when i take my pen,
my soul bursts to deface the paper
pus spills
spreads
deforming a line into a figure that violates my love,
when i take a pen
my crimson heart oozes into the ink,
dilutes its preads
the gem of my life makes the word i utter a gasp to the world... (serote 1974)
Thursday, February 16, 2012
Sunday, July 27, 2008
Eishhh, le Black Consciousness Bizznis!
On his own, therefore, the black man wishes to explore his surroundings, and test his possibilities. In other words to make his freedom real by whatever means he deems fit. At the heart of this kind of thinking is the realization by blacks that the most potent weapon in the hands of the oppressor is the mind of the oppressed. If one is free at heart, no man-made chains can bind one to servitude, but if one’s mind is so manipulated and controlled by the oppressor as to make the oppressed believe that he is a liability to the white man, then there will be nothing the oppressed can do to scare his powerful masters.
Hence thinking along lines of Black Consciousness makes the black man see himself as a being complete in himself. It makes him less dependent and more free to express his manhood. At the end of it all he cannot tolerate attempts by anybody to dwarf the significance of his manhood (Biko, I Write What I Like).
“What is the mission of Black Consciousness?” The question is often posed to me and friends in BCC. I will, once again, endeavor to wrestle with the subject, hoping that your comments will further bring clarity to the issue.
Black Consciousness has, historically, been a project advanced by the black being with a mission of freeing herself from a perpetual state of dependency that the white supremacist powers had thrust her.
At the time of Biko, as in now, the black person had so internalized racist representations of herself that she did not imagine herself a subject in history, capable, by herself, of forming and shaping historical processes and developments. The ideology of white supremacy had by then reached far and wide; penetrated the nooks and crannies of the black world, so that even those who were struggling for freedom saw a solution to their problems as essentially emanating from the west and the white thinkers and activist among them. Thus, even within the progressive circles, western ideas were uncritically accepted as powerful sources of reference and white people were easily elevated to leadership positions.
On the other hand, white South Africans, having been socialized for domination, were forever inclined to draft the agenda, steer courses of action, propose solutions and, ultimately wrest real power within the progressive multiracial circles.
Biko rightly foresaw the possibility of a situation where a black person enters the rendezvous of political victory (to borrow from Aime Cesaire) as a dependant; a child, forever requiring guidance and mentorship rather than a subject in her own right; that is, a matured, fully responsible person, capable of driving historical processes, especially as they affect her. He foresaw a situation where, at the point of victory, the black person remained nothing more than a beggar; wholly dependent on others for her welfare; those whose resources, whose ideas and whose leadership were pivotal, in the first instance, for her very liberation. And he cried out loud that in order for a black person to experience substantive freedom, she will first have to become a subject; take full responsibility for her liberation from white domination. For Biko; how a black person thought of herself in the context of struggle; whether she experienced herself as an object or subject, whether she experienced herself as a child to be liberated or an adult who is completely responsible for her liberation; will determine the quality of a person she becomes at the rendezvous of victory. Thus his insistence that, in the struggle to overthrow the racist regime, black people should reject simplistic solutions, in the form of blue prints from the west, and should, on their own, take initiative and assume full responsibility for their choices, decisions, actions and victories. They should exploit their capacities, test their potentialities and explore their possibilities. They should dare exercise their imagination and apply their collective strength to its maximum.
To be sure, taking initiative and accepting full responsibility for one’s choices, decisions and actions in the imagination and making of history is a quality that a black person had been systematically stripped off by centuries of white domination.
To Biko, if a black person was to sustain her freedom in the future; if she was to be free from a state of dependency that has historically defined her relations with white society; then she will have to become a subject by taking initiative, and accepting full responsibility for her life, her freedom and her destiny. True freedom can only be achieved by a subject; a fully matured person who takes complete responsibility for her destiny.
Biko’s philosophy is succinctly captured by the words of a radical Brazilian educator when he said that one can not enter the struggle as an object to later become a subject . Thus to Biko, as important as political freedom (the freedom accorded by rights) is, it cannot in and of itself, restore the black person her subject status, essential for her humanity, her dignity and her pride. If a black person is not a subject within the context of struggle; if she does not see herself as a fully matured person, rather than a perpetual dependant; then a black person will also remain a child at the rendezvous of political victory, wholly and perpetually dependent on others for her wellness, growth and development. Ultimately, failure to become a subject in the struggle for freedom, will result in the achievement of a form of freedom; where a black person is still a dependant; a child, and the white other is still completely responsible for her wellness, growth and development. To Biko, this type of freedom is nothing but an illusion of freedom. Hence the slogan; “black man you are on your own.”
The call for collective solitude in the quest for freedom is meant to inspire a black person to assume full responsibility for her freedom; and, finally, to enable her to enter the rendezvous of victory as a subject, a person, who realizes that African history, its success or its demise, lies in her very own hands.
It is important to realize that Biko was engaging attitudes and mentalities that are steeped in a long history of colonial domination. The construction of a black identity as a child identity at best and nature at worst (or a being who has just evolved from a state of nature), can be traced back to the early days of colonialism. It can be traced back to notions of Africa held by eminent European thinkers who took it upon themselves to inform the western public about the nature of an African. To these thinkers, the native of Africa whose color could not be separated from the soil of the land and the lion of the land was seen as, either an extension of nature or a child in her mindset and behavior, a being that has not realized the status of maturity, of adulthood, of full humanness. She was there to be conquered, tamed, controlled and used for ends of progress and civilization.
The French philosopher Voltaire set the general tone of Enlightenment attitudes to Africans. Although derogatory remarks may be found in most of his works, his short essay The Negro sums up his position. He tells his readers:
The NEGRO race is a species of men as different from ours as the breed of spaniels is from that of greyhounds ... if their understanding is not of a different nature from ours, it is at least greatly inferior. They are not capable of any great application of… our philosophy.
The NEGRO race is a species of men as different from ours as the breed of spaniels is from that of greyhounds ... if their understanding is not of a different nature from ours, it is at least greatly inferior. They are not capable of any great application of… our philosophy.
David Hume expressed similar views when he wrote:
I suspect that Negroes ... be naturally inferior to the whites. There never was a civilized nation of any other complexion than white...
I suspect that Negroes ... be naturally inferior to the whites. There never was a civilized nation of any other complexion than white...
To Rousseau, the difference between the African, who he refers to as a savage and the westerner lies in the fact that the African is still a part of nature, a species whose being is, primarily governed by instinct, whilst the westerner has achieved civilization, a state of thought, far removed from nature:
Solitary, indolent, and perpetually accompanied by danger, the savage cannot but be fond of sleep; his sleep too must be light, like that of the animals ... Such in general is the animal condition, and such, according to travelers, is that of most savage nations …
Solitary, indolent, and perpetually accompanied by danger, the savage cannot but be fond of sleep; his sleep too must be light, like that of the animals ... Such in general is the animal condition, and such, according to travelers, is that of most savage nations …
As indicated earlier, animality features strongly in the nature of an African, it governs her very beingness:
Savage man … must accordingly begin with purely animal functions ... being destitute of every species of intelligence … his desires never go beyond his physical wants … food, a female, and sleep …
Thus, for Rousseau, a life of the mind is far removed from the essentially instinct driven African. He states:
... everything seems removed from savage man … he is so far from having the knowledge which is needful to make him want more, that he can have neither foresight nor curiosity ... he has not understanding enough to wonder at the great miracles; nor is it in his mind that we can expect to find that philosophy man needs ...
The imagination, which causes such ravages among us, never speaks to the heart of savages, who quietly await the impulses of nature, yield to them involuntarily, with more pleasure and ardor, and, their wants once satisfied, loose the desire ... the Caribbeans, who have at yet least of all deviated from the state of nature …
The philosopher Kant might sound more cautious in his viewpoint. However, he still dares to construct a very racist hierarchy of talents:
Humanity exists in its greatest perfection in the white race. The yellow Indians have a smaller amount of talent. The Negroes are lower, and the lowest are a part of the American peoples.
Hegel comes out as the most scathing of the great colonial western thinkers. Enjoy him!
The Negro, as already observed, exhibits the natural man in his completely wild and untamed state. We must lay aside all thought of reverence and morality-all that we call feeling-if we would rightly comprehend him; there is nothing harmonious with humanity to be found in this type of character.
Africa is, to him, a hopeless case that has long forfeited an opportunity for the redemption.
At this point we leave Africa not to mention it again. For it is no historical part of the World; it has no movement or development to exhibit. Historical movements in it-that is in its northern part-belong to the Asiatic or European World.
Wholly convinced by facts about Africa established by his intellectual superiors, the average, even marginal European, for the first time, felt himself Lord over “nature.” He felt he would, finally test his potentialities, by exercising control over the land of Africa, the beast of Africa and the native of Africa. He would tame the strength of Africa and make it bow before him.
Savage man … must accordingly begin with purely animal functions ... being destitute of every species of intelligence … his desires never go beyond his physical wants … food, a female, and sleep …
Thus, for Rousseau, a life of the mind is far removed from the essentially instinct driven African. He states:
... everything seems removed from savage man … he is so far from having the knowledge which is needful to make him want more, that he can have neither foresight nor curiosity ... he has not understanding enough to wonder at the great miracles; nor is it in his mind that we can expect to find that philosophy man needs ...
