people who live permanently in urban areas is growing. This qualitative ethnographic study explores how older people employ welfare strategies, often involving members of the extended family in mutual care and support. These welfare strategies are emplaced; in this case, in different housing types in a former township in Namibia – Kuisebmond in Walvis Bay. Older people stay in former township houses, in backyard shacks or other rentals, or at an old-age home. Government welfare that was adjusted to family needs appeared in similar shapes in these housing types, such as access to better schools. Older people were both caregivers and receivers of care in these efforts. Taking care of grandchildren while their parents migrated for work was a mutuality of informal support that was highly beneficial to all involved. The non-contributory pensions facilitated many strategies by alleviating risks. Access to high quality housing and government healthcare made urban living a feasible alternative that challenged rural living. The study concludes that housing is a strategic welfare space where formal and informal welfare are optimised in various ways. Older individuals contribute to a large extent to the adjustment, maintenance, and development of these joint spaces.
{"title":"Urbanised Ageing and Strategic Welfare Space in a Namibian Former Township","authors":"C. Nord, J. Ananias","doi":"10.1080/00020184.2022.2060796","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/00020184.2022.2060796","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT The number of African older people who live permanently in urban areas is growing. This qualitative ethnographic study explores how older people employ welfare strategies, often involving members of the extended family in mutual care and support. These welfare strategies are emplaced; in this case, in different housing types in a former township in Namibia – Kuisebmond in Walvis Bay. Older people stay in former township houses, in backyard shacks or other rentals, or at an old-age home. Government welfare that was adjusted to family needs appeared in similar shapes in these housing types, such as access to better schools. Older people were both caregivers and receivers of care in these efforts. Taking care of grandchildren while their parents migrated for work was a mutuality of informal support that was highly beneficial to all involved. The non-contributory pensions facilitated many strategies by alleviating risks. Access to high quality housing and government healthcare made urban living a feasible alternative that challenged rural living. The study concludes that housing is a strategic welfare space where formal and informal welfare are optimised in various ways. Older individuals contribute to a large extent to the adjustment, maintenance, and development of these joint spaces.","PeriodicalId":51769,"journal":{"name":"African Studies","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2022-01-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44179365","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-01-02DOI: 10.1080/00020184.2022.2057922
Idom T. Inyabri, Imeobong J. Offong, Eyo O. Mensah
ABSTRACT The article explores the way Ibibio women in Akwa Ibom State, South-eastern Nigeria use satirical songs to challenge (or endorse) conservative gender ideologies and stereotypes in a bid to access power and agency within their patriarchal society. Drawing on ethnographic qualitative data sourced through participant observations, semi-structured interviews and metalinguistic conversations with twenty participants, and analysing a corpus of fifteen songs, the study demonstrates – from an ethnopragmatic paradigm and an African feminist perspective – that satirical songs are creative cultural resources that speak to the dynamics of women empowerment. The article identifies three main tropes in which the songs are framed: social challenges of marriage, asserting agency and contesting patriarchy. The study concludes that satirical songs represent cultural material with which marginalised women express their views and exercise agency against cultural forces that often subjugate them. In this way, these songs provide a veritable site for expanding the frontiers of feminism.