The imagination, which causes such ravages among us, never speaks to the heart of savages, who quietly await the impulses of nature, yield to them involuntarily, with more pleasure and ardor, and, their wants once satisfied, loose the desire ... the Caribbeans, who have at yet least of all deviated from the state of nature …
The philosopher Kant might sound more cautious in his viewpoint. However, he still dares to construct a very racist hierarchy of talents:
Humanity exists in its greatest perfection in the white race. The yellow Indians have a smaller amount of talent. The Negroes are lower, and the lowest are a part of the American peoples.
Hegel comes out as the most scathing of the great colonial western thinkers. Enjoy him!
The Negro, as already observed, exhibits the natural man in his completely wild and untamed state. We must lay aside all thought of reverence and morality-all that we call feeling-if we would rightly comprehend him; there is nothing harmonious with humanity to be found in this type of character.
Africa is, to him, a hopeless case that has long forfeited an opportunity for the redemption.
At this point we leave Africa not to mention it again. For it is no historical part of the World; it has no movement or development to exhibit. Historical movements in it-that is in its northern part-belong to the Asiatic or European World.
Wholly convinced by facts about Africa established by his intellectual superiors, the average, even marginal European, for the first time, felt himself Lord over “nature.” He felt he would, finally test his potentialities, by exercising control over the land of Africa, the beast of Africa and the native of Africa. He would tame the strength of Africa and make it bow before him.
In this state; this tamed condition, Africa would be used to bolster his inferiority complex, which was, in the first instance, the source of his drive for domination. But let it also be said that in this tamed state; Africa would be used to satisfy his whims and fancies; his characteristic propensity for indulgence.
To be sure, what the colonizer saw in Africa was nothing but a wish fulfillment. He had long realized that if he were to indulge in the colony, the native would have to become nothing but an extension of nature in her very essence and an object to be conquered and tamed. Thus innumerable campaigns, policies and measures were undertaken to construct the native as nature, as an object and as a child.
The native’s very humanness, her inclination to welcome strangers was constructed as an animal’s instinct for generosity. Her stylishly revealing garment was made comparable to the nakedness of the land and the beast. Her physical strength was the sheer strength of the wild beast. Her respect for nature was constructed as evidence for a primitive instinct connecting animals to nature.
The native could never redeem herself as a fully matured person in the sight of the European coloniser. Thus, if nature was there as an object, for the satisfaction of the European’s inexhaustible desire, then the native was also there, implicated as an object, for the indulgence of the colonialist and settlers. If it was justifiable to conquer, dominate and control nature, for scientific reasons, then it was justifiable to conquer, control and use the native for such questionable ends. If it was justifiable to pursue the realization of one self by dominating nature, then it was justifiable to dominate the native in the name of self actualisation. If it was justifiable to exploit nature for commercial ends, then it was justifiable to exploit the native in the name of commerce.
The South African political economy of Biko’s time was a crude embodiment of these racist ideas. It was a culmination of an interplay of centuries of political, historical, ideological and economic forces aimed at creating master-slave relationships between white people and black people. Ideology, in particular, was a force that the colonial and Apartheid white supremacist powers utilized to win the willing consent of the black oppressed.
Through ideology, couched as civilization and also as The Word of God, backed by political, economic and military forces, a black person was made to accept the status of a perpetual childhood imposed on her. She was made to see a white person as a natural parent, to whom she owes her very freedom. It was this childhood status; this dependency mentality that Biko, through the Black Consciousness project, had set out to destroy.
The emphasis that the black consciousness project had placed on the attainment of a subject status marked by qualities such as courage, responsibility, imagination, originality, and creativity on the part of a black person in the quest for freedom was, essentially, aimed at killing a child like mentality of dependancy in a black person instilled and entrenched by centuries of white domination.
Now the question is; to what extent has a black person achieved true emancipation in Africa? To what extent has she become free of a dependency mentality, disposition and orientation that, centuries of white supremacy has plunged her?
Ghosts of the past still haunt South Africa but the spirit of Biko's writings and life invoke a sense of hope and pride. Savor this young man's work and allow yourself to be guided by his spirit.
Ghosts of the past still haunt South Africa but the spirit of Biko's writings and life invoke a sense of hope and pride. Savor this young man's work and allow yourself to be guided by his spirit.
Wednesday, July 23, 2008
Waiting for Freedom
It all happened in the name of freedom. The struggle, the defiance, the rebellion, acts of courage that brought the Apartheid system to its knees and led to a negotiated settlement. No torture, no exile, no jail term, no teargas, no bullet, no mass murders could stop the wave that pounded on the system, all wrapped in the garment of freedom.
Mbongeni Ngema’s song, “Freedom is Coming Tomorrow” expressed a deep seated yearning, a cry lying in the deepest layer of a people’s soul. A yearning for a better tomorrow. A confidence that freedom will come tomorrow. Tomorrow then happened. Or did it?
Post 1994, the age of the constitution, was officially defined as a tomorrow that a people had hoped for. The struggle has ushered in an era of freedom. All the messages from mainstream society changed Ngema’s song into “Freedom is here today.”
See freedom is here, we are now all equal before the law; there is, essentially, no black nor white, no female nor male, no working class nor bourgeoisie; perceptable differences are like mere colours of a rainbow that adds to the beauty of a whole.
See we are equal, we are one, we are united, we are South Africa, we are a rainbow nation, essentially equal before the law.
Equal? Now there are groans everywhere. Expression of dissatisfaction with the current status quo.
Groans are even heard within the ruling party. The historic liberation party. Too many things have remained the same.
Freedom as equality before the law is now questioned everywhere. Too abstract for a people. How does it restore the dignity that a people were robbed of when their relationship to their environment, their land and all their resources was forcefully altered.
Human dignity does not come from an abstract statement like “equality before the law.”
The claim to equality needs concrete evidence to stand. It crumbles in the face of stark realities of inequality that people have to live with on a daily basis. It becomes utter meaningless when whiteness and all its signifiers remains a qualification for access and success.
It collapses when only a few from the ranks of the dispossessed access the resources they were formerly denied. It becomes an embarrassment when these few are window dressed to give the impression that things have changed and are changing for the better. It becomes a mockery when these use the toys they have acquired from the system to terrorise their own.
Freedom as used in South Africa, with its concomitant concept, equality, becomes a lie and indeed an opium to the people. In quest of their dignity, their humanness, the people raise their voice, in their own way, and if they are not heard, for the system is too English and too sophisticated, they resort to violence and destruction.
The play, Waiting for Freedom, written and directed by Tshepiso Konopi, succinctly drives the point home.
Through the creative interplay of action, music, dance, sound and silence the play struggles with the question of freedom in post Apartheid South Africa.
It is literally staged in the underground. It is thus free from the decorum and the correctness required from plays staged on the ground. The message conveyed by the play is that freedom is an ideal that continue to elude the people.
The play makes use of space, objects, music and action to convey freedom as something that is swinging above people’s heads; something that is desired and can almost be perceived but remains unreachable. Though they produce sounds, the characters do not speak in an intelligible human voice. They are stripped of their humanity in their own Africa and their voice(s) and actions are reduced to that of subhumans.
They are a cheated people. Cheated by a discourse of democracy, that promises them “freedom” of expression but refuses to hear them when they speak in their own terms to express their own needs. Though they are embodied in space, the characters are faceless, reduced to living things rather than “recognized” as human beings.
They are a cheated people; cheated by a negotiated settlement that promises to recognize their humanity and restore their dignity but then treats them as so much rubble and noise.
The play succeeds in conveying a deep sense of betrayal coupled by emotions of anguish, despair, frustration and rage. Plunged into the abyss of despair, the people resort to using any means possible to restore their dignity; their very humanity.
The people will stop at nothing to achieve this end. If their voices are not recognized by the current dispensation, if their form of expression is not accorded any currency in the system, the people will explore all means possible including terror, violence and destruction. They will make a statement at all costs. They will seek to bring about change by all means.
It was a people’s philosopher, Frantz Fanon, who insisted that a people will have to destroy all the barriers of old in order to achieve true emancipation. The truly new, fresh and humane is born out of the ruins of the old and stagnant.
“We are Everyone, We are Everywhere,” reads a placard. The message is sent that the voiceless and faceless have immense powers of destruction that will, in time, be unleashed to a society that refuses to recognize them.
The ultimate message sent by the play is that we are, as a nation, sitting on a time bomb that will, in time, explode should the necessary measures not be taken to urgently address the plight of the historically dispossessed and dehumanized.
Freedom remains an elusive ideal. The people remain voiceless and faceless in post Apartheid South Africa. Their situation is a permanent state of loss, anguish and despair that will result in the destruction of everything if not urgently responded to.
Mbongeni Ngema’s song, “Freedom is Coming Tomorrow” expressed a deep seated yearning, a cry lying in the deepest layer of a people’s soul. A yearning for a better tomorrow. A confidence that freedom will come tomorrow. Tomorrow then happened. Or did it?
Post 1994, the age of the constitution, was officially defined as a tomorrow that a people had hoped for. The struggle has ushered in an era of freedom. All the messages from mainstream society changed Ngema’s song into “Freedom is here today.”
See freedom is here, we are now all equal before the law; there is, essentially, no black nor white, no female nor male, no working class nor bourgeoisie; perceptable differences are like mere colours of a rainbow that adds to the beauty of a whole.
See we are equal, we are one, we are united, we are South Africa, we are a rainbow nation, essentially equal before the law.
Equal? Now there are groans everywhere. Expression of dissatisfaction with the current status quo.
Groans are even heard within the ruling party. The historic liberation party. Too many things have remained the same.
Freedom as equality before the law is now questioned everywhere. Too abstract for a people. How does it restore the dignity that a people were robbed of when their relationship to their environment, their land and all their resources was forcefully altered.
Human dignity does not come from an abstract statement like “equality before the law.”
The claim to equality needs concrete evidence to stand. It crumbles in the face of stark realities of inequality that people have to live with on a daily basis. It becomes utter meaningless when whiteness and all its signifiers remains a qualification for access and success.
It collapses when only a few from the ranks of the dispossessed access the resources they were formerly denied. It becomes an embarrassment when these few are window dressed to give the impression that things have changed and are changing for the better. It becomes a mockery when these use the toys they have acquired from the system to terrorise their own.
Freedom as used in South Africa, with its concomitant concept, equality, becomes a lie and indeed an opium to the people. In quest of their dignity, their humanness, the people raise their voice, in their own way, and if they are not heard, for the system is too English and too sophisticated, they resort to violence and destruction.
The play, Waiting for Freedom, written and directed by Tshepiso Konopi, succinctly drives the point home.
Through the creative interplay of action, music, dance, sound and silence the play struggles with the question of freedom in post Apartheid South Africa.
It is literally staged in the underground. It is thus free from the decorum and the correctness required from plays staged on the ground. The message conveyed by the play is that freedom is an ideal that continue to elude the people.
The play makes use of space, objects, music and action to convey freedom as something that is swinging above people’s heads; something that is desired and can almost be perceived but remains unreachable. Though they produce sounds, the characters do not speak in an intelligible human voice. They are stripped of their humanity in their own Africa and their voice(s) and actions are reduced to that of subhumans.
They are a cheated people. Cheated by a discourse of democracy, that promises them “freedom” of expression but refuses to hear them when they speak in their own terms to express their own needs. Though they are embodied in space, the characters are faceless, reduced to living things rather than “recognized” as human beings.
They are a cheated people; cheated by a negotiated settlement that promises to recognize their humanity and restore their dignity but then treats them as so much rubble and noise.
The play succeeds in conveying a deep sense of betrayal coupled by emotions of anguish, despair, frustration and rage. Plunged into the abyss of despair, the people resort to using any means possible to restore their dignity; their very humanity.
The people will stop at nothing to achieve this end. If their voices are not recognized by the current dispensation, if their form of expression is not accorded any currency in the system, the people will explore all means possible including terror, violence and destruction. They will make a statement at all costs. They will seek to bring about change by all means.
It was a people’s philosopher, Frantz Fanon, who insisted that a people will have to destroy all the barriers of old in order to achieve true emancipation. The truly new, fresh and humane is born out of the ruins of the old and stagnant.
“We are Everyone, We are Everywhere,” reads a placard. The message is sent that the voiceless and faceless have immense powers of destruction that will, in time, be unleashed to a society that refuses to recognize them.
The ultimate message sent by the play is that we are, as a nation, sitting on a time bomb that will, in time, explode should the necessary measures not be taken to urgently address the plight of the historically dispossessed and dehumanized.
Freedom remains an elusive ideal. The people remain voiceless and faceless in post Apartheid South Africa. Their situation is a permanent state of loss, anguish and despair that will result in the destruction of everything if not urgently responded to.
Money for Shoes
The artist agency lies in her ability to play with the nuances and subtleties of culture. She illuminates the intricacies and complexities of the everyday, and is forever bent on exploring the taken for granted. She sharpens aspects of lifestyle that are often ignored, and undermines the most cherished ones. At her best, the artist underplays aspects of culture that are promoted by mainstream society for the expedient purpose of maintaining a particular hegemony.
In the play Money for Shoes, by Ayanda Khala and Refiloe Lepere we encounter a play dealing with the world and its people in a subtle, witty, subversive, intelligent and informative manner. The play is interactive and allows the audience participation throughout its unfolding.
In this play we are exposed to interesting but difficult transformations in the lives of two black women coming of age, Dineo, played by Refiloe Lepere and Thando played by Ayanda Khala. Juanita Azanai plays the character of a show host Stella. She facilitates discussions on issues emanating from the play and she manages to engage the audience to bits.
In the play Money for Shoes, by Ayanda Khala and Refiloe Lepere we encounter a play dealing with the world and its people in a subtle, witty, subversive, intelligent and informative manner. The play is interactive and allows the audience participation throughout its unfolding.
In this play we are exposed to interesting but difficult transformations in the lives of two black women coming of age, Dineo, played by Refiloe Lepere and Thando played by Ayanda Khala. Juanita Azanai plays the character of a show host Stella. She facilitates discussions on issues emanating from the play and she manages to engage the audience to bits.
The lives of the characters are placed within an evolving South African black socio-cultural context. A context that is mostly ignored, and when attended, is often portrayed in a manner that perpetuates the stereotype of uncontrolled sexuality and unbridled criminal behavior.
Through the lives of two women, we are exposed to the often ignored aesthetic texture of township vernacular culture and its complex relationship to mainstream white patriarchy. We are exposed to the women’s multiple experiences and relations at different stages of their lives. We are exposed to their authorities, their networks, their routines, their games, their joys, their frustrations, their politics, their aspirations, their resentments and their rebelliousness. We are exposed to the pains and joys engendered by transitions in their lives. We are exposed to ways in which the various transitions and changes in life are negotiated.
The women are friends since childhood and they take their friendship to adulthood. They play and love. But they also harbor aspirations beyond where they are at any given stage of their lives. They encounter major conflicts and contradictions in their games, their relationships, their sex lives and their aspirations. By virtue of being friends, they are involved in the same kind of games. But they play their cards differently. Their understanding of what it means to be a black woman differs. As a result they react differently and come to different conclusions about living life as a black woman in a “free” South Africa.
They agree on something though and that one thing becomes a rallying cry against the one force they feel the most; patriarchy. Their pact Men are nothing but Money for Shoes. With this “declaration” the two women attain to some measure of agency, some form of power, even under circumstances aimed at humiliating them. For conquest achieves its fullest effect when its victims admit defeat.
Most black men, just like white men, are sick creatures who derive their sense of manhood from their sexual conquests. This inflates their egos; their sense of self worth and importance. The women in the story find agency in their power to define. They might not change men but they can change what they think about them. For, meaning is also a zone of struggle. A terrain of power. The women dare define their relations with men differently, and in their own world men are “nothing” but Money for Shoes.
Men might think that they have conquered them, but in so far as they are not conceding to this they deny them a sardistic delight in absolute conquest. Agency is, however, something to constantly struggle for. The women fail to recognize the power of patriarchy and therefore the urgency and immensity of their struggle and the constant alertness and commitment it is calling for, and, in the end, a man comes in between them and they part ways. A tragedy indeed!
Perhaps the greatest strength of the play lies in its capacity to engage the audience. The audience is involved in the resolving of serious ethical challenges facing women coming of age, such as abuse, harassment, xenophobia, sexism, tribalism, racism, love, betrayal, marriage, choice, commitment and so on. Though the nature of the play is such that it does not present simple solutions to these challenges, the audience is left with something to think about and, perhaps, projects to commit to in a quest to change the world to a better form.
Tuesday, January 29, 2008
A Response
I should start with bringing your attention to the fact that I am responding as an individual, and not as a group. But do not despair, I respond as a member of the group, organically linked to its working and, if that is not arrogance, entitled to speaking from a\my perspective within it.
Then I should further alert you to the fact that I am a structuralist: contents are shaped and thereby delimited by structural considerations and concerns. The content is, of course, important, indeed it is the content that enables people to be unique and a one, but all of that content is given articulation by a dominant structure. It means then that, as a strategy, I argue at a structural level, framing my response within what I deem appropriate boundaries. It has the unfortunate side effect of portraying me as a fatuous sophist, interested in rhetoric, or less graciously put, interested only in the sound of my own voice. If so, I apologise in advance, and beg a tolerant reading of me.
The Black Consciousness Collective is, as you have correctly pointed out, about Black Consciousness. But, as I hope is self evident, BC is the object of our coming together. As a concept then, I suggest, it is mute and seeks, as with Biko and his contemporaries so with us, an animator. It seeks, in a word reminiscent of an ideology that shamelessly pulled from the supernatural to cow the illiterate and weak into submission, to be quickened. In us, very specifically the working committee of the BCC, but also, to our eternal delight, those who respond to the call we issue regularly, it found Subjects willing to impregnate it with the seed of present day black aspirations. I suggest, Andile, that the real player here, and the frame within which questions should be articulated, is non other than the Collective. It is, as I sense you suggest in your writing, the players that make the BC. Hence, for example, your categories of different players that constitute, broadly speaking, present day Black Consciousness.