{"title":"Satire, Agency and the Contestation of Patriarchy in Ibibio Women’s Songs","authors":"Idom T. Inyabri, Imeobong J. Offong, Eyo O. Mensah","doi":"10.1080/00020184.2022.2057922","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/00020184.2022.2057922","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT The article explores the way Ibibio women in Akwa Ibom State, South-eastern Nigeria use satirical songs to challenge (or endorse) conservative gender ideologies and stereotypes in a bid to access power and agency within their patriarchal society. Drawing on ethnographic qualitative data sourced through participant observations, semi-structured interviews and metalinguistic conversations with twenty participants, and analysing a corpus of fifteen songs, the study demonstrates – from an ethnopragmatic paradigm and an African feminist perspective – that satirical songs are creative cultural resources that speak to the dynamics of women empowerment. The article identifies three main tropes in which the songs are framed: social challenges of marriage, asserting agency and contesting patriarchy. The study concludes that satirical songs represent cultural material with which marginalised women express their views and exercise agency against cultural forces that often subjugate them. In this way, these songs provide a veritable site for expanding the frontiers of feminism.","PeriodicalId":51769,"journal":{"name":"African Studies","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2022-01-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48490770","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-01-02DOI: 10.1080/00020184.2022.2045569
Abenea Ndago, Manase Irikidzayi, R. Makombe
ABSTRACT The paper interrogates the role of cartoons in the discursive construction of nationhood and national identity with a specific focus on cartoons published in a Kenyan literary magazine named Kwani? between 2007 and 2008. Kwani? employs cartoons to archive specific events in Kenyan history and articulate a particular view of ‘Kenyanness’. Cartoons act as a disruptive art form that guides the process of making meaning out of a text. This function allows cartoons to influence ideological perspectives on certain issues. The article draws on Gerard Genette’s concept of the paratext, and Mikhail Bakhtin’s notion of the carnivalesque to analyse how selected cartoons in Kwani? influence interpretations of Kenyan nationhood in the context of the 2007/2008 post-election violence. We focus on cartoons that depict the politics of male circumcision, violence in Kibera slums, and International Criminal Court cases that dominated Kenyan political discourse during and after the 2007 elections. The paper examines how the selected cartoons mediate discourses of nationhood and ethnicity in Kenya and concludes that cartoons published in Kwani? in the context of the violence reinforced ethnic polarisation in Kenyan political discourse.
{"title":"Nationhood and Ethnic Ideology: Examining Selected Cartoon Paratexts in Kwani?","authors":"Abenea Ndago, Manase Irikidzayi, R. Makombe","doi":"10.1080/00020184.2022.2045569","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/00020184.2022.2045569","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT The paper interrogates the role of cartoons in the discursive construction of nationhood and national identity with a specific focus on cartoons published in a Kenyan literary magazine named Kwani? between 2007 and 2008. Kwani? employs cartoons to archive specific events in Kenyan history and articulate a particular view of ‘Kenyanness’. Cartoons act as a disruptive art form that guides the process of making meaning out of a text. This function allows cartoons to influence ideological perspectives on certain issues. The article draws on Gerard Genette’s concept of the paratext, and Mikhail Bakhtin’s notion of the carnivalesque to analyse how selected cartoons in Kwani? influence interpretations of Kenyan nationhood in the context of the 2007/2008 post-election violence. We focus on cartoons that depict the politics of male circumcision, violence in Kibera slums, and International Criminal Court cases that dominated Kenyan political discourse during and after the 2007 elections. The paper examines how the selected cartoons mediate discourses of nationhood and ethnicity in Kenya and concludes that cartoons published in Kwani? in the context of the violence reinforced ethnic polarisation in Kenyan political discourse.","PeriodicalId":51769,"journal":{"name":"African Studies","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2022-01-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48818515","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-10-27DOI: 10.1093/obo/9780199846733-0225
In the interwar period (1919–1939), the Africans who fought against colonial rule, such as the Moroccans, were virtually on their own: they received very little help from abroad. This changed after 1945. Henceforth, the backdrop of decolonization was the Cold War. While the colonial empires crumbled, two superpowers jostled for influence in the world. The United States was sympathetic, in principle, to the gradual progression of colonized people toward independence. The onset of the Cold War added a sense of urgency. Washington feared that the metropoles’ intransigence would open the door to Soviet meddling. The Cold War, however, also pushed US policymakers in the opposite direction. US empathy for the colonized faced two constraints that were most significant when their struggle was violent: the colonial powers were America’s allies against the Soviet Union, and Washington insisted that independence movements be free of the Communist virus. Therefore, US policy on decolonization often clashed with its rhetoric. On the other hand, both ideology and realpolitik led the Soviet Union to support those who fought for independence. Not only did Moscow oppose colonialism in principle, but the insurgents were fighting Washington’s friends. At times, however, realpolitik acted as a brake. For example, after the Algerian revolution began in November 1954, the Soviets hesitated for more than two years before sending weapons to the rebels for fear of antagonizing the French government. Soviets and Americans were not the only outside actors on the stage of decolonization. Two small countries deserve pride of place: Cuba, which sent tens of thousands of soldiers to southern Africa, and Sweden, which gave vital economic assistance to African liberation movements. The list of external actors also includes the other Scandinavian countries, Yugoslavia, Moscow’s Eastern European clients, Egypt, and the People’s Republic of China. This bibliographical essay focuses on the Cold War crises in Africa. It will not include, therefore, one of Africa’s greatest human dramas, the Nigerian civil war (1967–1970), because the two superpowers supported the federal government in Lagos.