I also suggest that BC is yet a concept that needs elevation to the level of structure. I suspect that this distinction, between concept and structure, will need a separate argument all of its own to make sense. I cannot pursue that here though and ask, yet again, an indulgence in this matter for the sake of this argument.
The player, though, should be dialectically understood, no? All during the unchallenged hegemony of formal logic thinking patterns could not deal with contradictions. In its nature, formal logic could only deal with clear and unambiguous boundaries, necessitating the need for exclusions. Dialectics, originally advanced in the form of questions to break down established ideological (in the Marxist sense) certitudes, evolved (mutated is the word I would use) to a point where it could hold contradictions. In its earlier state, before Hegel and the not so benevolent intervention of Marx, the dialectic appeared as a question. Questions are silent about the nature of answers, and can comfortably reach eternal age without answers. Contrary to the formal logician’s construction of the relationship between questions and answers, chronologically articulated as cause and effect, questions demand no necessary relationship with and to answers.
And so, rather fatuously, we reach a point where I can state a thesis and defend it. Hopefully.
There is no practise without theory. I do not simply mean that whenever you find practise you also find theory, but that without theory there cannot exist practise. The fuddled and generally inchoate pronouncements half heard from populist Preachers masquerading as Politicians, and howled at full throttle by many Followers, do not qualify as theory. Yet, and this we know from our own pathetic situation, practise is not necessary to yoke people together in a common nonsense cause. We know from our own experiences that people can be yoked together for the sole purpose of gorging themselves like pigs at the trough, and about the same amount of thinking as pigs is required to fill the belly with pig food.
Further, and this is something you hint at first, Andile, people can hide this piggish behaviour behind the guise of practise. They can do this because practise is within the realm of the real, and the real is not but constantly becoming. So those in power can produce substandard realities, and we, trapped within realities because we are already always produced, continue to seek reprieve in that matrix. This unfortunate circumstance can only be effectively fought at the realm of Ideas. At this level, the level of ideas, people can effectively stop the production of certain realities, and certainly substandard realities.
The Girl From Khutsong, without theory, will continue to fail to produce reality. Though I understand and sympathise with Girl From Khutsong’s plight, for it is my plight and that of people I hold dear, I do not make the mistake of apprehending what she does as practise. Her anger is qualitatively no different from that of a hurricane; you need only wait for it to blow over. And though the hurricane is frightening in its anger, and we are happy to accept that that anger is many times brought on by our alienated from nature pursuits, we therefore also know that the solution lies with us, and not the hurricane. See this, Andile? Constantly and continuously, the oppressed seek salvation from the oppressor. Even when they seem to be fighting those in power, the oppressed, like the hurricane, remain the creation of the oppressor.
Black Consciousness is yet an Idea, still at its conceptual stage. In this regard Biko, and the early Black Consciousness adherents, provide us with material with which to build a structure. The structure that is being built is geared towards a black world where every content, be it material or immaterial substances, will be structured by that black world. Structures, though, are considerably more than Ideas, even if those ideas form the basis, indeed are the material, of the structure. To move, in the ultimate liberation struggle, from ideas to structure will call for first immersion in and then above average (am I quoting the President’s mother?) skill in wielding those ideas. Immersion in ideas will always be a struggle. But immersion in ideas that are against the very being that you are produced to be will take sacrifice to dwarf that of the cross hanged man. To immerse yourself and then get to be above average in the wielding of those selfsame ideas will take many lifetimes. It is not the stone against the Casper that can be imported to posterity; it is the idea of it that will be handed down. The best we can do, even as we live dangerously and actually take up stones to throw at the Casper, is to refine those ideas. Those ideas refined create ideology. Ideology, understood simply as ideas related to each other in a particular way, and not as a systematic deceiver in the Marxist sense, becomes theory when we can translate ideology into phenomenon. That whole process, seen from beginning to end, constitute structure. Obviously this is abstract, and I would have to give an actual example i.e. capture the relations between ideas as relations between concrete visible matter. Again, this will need a separate paper.
The material that aboBiko provide us with is necessary, but far from sufficient. It is, I submit, a thing that both he and his contemporaries understood, though, unfortunately, some of his contemporaries have been overtaken by linear time, and the material world. We get to another part of this paper then: the dialectic and the holding of contradictions.
Let us start with what I consider a basic component of Black Consciousness: a black skin. Consciousness, as in Black Consciousness, will have to be embodied in a body that has a black skin. It is then the efforts of these black skinned people that must bring about the structure alluded to above. The first step is to allow all black skinned people to have a space for their views. In this space, that start with the basic fact of the black skin, holding contradictory views should not be a basis for exclusion. The Collective, even though they may hold different conceptions of BC, must give themselves over to that common cause.
It is within that space that we can synthesize, and it is also within that space that substandard realities can be exposed for what they are. In my construction, where theory precedes practise, death at the theoretical stage is enough to stop the emergence of piggish realities. If one’s position cannot be articulated, and one holds it still, then that one is perverse. Can we not deal with perversity?
Mbongisi Dyantyi
Then I should further alert you to the fact that I am a structuralist: contents are shaped and thereby delimited by structural considerations and concerns. The content is, of course, important, indeed it is the content that enables people to be unique and a one, but all of that content is given articulation by a dominant structure. It means then that, as a strategy, I argue at a structural level, framing my response within what I deem appropriate boundaries. It has the unfortunate side effect of portraying me as a fatuous sophist, interested in rhetoric, or less graciously put, interested only in the sound of my own voice. If so, I apologise in advance, and beg a tolerant reading of me.
The Black Consciousness Collective is, as you have correctly pointed out, about Black Consciousness. But, as I hope is self evident, BC is the object of our coming together. As a concept then, I suggest, it is mute and seeks, as with Biko and his contemporaries so with us, an animator. It seeks, in a word reminiscent of an ideology that shamelessly pulled from the supernatural to cow the illiterate and weak into submission, to be quickened. In us, very specifically the working committee of the BCC, but also, to our eternal delight, those who respond to the call we issue regularly, it found Subjects willing to impregnate it with the seed of present day black aspirations. I suggest, Andile, that the real player here, and the frame within which questions should be articulated, is non other than the Collective. It is, as I sense you suggest in your writing, the players that make the BC. Hence, for example, your categories of different players that constitute, broadly speaking, present day Black Consciousness.
I also suggest that BC is yet a concept that needs elevation to the level of structure. I suspect that this distinction, between concept and structure, will need a separate argument all of its own to make sense. I cannot pursue that here though and ask, yet again, an indulgence in this matter for the sake of this argument.
The player, though, should be dialectically understood, no? All during the unchallenged hegemony of formal logic thinking patterns could not deal with contradictions. In its nature, formal logic could only deal with clear and unambiguous boundaries, necessitating the need for exclusions. Dialectics, originally advanced in the form of questions to break down established ideological (in the Marxist sense) certitudes, evolved (mutated is the word I would use) to a point where it could hold contradictions. In its earlier state, before Hegel and the not so benevolent intervention of Marx, the dialectic appeared as a question. Questions are silent about the nature of answers, and can comfortably reach eternal age without answers. Contrary to the formal logician’s construction of the relationship between questions and answers, chronologically articulated as cause and effect, questions demand no necessary relationship with and to answers.
And so, rather fatuously, we reach a point where I can state a thesis and defend it. Hopefully.
There is no practise without theory. I do not simply mean that whenever you find practise you also find theory, but that without theory there cannot exist practise. The fuddled and generally inchoate pronouncements half heard from populist Preachers masquerading as Politicians, and howled at full throttle by many Followers, do not qualify as theory. Yet, and this we know from our own pathetic situation, practise is not necessary to yoke people together in a common nonsense cause. We know from our own experiences that people can be yoked together for the sole purpose of gorging themselves like pigs at the trough, and about the same amount of thinking as pigs is required to fill the belly with pig food.
Further, and this is something you hint at first, Andile, people can hide this piggish behaviour behind the guise of practise. They can do this because practise is within the realm of the real, and the real is not but constantly becoming. So those in power can produce substandard realities, and we, trapped within realities because we are already always produced, continue to seek reprieve in that matrix. This unfortunate circumstance can only be effectively fought at the realm of Ideas. At this level, the level of ideas, people can effectively stop the production of certain realities, and certainly substandard realities.
The Girl From Khutsong, without theory, will continue to fail to produce reality. Though I understand and sympathise with Girl From Khutsong’s plight, for it is my plight and that of people I hold dear, I do not make the mistake of apprehending what she does as practise. Her anger is qualitatively no different from that of a hurricane; you need only wait for it to blow over. And though the hurricane is frightening in its anger, and we are happy to accept that that anger is many times brought on by our alienated from nature pursuits, we therefore also know that the solution lies with us, and not the hurricane. See this, Andile? Constantly and continuously, the oppressed seek salvation from the oppressor. Even when they seem to be fighting those in power, the oppressed, like the hurricane, remain the creation of the oppressor.
Black Consciousness is yet an Idea, still at its conceptual stage. In this regard Biko, and the early Black Consciousness adherents, provide us with material with which to build a structure. The structure that is being built is geared towards a black world where every content, be it material or immaterial substances, will be structured by that black world. Structures, though, are considerably more than Ideas, even if those ideas form the basis, indeed are the material, of the structure. To move, in the ultimate liberation struggle, from ideas to structure will call for first immersion in and then above average (am I quoting the President’s mother?) skill in wielding those ideas. Immersion in ideas will always be a struggle. But immersion in ideas that are against the very being that you are produced to be will take sacrifice to dwarf that of the cross hanged man. To immerse yourself and then get to be above average in the wielding of those selfsame ideas will take many lifetimes. It is not the stone against the Casper that can be imported to posterity; it is the idea of it that will be handed down. The best we can do, even as we live dangerously and actually take up stones to throw at the Casper, is to refine those ideas. Those ideas refined create ideology. Ideology, understood simply as ideas related to each other in a particular way, and not as a systematic deceiver in the Marxist sense, becomes theory when we can translate ideology into phenomenon. That whole process, seen from beginning to end, constitute structure. Obviously this is abstract, and I would have to give an actual example i.e. capture the relations between ideas as relations between concrete visible matter. Again, this will need a separate paper.
The material that aboBiko provide us with is necessary, but far from sufficient. It is, I submit, a thing that both he and his contemporaries understood, though, unfortunately, some of his contemporaries have been overtaken by linear time, and the material world. We get to another part of this paper then: the dialectic and the holding of contradictions.
Let us start with what I consider a basic component of Black Consciousness: a black skin. Consciousness, as in Black Consciousness, will have to be embodied in a body that has a black skin. It is then the efforts of these black skinned people that must bring about the structure alluded to above. The first step is to allow all black skinned people to have a space for their views. In this space, that start with the basic fact of the black skin, holding contradictory views should not be a basis for exclusion. The Collective, even though they may hold different conceptions of BC, must give themselves over to that common cause.
It is within that space that we can synthesize, and it is also within that space that substandard realities can be exposed for what they are. In my construction, where theory precedes practise, death at the theoretical stage is enough to stop the emergence of piggish realities. If one’s position cannot be articulated, and one holds it still, then that one is perverse. Can we not deal with perversity?
Mbongisi Dyantyi
Friday, January 25, 2008
A Response
Analysis of the letter to BCC
The role of the current BC streams highlighted is perhaps crude and minimal, but Andile's oversimplified, harsh and purely polemical account contributes very minimally to the subject matter, Black Consciousness (BC). All these strands can be appropriated and given explicit roles in BC as I will endeavour to demonstrate below.
First stream
If the account of this stream is to be taken seriously, then we will have to assume that it is not so mindless and sterile after all. I can see that this fact is within Andile’s reach but out of his conscious grasp. Insofar as he states that the stream is a BC strand, I infer that, even for him, the stream is not so mindless and sterile. The problem is that it is rather overshadowed by what he refers to as "capitalism madness." This is a fact I am willing to consent to. Though the capitalist agenda has tainted the strand, I still refuse to totally discard it. The black consciousness elements in the strand; also acknowledged by Andile, are of essence to modern African culture and thus it can be afforded a role in the bigger BC agenda. Rather, an appropriate response to this is, if you cannot evade planting your seeds with weed you might as well let the weed grow with the plants when the time for harvest comes you burn away the weed and keep your crops. But still let me concede the validity of the author’s prudence against the weed but discourage going overboard by uprooting everything.
Second stream
It is an indubitable fact that it was Biko’s and BC’ will that blacks one day should define themselves as they deem fit, thus the poets’ role within BC. However blackness is something to struggle for and anyone who dares assert the word "black" or speak in the name of "the black experience" need to account to the black community at large. Thus the need for engaging poetry. I do not see how does dismissing the poetic in expression contributes in the attainment of the desired self definition.
Third stream
Again this version can be exploited as the historical heritage of BC, instead of throwing stones while living in a glass house we should be the voice of this mute and be the lively motion to these monuments. By the way, such intellectual outputs as I Write What I like, Bounds of Possibilities, and On Your Own, just to name but a few, are products of Biko’s contemporaries who occupy these institutions today.
Fourth stream
We need not to bring capital to justice, since we have no case against it but against the capitalists. Our predecessors worked hard for these capitalists but were unfairly treated. What we need now is the re-administration of value.
Fifth stream
Yes, we are still confronted by issues of poverty, lack of efficient service delivery, unemployment, exclusion in the socio-economical and political spheres at large. I am not, however, certain that this reality necessarily make those at the receiving end conscious. I deem this comprehension of BC disturbingly problematic; unlike Biko’s BC, a complex philosophy which perceives and explicates the underpinnings of the above mentioned experiences. Alternatively, being aware through just experience of poverty is simply being aware first and foremost of your own position within a broader socio-economical system, but still this does not constitute black consciousness. this view is very crude. BC is a meticulous theoretical undertaking on issues not just brute experiences which are not defined. Infact you will be surprised how many of the marginalized think that the problem is exclusion from participation in capitalist indulgence.
The current protests you highlight as the source of true BC are far from being informed by the theoretical underpinnings of BC; they lack rigorous diagnosis pertaining to socio-economical and political issues. How on earth are such actions without a philosophical base understood as BC? The author here fails to take into cognizance that external equivalence does not necessary presuppose “internal equivalence”. That is, the fact that the 1976 youth and the Khutsong youth “courageously” confronted the regimes of their times does not add up to the same intent. The 1976 upheaval led by SASM was unequivocally about defending the dignity of blackness; I am not so sure that the same can be boldly said about Khutsong.
My analysis on these streams is immensely influenced by the surrealists who are later mentioned in this paper. This movement of art and literature which is said to express itself in disfigured, disjoined, and exotic imagery as though in dreams. The insight I extracted from this movement’s depictions is exactly their expressionism which I relate to as I fail to paint a complete body with all it members in right positions, conjoined, allure, well shaped and a colourful picture of my black identity. Regardless of my artistic skills (reasoning), the colourful paints of my logic which then seem dull, the clean brushes of my analysis which now look filthy, and the beautiful background of my history which is the crux of civilizations, albeit I know better about my barbaric history from 1652; I still emerge with a grotesque painting. My point being, the above distorted streams of bc resembles the art of surrealists; “with their devoid poetry”, “sterile cultural expressionism”, the influence from a “despicable pamphlet of death masquerading as serious work of the black question”, the noisy status bound hip-hop and urban spoken words projects with their “African” regalia to boot”, “Their dead poetry which repeats itself into a deadening crescendo utterly devoid of the beauty of authentic black rage”, “mute and deaf monuments and icons which find refuge in past glories and burden the dead with the projects of now” “and black collective experience of sorrow”. Against the backdrop of white supremacy how else do we express our identity, I ask?
Andile’s approach of anticipating the strands within BC to be completely ideal (perfect) is unrealistic and thus not in touch with theory, since it is an unattainable aspiration for theory to be ideal, apart from handful exceptional cases. Reality is only captured in theory, and anything that occurs outside the ambit of it cannot be understood as something that has really transpired, regardless of its coercive appearances. If it cannot stand the trial of theory and cogently affirm itself, it is spurious. If this assertion holds, how off tangent it is to expect theory (reality) to encapsulate the ideal, bearing in mind that by nature theory is not ideal.
“Blacks are out to completely transform the system and to make of it what they wish. Such a major undertaking can only be realized in an atmosphere where people are conscious of the truth inherent in their stand. Liberation therefore is of paramount importance in the concept of Black Consciousness, for we cannot be conscious of ourselves and yet remain in bondage. We want to attain the envisioned self, which is a free self”. Yes consciousness precedes liberation not the other way around, and you cannot have the consequent without the antecedent. Courageous acts without proper guidance by theory are as futile as “theory” followed by cowardice acts.
On Thought and Action
Let me begin by remedial work here, it is not just any action which is implicated in any thought, but it is rather, right thinking which implicates right action.
This Karl Max’s citation is the most misused phrase of all time. What people forget when they utilize it is to reflect on the fact that Karl Marx himself did not change the world largely by action, but he gave further interpretations (theory) of the world which changed it. This also goes for Jesus (in response to that scripture by James). It is rather ironic that Jesus’ significance is theoretical to a larger extent rather than practical.
Let me be controversial here; "actions cannot reflect, it is only theory that reflects." But if the two sentences which preceded this scrutiny were true, this would mean there was an inappropriate connection between the two, that is, thought and action. That is, right theoretical thinking precedes right action. Proper action only comes after revision of action. I argue that revision is not solely a result of action. Recall that actions are preceded by thought; therefore if an action seems to be in need of improvement, in actual fact it is the antecedent (the thought) that needs improvement not the action.
On Western Philosophy
Now venturing into the valley of the most appalling views of Andile’s paper, these are irredeemable contradictions of the paper which seek to subvert the rationality of the paper in totality.
Above the paper went on about the futility of philosophy, but the white men’s philosophy currently is said to have “alienated” us; but yet the author fails to see the necessity of a black strong philosophy to counter the West! Rather perplexing that the Western philosophy explicitly elicit action (alienation, though subtle but still an action), but the same credit is barely granted to “black philosophy”.