{"title":"Africa in the Cold War","authors":"","doi":"10.1093/obo/9780199846733-0225","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/obo/9780199846733-0225","url":null,"abstract":"In the interwar period (1919–1939), the Africans who fought against colonial rule, such as the Moroccans, were virtually on their own: they received very little help from abroad. This changed after 1945. Henceforth, the backdrop of decolonization was the Cold War. While the colonial empires crumbled, two superpowers jostled for influence in the world. The United States was sympathetic, in principle, to the gradual progression of colonized people toward independence. The onset of the Cold War added a sense of urgency. Washington feared that the metropoles’ intransigence would open the door to Soviet meddling. The Cold War, however, also pushed US policymakers in the opposite direction. US empathy for the colonized faced two constraints that were most significant when their struggle was violent: the colonial powers were America’s allies against the Soviet Union, and Washington insisted that independence movements be free of the Communist virus. Therefore, US policy on decolonization often clashed with its rhetoric. On the other hand, both ideology and realpolitik led the Soviet Union to support those who fought for independence. Not only did Moscow oppose colonialism in principle, but the insurgents were fighting Washington’s friends. At times, however, realpolitik acted as a brake. For example, after the Algerian revolution began in November 1954, the Soviets hesitated for more than two years before sending weapons to the rebels for fear of antagonizing the French government. Soviets and Americans were not the only outside actors on the stage of decolonization. Two small countries deserve pride of place: Cuba, which sent tens of thousands of soldiers to southern Africa, and Sweden, which gave vital economic assistance to African liberation movements. The list of external actors also includes the other Scandinavian countries, Yugoslavia, Moscow’s Eastern European clients, Egypt, and the People’s Republic of China. This bibliographical essay focuses on the Cold War crises in Africa. It will not include, therefore, one of Africa’s greatest human dramas, the Nigerian civil war (1967–1970), because the two superpowers supported the federal government in Lagos.","PeriodicalId":51769,"journal":{"name":"African Studies","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2021-10-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"43966075","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-10-02DOI: 10.1080/00020184.2021.1987188
Mphathisi Ndlovu, L. Tshuma
ABSTRACT In 1983, the Zimbabwean government unleashed terror upon civilians in Matabeleland and Midlands provinces that led to the death of at least 20 000 Ndebele-speaking people. The memories of the Gukurahundi genocide remain heavily guarded by the government that perpetrated these atrocities. Although there is literature on the role of the media in preserving memories of this genocide, little scholarly attention has been paid to how the descendants of the survivors of genocide are inheriting memories of this violent past event. Drawing upon Marianne Hirsch’s concept of postmemory, this research examines how Gukurahundi memories are being inherited by the generation in Matabeleland and Midlands born after these horrific events. Through in-depth interviews and focus group discussions held with selected National University of Science and Technology students in Bulawayo (Matabeleland), this research explores how the post-generation uses the media to adopt and inherit memories that preceded their births. Although social media such as Twitter, WhatsApp and Facebook serve as mechanisms of postmemory, the young generation are primarily relying on their family members as credible and authoritative sources of knowledge on the genocide.