But in this insurmountable contradictory extract he further acknowledges the impact of philosophy, consider: “My view in fact is that it is of little use to philosophize outside action aimed at dislodging the white supremacist edifice deeply ingrained in the structures of politics, economics and even the whole cultural plain (here I understand culture in its broadest sociological sense)”. How on earth can we dissipate these white supremacy structures without theory? if they have entrenched themselves philosophically in “our” politics, economics, society and cultural sight. Now without right philosophical theory, how can the Khutsong multitudes which he fails to see that they share the same bed with what he called black colonialist and Indunas bring about revolution?
On Critiques of Black Western Educated Middle Class
All these critiques cannot have been articulated immaculately, since they also employed particular intellectual tools. This segment of the paper demonstrates lack of rigorous treatment of phenomena, which is, specificity on references and averting overgeneralization. Consider the following Reduction ad absurdum.
* Western intellectual tools are flawed; thus they should all be discarded
* Educated black middle class employ Western intellectual tools
* Therefore educated black middle class should commit class suicide
The above assertion employed Western intellectual tools to conduct the analysis. Hence it follows that the intellectual tools employed to conduct the above assertion are also flawed, thus they should also he discarded (this is the insanity of this argument; it employs the same flawed tools it condemns).
On the Drunken Exchange
Yes, the argument can be universalized.
All states are corruptible
South Africa is a state
Therefore South Africa is corruptible
Having listened to the drunken exchange which I was a part of, I feel compelled to set the record straight that the Bolivian and Venezuelan arguments were dismissed on rather reasonable grounds. They were accused of designating the deterioration of abstract argument into concrete disputation. But also the charge above of concrete “arguments” leading to endless quarrels holds, especially if they are not treated well, that is, employed by abstract arguments as their concrete instantiations.
Nkosinathi Mahlangu.
The role of the current BC streams highlighted is perhaps crude and minimal, but Andile's oversimplified, harsh and purely polemical account contributes very minimally to the subject matter, Black Consciousness (BC). All these strands can be appropriated and given explicit roles in BC as I will endeavour to demonstrate below.
First stream
If the account of this stream is to be taken seriously, then we will have to assume that it is not so mindless and sterile after all. I can see that this fact is within Andile’s reach but out of his conscious grasp. Insofar as he states that the stream is a BC strand, I infer that, even for him, the stream is not so mindless and sterile. The problem is that it is rather overshadowed by what he refers to as "capitalism madness." This is a fact I am willing to consent to. Though the capitalist agenda has tainted the strand, I still refuse to totally discard it. The black consciousness elements in the strand; also acknowledged by Andile, are of essence to modern African culture and thus it can be afforded a role in the bigger BC agenda. Rather, an appropriate response to this is, if you cannot evade planting your seeds with weed you might as well let the weed grow with the plants when the time for harvest comes you burn away the weed and keep your crops. But still let me concede the validity of the author’s prudence against the weed but discourage going overboard by uprooting everything.
Second stream
It is an indubitable fact that it was Biko’s and BC’ will that blacks one day should define themselves as they deem fit, thus the poets’ role within BC. However blackness is something to struggle for and anyone who dares assert the word "black" or speak in the name of "the black experience" need to account to the black community at large. Thus the need for engaging poetry. I do not see how does dismissing the poetic in expression contributes in the attainment of the desired self definition.
Third stream
Again this version can be exploited as the historical heritage of BC, instead of throwing stones while living in a glass house we should be the voice of this mute and be the lively motion to these monuments. By the way, such intellectual outputs as I Write What I like, Bounds of Possibilities, and On Your Own, just to name but a few, are products of Biko’s contemporaries who occupy these institutions today.
Fourth stream
We need not to bring capital to justice, since we have no case against it but against the capitalists. Our predecessors worked hard for these capitalists but were unfairly treated. What we need now is the re-administration of value.
Fifth stream
Yes, we are still confronted by issues of poverty, lack of efficient service delivery, unemployment, exclusion in the socio-economical and political spheres at large. I am not, however, certain that this reality necessarily make those at the receiving end conscious. I deem this comprehension of BC disturbingly problematic; unlike Biko’s BC, a complex philosophy which perceives and explicates the underpinnings of the above mentioned experiences. Alternatively, being aware through just experience of poverty is simply being aware first and foremost of your own position within a broader socio-economical system, but still this does not constitute black consciousness. this view is very crude. BC is a meticulous theoretical undertaking on issues not just brute experiences which are not defined. Infact you will be surprised how many of the marginalized think that the problem is exclusion from participation in capitalist indulgence.
The current protests you highlight as the source of true BC are far from being informed by the theoretical underpinnings of BC; they lack rigorous diagnosis pertaining to socio-economical and political issues. How on earth are such actions without a philosophical base understood as BC? The author here fails to take into cognizance that external equivalence does not necessary presuppose “internal equivalence”. That is, the fact that the 1976 youth and the Khutsong youth “courageously” confronted the regimes of their times does not add up to the same intent. The 1976 upheaval led by SASM was unequivocally about defending the dignity of blackness; I am not so sure that the same can be boldly said about Khutsong.
My analysis on these streams is immensely influenced by the surrealists who are later mentioned in this paper. This movement of art and literature which is said to express itself in disfigured, disjoined, and exotic imagery as though in dreams. The insight I extracted from this movement’s depictions is exactly their expressionism which I relate to as I fail to paint a complete body with all it members in right positions, conjoined, allure, well shaped and a colourful picture of my black identity. Regardless of my artistic skills (reasoning), the colourful paints of my logic which then seem dull, the clean brushes of my analysis which now look filthy, and the beautiful background of my history which is the crux of civilizations, albeit I know better about my barbaric history from 1652; I still emerge with a grotesque painting. My point being, the above distorted streams of bc resembles the art of surrealists; “with their devoid poetry”, “sterile cultural expressionism”, the influence from a “despicable pamphlet of death masquerading as serious work of the black question”, the noisy status bound hip-hop and urban spoken words projects with their “African” regalia to boot”, “Their dead poetry which repeats itself into a deadening crescendo utterly devoid of the beauty of authentic black rage”, “mute and deaf monuments and icons which find refuge in past glories and burden the dead with the projects of now” “and black collective experience of sorrow”. Against the backdrop of white supremacy how else do we express our identity, I ask?
Andile’s approach of anticipating the strands within BC to be completely ideal (perfect) is unrealistic and thus not in touch with theory, since it is an unattainable aspiration for theory to be ideal, apart from handful exceptional cases. Reality is only captured in theory, and anything that occurs outside the ambit of it cannot be understood as something that has really transpired, regardless of its coercive appearances. If it cannot stand the trial of theory and cogently affirm itself, it is spurious. If this assertion holds, how off tangent it is to expect theory (reality) to encapsulate the ideal, bearing in mind that by nature theory is not ideal.
“Blacks are out to completely transform the system and to make of it what they wish. Such a major undertaking can only be realized in an atmosphere where people are conscious of the truth inherent in their stand. Liberation therefore is of paramount importance in the concept of Black Consciousness, for we cannot be conscious of ourselves and yet remain in bondage. We want to attain the envisioned self, which is a free self”. Yes consciousness precedes liberation not the other way around, and you cannot have the consequent without the antecedent. Courageous acts without proper guidance by theory are as futile as “theory” followed by cowardice acts.
On Thought and Action
Let me begin by remedial work here, it is not just any action which is implicated in any thought, but it is rather, right thinking which implicates right action.
This Karl Max’s citation is the most misused phrase of all time. What people forget when they utilize it is to reflect on the fact that Karl Marx himself did not change the world largely by action, but he gave further interpretations (theory) of the world which changed it. This also goes for Jesus (in response to that scripture by James). It is rather ironic that Jesus’ significance is theoretical to a larger extent rather than practical.
Let me be controversial here; "actions cannot reflect, it is only theory that reflects." But if the two sentences which preceded this scrutiny were true, this would mean there was an inappropriate connection between the two, that is, thought and action. That is, right theoretical thinking precedes right action. Proper action only comes after revision of action. I argue that revision is not solely a result of action. Recall that actions are preceded by thought; therefore if an action seems to be in need of improvement, in actual fact it is the antecedent (the thought) that needs improvement not the action.
On Western Philosophy
Now venturing into the valley of the most appalling views of Andile’s paper, these are irredeemable contradictions of the paper which seek to subvert the rationality of the paper in totality.
Above the paper went on about the futility of philosophy, but the white men’s philosophy currently is said to have “alienated” us; but yet the author fails to see the necessity of a black strong philosophy to counter the West! Rather perplexing that the Western philosophy explicitly elicit action (alienation, though subtle but still an action), but the same credit is barely granted to “black philosophy”.
But in this insurmountable contradictory extract he further acknowledges the impact of philosophy, consider: “My view in fact is that it is of little use to philosophize outside action aimed at dislodging the white supremacist edifice deeply ingrained in the structures of politics, economics and even the whole cultural plain (here I understand culture in its broadest sociological sense)”. How on earth can we dissipate these white supremacy structures without theory? if they have entrenched themselves philosophically in “our” politics, economics, society and cultural sight. Now without right philosophical theory, how can the Khutsong multitudes which he fails to see that they share the same bed with what he called black colonialist and Indunas bring about revolution?
On Critiques of Black Western Educated Middle Class
All these critiques cannot have been articulated immaculately, since they also employed particular intellectual tools. This segment of the paper demonstrates lack of rigorous treatment of phenomena, which is, specificity on references and averting overgeneralization. Consider the following Reduction ad absurdum.
* Western intellectual tools are flawed; thus they should all be discarded
* Educated black middle class employ Western intellectual tools
* Therefore educated black middle class should commit class suicide
The above assertion employed Western intellectual tools to conduct the analysis. Hence it follows that the intellectual tools employed to conduct the above assertion are also flawed, thus they should also he discarded (this is the insanity of this argument; it employs the same flawed tools it condemns).
On the Drunken Exchange
Yes, the argument can be universalized.
All states are corruptible
South Africa is a state
Therefore South Africa is corruptible
Having listened to the drunken exchange which I was a part of, I feel compelled to set the record straight that the Bolivian and Venezuelan arguments were dismissed on rather reasonable grounds. They were accused of designating the deterioration of abstract argument into concrete disputation. But also the charge above of concrete “arguments” leading to endless quarrels holds, especially if they are not treated well, that is, employed by abstract arguments as their concrete instantiations.
Nkosinathi Mahlangu.
Wednesday, January 23, 2008
A letter to the Black Consciousness Collective
Its been a long time since we've posted anything on this blog. Perhaps Andile Mngxitama's letter will, once again, remind us of issues at stake!
In the bc spirit of reflection, collective effort, critical engagement and praxis, your take on these matters is always welcome.
Lerato
A letter to the Black Consciousness Collective
The idea of writing this letter struck me whilst at my home village eNgcobo in the former Transkei.
Our village, which is know as eNyanga is part of a place with a strange name - “All Saints”. eNyanga is situated in the belly of mountains.
To the North is Kalinyanga, the south is Gilindonda and east the Qhuthubeni mountain. These are enchanting plains.
The faces of the rocks on the these mountains are permanantly embraced by paintings of Abatwa (the Sarah Baartman people), who helped to birth iSixhosa and gave it its seductive clicking sounds.
The majestic Xuka river meanders down stream towards Umthata. Here, I was generally engaged in the rituals and other festivities of our people, when my mind drifted to the Black Consciousness Collective (BCC).
Walking the land of Ngqika, it occurred to me that the BCC is far too important to be ignored. I also realized that I harbor some sense of impatience if not utter contempt at some of the habits (what I consider intellectual snobbery in particular), and gestures of arrogance of its members.
I also acknowledge that my interaction with the collective, its members and sympathizers is rather perfunctory to say the least- but still the BCC is such an important and promising initiative that I would be remise to give it a miss.
So I thought I should attempt a structured engagement which could afford us a basis for engagement and also leaving a record of this for posterity where it to be concerned with matters such as these.Let me say it at the outset, my intention is to seek clarity for myself on the role, politics and philosophy of the BCC amongst others.
I regard this as the first installment in what must naturally be a mutual educational intercourse for all of us (yes old dogs can learn new tricks too).I gather from the name of the collective that it is committed to or rather it is about Black Consciousness.
That’s well and good but which of the various contrasting and contending BC streams does the BCC align itself? (like Marxism, we can not longer take for granted that when we say “bc” we are all referring to the same thing).
I can immediately think of at least four contending versions of bc for instance: Firstly there is the BC of sterile cultural expressionism which is about promoting mindless consumption in aid of the capitalism madness of our age.
It’s the BC of Stone Cherry and Eric Miyenis of this world, its in agreement with the thesis proffered by the author of that despicable pamphlet of death, masquerading as serious work of on the black question - The Capitalist Nigger (which is our national best seller by the way). Secondly, and this is the off shoot of the first type of BC, its the noisy status bound hip-hop and urban spoken words projects with their “African” regalia to boot.
Practitioners of this bc simulate rebellion whilst they work their ways towards acceptance in the existing anti-black mainstream of the commercial cultural beast. The Rosebank underground.
These are by and large poets for hire. Their dead poetry repeats itself into a deadening crescendo utterly devoid of the beauty of authentic black rage.
Then there is the BC of monuments and icons. This is primarily promoted by institutional custodians of BC like Azanian People’s Organisation (AZAPO).
This kind of BC is mute and deaf on the prevailing black condition; it finds refuge in past glories and burdens the dead with the projects of now. It thrives on “ifs”, and exists in an inconsolable sorrow devoid of the impatience and appetite for “Bolekaja!”[1].
This BC cannot inspire blacks to rebellion and fire.
Then there is the BC of BEE, the least said about this the better (of course this version has strong affinities with the first two alluded to above).
BEE is about a new class of plunderers who use their black skin and our black collective experience of sorrow to insert them in the economic mainstream built and still sustaining itself on stolen black land, labour and the African “being”.
These new agents of accumulation by theft and dispossession provide legitimacy to white monopoly capitalism, which must be vanquished if blacks are to have a chance to liberation.
Capital in our country needs to be brought to the justice and answer for its sins and atone for near death agony it inflicted/afflicts on the black body.
The last version is what I’d like to think of as the real living BC, which resides within the excluded multitudes. It’s a bc of the black margins.
This BC finds concrete expression in the young girl of Khutsong hurling a rock at an oncoming Caspire in an act of courageous defiance and rage against the arrogance of post apartheid democratic power which looks and acts like the apartheid monster.
Its stones against bullets again, produced by the arrogance of state power instead of theuncompromising commitment to the art of persuasion/engagement/listening/dialogue/response/respect, these are the birth mark of true freedom.
This living BC resonated with the thousands which partake in what the media calls “service delivery protests”. For me BC and Biko lives in those cracks of the great unwashed every time they cry ya basta! From Khutsong to Chiapas.
It may be opportune to remind ourselves of how Biko viewed this matter of a philosophy of black liberation:“Blacks are out to completely transform the system and to make of it what they wish.
Such a major undertaking can only be realized in an atmosphere where people are conscious of the truth inherent in their stand. Liberation, therefore, is of paramount importance in the concept of black Consciousness, for we cannot be conscious of ourselves and yet remain in bondage.
We want to attain the envisioned self, which is a free selfI realize that I have been presumptuous on a number of points, but I have now gone too far to halt myself, so im going to ask, is the BCC at the beginning again?
In other words at the point of re-imagining BC? My question really is this, what does the BCC mean by BC? Implicit in this question is both a philosophical and practical consideration, what does BCC wants to achieve with its BC?
A related but side and inconsequential issue is this, what is BCC’s BC attitude to the ANC’s politics of non-racialism and integration (as a theory and now as practice of party in government).
Im sure you also may have to allude to the existing political formations such as Azapo, SOPA and BPC which proclaim bc as their guiding philosophy or ideology (a rather oppression term really, this ideology business).
I think it a little passé to raise the old question of the unity of thought and action. But I think I need to be explicit in case its not take care of in the broad set of “identity” questions I ask above.
In my engagement with members of your collective it seem to me that one can read a few contradictory attitudes towards this question of the unity of action and thought or lack thereof.
I heard, I hope correctly, for instance that action is already implicated in thought. This means there is no action, which is not preceded by thought.
I agree that this is generally a truthful assertion. But is it automatic that thought ends in action, or thought here is also action? A dialectical unity? But then how do we judge effectiveness? Or there is not physical materiality about this process?
Then of course I think there are certain forms of “thought” which are anti-thought and action, such as formulistic Eurocentric “logical” philosophy. I also recognize that Nazis, colonialists and imperialists have their own intellectuals and philosophers.
So from this point of view there is nothing progressive about philosophy a prior. I would not now want to raise my pet hate subject - the anti-black origins of most of western philosophy (how do you deal with this?).
I think a bit of Foucault quickly shows how everything is implicated in power, self interest and subjectivity. But of course im not interested in abstracted philosophical assertions, I'm interested in the specificity of your collective’s “thought” process and its relation to “action” aimed at the structures of oppression and denigration of black people... Surely, the sum total of your “action” can not be reduced to creating spaces for “critical dialogue”, although I would under duress accept such engagement as as action too.
If I were to walk ahead of your response on this one, I would say, im inspired by the likes of originators of the negritude movement (Suzanne Ceseair, Aime Cessaire, less so the likes of Sengor). These pioneers “culled” a lot of fire from the Surrealists and giving that philosophical movement some flames of rebellion in exchange, in the process created the possibility to act against all sorts of colonialisms.
I also remember well, old Karl Marx admonishing his German fellow philosophers for being obsessed with interpreting the world when the point was to change it.Allow me go religious a little.
You see, I grew up in a religious family even if I later I went agnostic- I have done my time in the trenches in the service of god, so there must be some residual matter of this past in me, I agree with Terry Eagleton, we cant be but what we are. So I beg your indulgence, just to draw a parallel if not a lesson from the holy book. I
n the book of James, James he postulates on matters of “Faith and Actions” (I hope to substitute “faith” for theory if not philosophy), he teachers us that; “ suppose there are brothers and sisters who need clothes and not have enough to eat. What good is there in you saying to them, “God bless you! Keep warm and eat well!”- if you don’t give them the necessities of life? So it is with faith: if it is alone and includes no actions then it is dead…. So then as the body without the spirit is dead, so also faith without actions is dead”.
I think it was Lenin who said he has yet to see a successful revolution without a revolutionary theory, but he also laughed at the idea of theory without action. Cabral said something alone those lines when he theorized on the issue “theory and practice”.