{"title":"Bleeding from One Generation to the Next: The Media and the Constructions of Gukurahundi Postmemories by University Students in Zimbabwe","authors":"Mphathisi Ndlovu, L. Tshuma","doi":"10.1080/00020184.2021.1987188","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/00020184.2021.1987188","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT In 1983, the Zimbabwean government unleashed terror upon civilians in Matabeleland and Midlands provinces that led to the death of at least 20 000 Ndebele-speaking people. The memories of the Gukurahundi genocide remain heavily guarded by the government that perpetrated these atrocities. Although there is literature on the role of the media in preserving memories of this genocide, little scholarly attention has been paid to how the descendants of the survivors of genocide are inheriting memories of this violent past event. Drawing upon Marianne Hirsch’s concept of postmemory, this research examines how Gukurahundi memories are being inherited by the generation in Matabeleland and Midlands born after these horrific events. Through in-depth interviews and focus group discussions held with selected National University of Science and Technology students in Bulawayo (Matabeleland), this research explores how the post-generation uses the media to adopt and inherit memories that preceded their births. Although social media such as Twitter, WhatsApp and Facebook serve as mechanisms of postmemory, the young generation are primarily relying on their family members as credible and authoritative sources of knowledge on the genocide.","PeriodicalId":51769,"journal":{"name":"African Studies","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2021-10-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49263860","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-10-02DOI: 10.1080/00020184.2021.2012754
M. Seedat, S. Suffla, S. Ndlovu-Gatsheni
ABSTRACT We offer a critical reading of Thabo Mbeki’s ‘I am an African’ speech to illustrate how he foregrounded humaning, namely onto-epistemological recovery, as a key dimension of psycho-political reconstruction. Mbeki’s speech, delivered on the occasion of the adoption of South Africa’s democratic Constitution, was inherent to the larger quest to (re)imagine South Africa and (South)Africanness and assert independent Black intellectual thought. Positioning himself as an epistemic agent, Mbeki historicised that moment of adopting the Constitution and attempted to raise critical consciousness about the protracted struggle for democracy. He mobilised marginalised knowledge about the anti-colonial struggle to challenge forgetfulness and limited interpretations of South Africa’s negotiated settlement. Mbeki also invoked the idea of a relational ontology and hermeneutic love to effect an inclusive Africanity constituted of multiple histories and ‘races’. Mbeki, resisting Afro-pessimism, referenced the making of an inclusive Africanity against Africa as a generative place despite the colonial encounter, African humanism and South Africa’s aspirations for reconciliation as articulated by the ANC and the Constitution. Notwithstanding the psycho-political import of Mbeki’s speech, the process of humaning remains incomplete.
{"title":"Mbeki’s ‘I am an African’ Speech: Mobilising Psycho-Political Resources for Political Reconstitution of Post-Apartheid South Africa","authors":"M. Seedat, S. Suffla, S. Ndlovu-Gatsheni","doi":"10.1080/00020184.2021.2012754","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/00020184.2021.2012754","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT We offer a critical reading of Thabo Mbeki’s ‘I am an African’ speech to illustrate how he foregrounded humaning, namely onto-epistemological recovery, as a key dimension of psycho-political reconstruction. Mbeki’s speech, delivered on the occasion of the adoption of South Africa’s democratic Constitution, was inherent to the larger quest to (re)imagine South Africa and (South)Africanness and assert independent Black intellectual thought. Positioning himself as an epistemic agent, Mbeki historicised that moment of adopting the Constitution and attempted to raise critical consciousness about the protracted struggle for democracy. He mobilised marginalised knowledge about the anti-colonial struggle to challenge forgetfulness and limited interpretations of South Africa’s negotiated settlement. Mbeki also invoked the idea of a relational ontology and hermeneutic love to effect an inclusive Africanity constituted of multiple histories and ‘races’. Mbeki, resisting Afro-pessimism, referenced the making of an inclusive Africanity against Africa as a generative place despite the colonial encounter, African humanism and South Africa’s aspirations for reconciliation as articulated by the ANC and the Constitution. Notwithstanding the psycho-political import of Mbeki’s speech, the process of humaning remains incomplete.","PeriodicalId":51769,"journal":{"name":"African Studies","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2021-10-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42132335","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-10-02DOI: 10.1080/00020184.2021.1948235
Nickolaus Bauer
For the Ruth First Fellowships, of which African Studies is a sponsor, we seek new, younger voices to address a pressing, current issue in the tradition of Ruth First’s activist research. In 2019, we put together two concerning trends: calls for action from a wide range of public figures to deal with undocumented migrants, and the rise of a new brand of populist politics. This potentially toxic mix gave us our theme: Migrancy and Populism, and we posed the question, ‘Is our Politics Normalising the Language of Xenophobia?’ Nickolaus Bauer was one of two fellows who were appointed, and he delivered the Ruth First Memorial Lecture in August 2019, with a keynote address by Prof. Achille Mbembe. For his lecture entitled ‘Blaming The Other: Migrancy and Populism in Contemporary South Africa’, Bauer interviewed the people of Johannesburg’s inner city to gather their views on migrants, showing that the views of ordinary South Africans are not always what we – or the politicians who represent them – expect them to be.
非洲研究是Ruth First奖学金的赞助者之一，我们寻求新的、年轻的声音来解决Ruth First激进主义研究传统中一个紧迫的、当前的问题。2019年，我们总结了两种令人担忧的趋势:广泛的公众人物呼吁采取行动应对无证移民，以及一种新型民粹主义政治的兴起。这种潜在的有毒混合物给我们带来了主题:移民和民粹主义，我们提出了这样一个问题:“我们的政治正在使仇外的语言正常化吗?”Nickolaus Bauer是两位被任命的研究员之一，他于2019年8月发表了Ruth First Memorial Lecture, Achille Mbembe教授发表了主题演讲。鲍尔在题为“指责他人:当代南非的移民和民粹主义”的演讲中，采访了约翰内斯堡内城的人们，收集他们对移民的看法，表明普通南非人的看法并不总是我们或代表他们的政治家所期望的那样。
{"title":"Blaming the Other: Migrancy and Populism in Contemporary South Africa","authors":"Nickolaus Bauer","doi":"10.1080/00020184.2021.1948235","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/00020184.2021.1948235","url":null,"abstract":"For the Ruth First Fellowships, of which African Studies is a sponsor, we seek new, younger voices to address a pressing, current issue in the tradition of Ruth First’s activist research. In 2019, we put together two concerning trends: calls for action from a wide range of public figures to deal with undocumented migrants, and the rise of a new brand of populist politics. This potentially toxic mix gave us our theme: Migrancy and Populism, and we posed the question, ‘Is our Politics Normalising the Language of Xenophobia?’ Nickolaus Bauer was one of two fellows who were appointed, and he delivered the Ruth First Memorial Lecture in August 2019, with a keynote address by Prof. Achille Mbembe. For his lecture entitled ‘Blaming The Other: Migrancy and Populism in Contemporary South Africa’, Bauer interviewed the people of Johannesburg’s inner city to gather their views on migrants, showing that the views of ordinary South Africans are not always what we – or the politicians who represent them – expect them to be.","PeriodicalId":51769,"journal":{"name":"African Studies","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2021-10-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"41968695","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-10-02DOI: 10.1080/00020184.2021.2015682
W. Rotich
ABSTRACT This article analyses the use of ‘the disc’ – a curious pedagogical post-colonial artifact, intended to discourage native languages – a tool employed in teaching colonial languages in schools in parts of the post-colonial world. The disc assumes many forms depending on where it is employed, but it is usually an object fashioned to be carried, or worn as an article of clothing, or a cap making it reminiscent of the Dunce Cap. The role of the disc and its variants is the same: to leverage surveillance and shaming and channel them towards the purposes of instilling school discipline, promoting moral education and often as a pedagogical tool. However, the use of shame for these purposes has since fallen out of favour in the West (Stearns & Stearns 2017). Using Michel Foucault’s notion of panopticism to illuminate the workings of this artifact, this article focuses on shedding some light on the indignities suffered by speakers of native languages in such post-colonial school systems. As Foucault (1980, 30) wrote, power reaches into the very grain of individuals, touches their bodies and inserts itself into their actions, attitudes, their discourses, learning processes and everyday lives. This article’s main gist is on this one aspect of colonial legacy in education: the language policies that put a premium on mastery of colonial over native languages. Among the issues typical in post-colonial discourse, this vestige represents apt exemplification of deleterious aspects of colonialism that continue to present perverse challenges in post-colonial societies. It however concurs, in spite of the blistering critique of the emphasis on colonial language use, and in light of a rapidly globalising world, with Kevin Forster’s (2003) analysis, which concludes that in instances where contemporary values like empowerment and perfection is gained while sacrificing autonomy and freedom from surveillance, subjugation could be seen as worthwhile.
{"title":"Catching the Disc: Panopticism, Surveillance and Punishment as a Pedagogical Tool in the Acquisition of Colonial Languages in Post-Colonial Schooling","authors":"W. Rotich","doi":"10.1080/00020184.2021.2015682","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/00020184.2021.2015682","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT This article analyses the use of ‘the disc’ – a curious pedagogical post-colonial artifact, intended to discourage native languages – a tool employed in teaching colonial languages in schools in parts of the post-colonial world. The disc assumes many forms depending on where it is employed, but it is usually an object fashioned to be carried, or worn as an article of clothing, or a cap making it reminiscent of the Dunce Cap. The role of the disc and its variants is the same: to leverage surveillance and shaming and channel them towards the purposes of instilling school discipline, promoting moral education and often as a pedagogical tool. However, the use of shame for these purposes has since fallen out of favour in the West (Stearns & Stearns 2017). Using Michel Foucault’s notion of panopticism to illuminate the workings of this artifact, this article focuses on shedding some light on the indignities suffered by speakers of native languages in such post-colonial school systems. As Foucault (1980, 30) wrote, power reaches into the very grain of individuals, touches their bodies and inserts itself into their actions, attitudes, their discourses, learning processes and everyday lives. This article’s main gist is on this one aspect of colonial legacy in education: the language policies that put a premium on mastery of colonial over native languages. Among the issues typical in post-colonial discourse, this vestige represents apt exemplification of deleterious aspects of colonialism that continue to present perverse challenges in post-colonial societies. It however concurs, in spite of the blistering critique of the emphasis on colonial language use, and in light of a rapidly globalising world, with Kevin Forster’s (2003) analysis, which concludes that in instances where contemporary values like empowerment and perfection is gained while sacrificing autonomy and freedom from surveillance, subjugation could be seen as worthwhile.","PeriodicalId":51769,"journal":{"name":"African Studies","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2021-10-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45677512","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-10-02DOI: 10.1080/00020184.2021.1975532
G. Walker
ABSTRACT South Africa has the highest number of HIV infections in the world, with more than five million people receiving anti-retroviral (ARV) therapies (UNAIDS 2019). However, during the early stages of the epidemic, there was no provision for ARVs through the state-run public health system, effectively limiting access to life-saving drugs. In response, the AIDS activist group the Treatment Action Campaign (TAC) and their HIV positive choir, The Generics, were established to mobilise South African civil society towards pressuring the government into deploying a national ARV programme. This article analyses and compares three culturally significant songs that were appropriated by The Generics. The analyses are socially and historically contextualised by interview data with current and former TAC members. The article suggests that songs facilitated collective mourning and psychosocial healing at a time when HIV treatments were largely unavailable. They further provided a catalyst for mobilisation that was steeped in the recent history of racial oppression against a virus that affected a disproportionate number of black South Africans. By appropriating struggle songs for their cause, The Generics tapped into emotional reservoirs of resistance culture to propel their agenda of government accountability and access to HIV medication.
{"title":"‘A Song is Not Just a Song’: Community Mobilisation and Psychosocial Healing in South Africa’s AIDS Crisis","authors":"G. Walker","doi":"10.1080/00020184.2021.1975532","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/00020184.2021.1975532","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT South Africa has the highest number of HIV infections in the world, with more than five million people receiving anti-retroviral (ARV) therapies (UNAIDS 2019). However, during the early stages of the epidemic, there was no provision for ARVs through the state-run public health system, effectively limiting access to life-saving drugs. In response, the AIDS activist group the Treatment Action Campaign (TAC) and their HIV positive choir, The Generics, were established to mobilise South African civil society towards pressuring the government into deploying a national ARV programme. This article analyses and compares three culturally significant songs that were appropriated by The Generics. The analyses are socially and historically contextualised by interview data with current and former TAC members. The article suggests that songs facilitated collective mourning and psychosocial healing at a time when HIV treatments were largely unavailable. They further provided a catalyst for mobilisation that was steeped in the recent history of racial oppression against a virus that affected a disproportionate number of black South Africans. By appropriating struggle songs for their cause, The Generics tapped into emotional reservoirs of resistance culture to propel their agenda of government accountability and access to HIV medication.","PeriodicalId":51769,"journal":{"name":"African Studies","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2021-10-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"41565354","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-10-02DOI: 10.1080/00020184.2021.2007356
M. Makgoba
ABSTRACT By employing a critical discourse analysis and approaching Black economic empowerment as an institutionalised discursive phenomenon, this article argues that BEE has always maintained a discursive stance against the transformation of historical, structural and power inequities in South Africa. However, there is a presumption in academic circles that BEE aims to transform these inequities that emanate from the structural legacies of apartheid and colonialism. This article disputes this presumption in constructionist and discursive terms. It concludes that BEE contains corporate and ahistorical discourses of managerialism and depoliticised empowerment and redistribution that disconnect the policy from structural and political processes. These discourses structurally preserve, conceal, reproduce and depoliticise oppression and domination while running the risk of maintaining existing structures of decision-making, power and procedures in the private sectors. The article finds that primary documents such as the Black Economic Empowerment Commission Report, the Department of Trade and Industry’s BEE Strategy and the BBBEE Acts appropriate anti-colonial and anti-apartheid discourses to legitimise the legalisation, formalisation and implementation of BEE and to promote the inclusion, participation and assimilation of Black people within the existing structures and historical practices that produced racial injustices in the first place.
{"title":"Constructing the Symbolic Agendas of Political and Structural Transformation with the Discourse of Black Economic Empowerment in South Africa","authors":"M. Makgoba","doi":"10.1080/00020184.2021.2007356","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/00020184.2021.2007356","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT By employing a critical discourse analysis and approaching Black economic empowerment as an institutionalised discursive phenomenon, this article argues that BEE has always maintained a discursive stance against the transformation of historical, structural and power inequities in South Africa. However, there is a presumption in academic circles that BEE aims to transform these inequities that emanate from the structural legacies of apartheid and colonialism. This article disputes this presumption in constructionist and discursive terms. It concludes that BEE contains corporate and ahistorical discourses of managerialism and depoliticised empowerment and redistribution that disconnect the policy from structural and political processes. These discourses structurally preserve, conceal, reproduce and depoliticise oppression and domination while running the risk of maintaining existing structures of decision-making, power and procedures in the private sectors. The article finds that primary documents such as the Black Economic Empowerment Commission Report, the Department of Trade and Industry’s BEE Strategy and the BBBEE Acts appropriate anti-colonial and anti-apartheid discourses to legitimise the legalisation, formalisation and implementation of BEE and to promote the inclusion, participation and assimilation of Black people within the existing structures and historical practices that produced racial injustices in the first place.","PeriodicalId":51769,"journal":{"name":"African Studies","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.9,"publicationDate":"2021-10-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"43394965","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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