I find Paulo Ferere much useful on this score, personally. His dialogical method, of cause is not perfect, but shows that there is no possibility of learning or clarification, or even building critical consciousness without doing.
Action allows reflection on the concrete, leading to improvement and critical awareness.
This is the revolution!
Of course those students who started SASO in the late 60’s were deep into philosophy but they understood oppression as a concrete truth, deeply implicated power. Racial capitalism or apartheid is as concrete as the N1.
The SASO students understood very well that oppression couldn’t be dislodged by philosophic disputations alone.
It’s my contention that no one has yet contributed to changing the world for the better by simply holding a “correct philosophy”.
In fact under certain circumstances, to “philosophize” is a great sign of betrayal and cowardice. My view in fact is that its of little use to philosophize outside action aimed at dislodging the white supremacist edifice deeply ingrained in the structures of politics, economics and even the whole cultural plain (here I understand culture in its broadest sociological sense).
To try play philosophers without action is actually a self-serving and a safe option which also provides an alibi for doing nothing, it’s not unlike the “superfluous men” on the 19 century Russia.
This reminds me of the warnings from the pen of the mad one- Dambudzo Marechera, in his majestic “The Black Insider”( one can read that book from the back to the front because it doesn’t matter where you start really, it has no begging, middle or ending)- it’s a scream of consciousnesses shouting impatiently at you.
Somewhere Dambudzo writes;‘An excessive indulgence of the senses and thoughts… leads to the kind of decadence which can paralys all action. To tick all the orifices of pleasure and stimulate all the possible orgasms of intellectual heights would be to sort of contrast demanded by this sordid war”.
ncidentally, I happen to think that black people the world over live in a state of one sided sordid war which has not given us respite since the disastrous encounter with the white world starting with slavery, moving to colonialism, and imperialism to day.
I'm permanently flabbergasted by the patience and laxity from the black world living through this living hell. Only we blacks can afford this type of absent-mindedness in the middle of war of decimation. We are wont at keeping us busy with inane, irrelevancies; this is the curse of our black skin.
Somewhere else in the same text Dambudzo raises a matter which I think is relevant to this letter and to people like us;“…we use to joke about being fucked out by everything but never to the extent of seeing the uttermost truth at the center of the jest.
There was the gulf –as we saw it- between student thinking and activities and the workers-themselves whom I did not feel we had any qualifications to lead in anything. I had seen how “education” had given us too early a veneer of experience which our own elders mistook for mature and solid knowledge of a world that has rapidly ceased to be ours and had become a whiteman’s play ground for investment, good living, and casuals tormenting of Caliban”.
My point is that we (western educated black middle classes) are already deeply implicated in whiteness, our souls and minds are held captive by whiteness. Our philosophies are by and large alien. We have nothing to say to the great multitudes of our people except to give them disdain and scorn- we call them “the masses” with no sense of irony.
I have heard some of you say, “the masses think….”, and generally this would be to create a caricature- a mass of undifferentiated beings gravitating in colossal confusion and ignorance, and then we self congratulatingly arrogate clever philosophic position to “ourselves” – we are the philosophers!
The end result of this snobbish and vulgar valorization of our philosophic prowess leaves the “masses” all looking like Zuma.
This in my mind is the perfect colonial representation of the black world. Marechera on the other hand displays a liberating self-awareness of the place and general uselessness of the “educated” classes. Cabral, was crude but in my mind hugely correct to call for a “class suicide” of the “educated” anti-colonial African classes.
No one listened and we have reproduced what Chinuweizu correctly calls: “the black colonialists”- with no discernable exceptions all our African political, academic, intellectual and business leaders are black colonialist!
This brings me inevitably to politics. And here I understand politics narrowly as the exercise of power at state/government level.
I wish to raise a few questions, here. Firstly, does the BCC have any shared conceptual clarity on the “nature” or “character” of the post apartheid state?
I argue that there has been no rapture in this post apartheid state from the white supremacist one which was designed for serving white interest, the only substantial difference is that now this colonial, racist state is managed by black former liberation movement cadres. This reduces these managers of the racist state to indunas of whiteness.
Secondly, and I think we reflected a little on this, does the BCC have a general attitude to the state qua state? If so what?
This is really a ‘question of power’, to borrow from Bessie Head.
I was reminded of the sterile exchange we had with a member or sympathizer of BCC the last time- it went on like this (im paraphrasing)-
“The state has failed everywhere?”. person 1
“No the state can and must be subordinated to serve the interest of the people”, person 2.
“no there is no record of the state ever serving the people” person 1
“what about Venezuela and Bolivia…” person 2
“oh! Venezuela is going to save us all now. Hahahaha”- person 1
“ok, the Ven experiment is flawed buts it’s the real and existing example of what can be done”, person 2
“oh! No! my lord! Examples are poor substitute for argument, all which is need to is just to provide a counter example”- person 1 (reclining on his chair with the smile that talks victory).
The poverty of the above encounter, resides not in the bad formulation of argument and counter argument, in my book, but on the politics/philosophic perspectives informing the interlocutors (of course the arguments can be improved a lot and shed some more light).
For instance is person 1, making a universal statement which they purport to be true in all situations? Then of course this becomes abstract disputation, which would not yield to evidence.
Then we have abandoned philosophy and have entered the world of ideology. Is the second person on the other hand postulating that the state is necessarily a good thing in all situations over time and space? I think not. But I think the above drunken exchange points to sterility of a kind of argumentation devoid of “people centered” perspectives.
The issue of the state or non state can no longer be debated outside the history of the state and the different perspectives/ideologies informing the theorization of the state.
To argue against the state without distancing one from the likes of Milton Friedman and his latter day apostles in the form of the World Bank, IMF, the WTO and other agents neo-colonialism is to be in the side of death by default. There have always been various anti state positions, and one must be aware of this to avoid confusion.
For instance I find the example of Zapatistas and theory of “changing the world without taking power” ala John Holloway quite seductive, but I realize that one must deal with the impressive current now sweeping Latin American, signified by the state driven left transformations ala Bolivia. Ecuador, Venezuela etc. then there is the Chiapas example and multiple peasants and other movements of the excluded.
These are some of my initial thoughts, questions and postulations. And I realize this intervention made more “pragmatic” than “analytical”. It’s the 31st of December in the morning, I see the sun is shining bright outside, Im preparing myself to go get some drinks, meat and fireworks. 2007 was indeed a year of the Zunami. Let 2008 be better for black people the world over.
I think Mao Tse Tung was on to something when he penned this poem:"So many deeds cry out to be doneand always urgentlythe world rolls ontime pressesthen thousands and years are too longseized the dayseize the hour
Ona move!
Andile Mngxitama
31.12.2007
In the bc spirit of reflection, collective effort, critical engagement and praxis, your take on these matters is always welcome.
Lerato
A letter to the Black Consciousness Collective
The idea of writing this letter struck me whilst at my home village eNgcobo in the former Transkei.
Our village, which is know as eNyanga is part of a place with a strange name - “All Saints”. eNyanga is situated in the belly of mountains.
To the North is Kalinyanga, the south is Gilindonda and east the Qhuthubeni mountain. These are enchanting plains.
The faces of the rocks on the these mountains are permanantly embraced by paintings of Abatwa (the Sarah Baartman people), who helped to birth iSixhosa and gave it its seductive clicking sounds.
The majestic Xuka river meanders down stream towards Umthata. Here, I was generally engaged in the rituals and other festivities of our people, when my mind drifted to the Black Consciousness Collective (BCC).
Walking the land of Ngqika, it occurred to me that the BCC is far too important to be ignored. I also realized that I harbor some sense of impatience if not utter contempt at some of the habits (what I consider intellectual snobbery in particular), and gestures of arrogance of its members.
I also acknowledge that my interaction with the collective, its members and sympathizers is rather perfunctory to say the least- but still the BCC is such an important and promising initiative that I would be remise to give it a miss.
So I thought I should attempt a structured engagement which could afford us a basis for engagement and also leaving a record of this for posterity where it to be concerned with matters such as these.Let me say it at the outset, my intention is to seek clarity for myself on the role, politics and philosophy of the BCC amongst others.
I regard this as the first installment in what must naturally be a mutual educational intercourse for all of us (yes old dogs can learn new tricks too).I gather from the name of the collective that it is committed to or rather it is about Black Consciousness.
That’s well and good but which of the various contrasting and contending BC streams does the BCC align itself? (like Marxism, we can not longer take for granted that when we say “bc” we are all referring to the same thing).
I can immediately think of at least four contending versions of bc for instance: Firstly there is the BC of sterile cultural expressionism which is about promoting mindless consumption in aid of the capitalism madness of our age.
It’s the BC of Stone Cherry and Eric Miyenis of this world, its in agreement with the thesis proffered by the author of that despicable pamphlet of death, masquerading as serious work of on the black question - The Capitalist Nigger (which is our national best seller by the way). Secondly, and this is the off shoot of the first type of BC, its the noisy status bound hip-hop and urban spoken words projects with their “African” regalia to boot.
Practitioners of this bc simulate rebellion whilst they work their ways towards acceptance in the existing anti-black mainstream of the commercial cultural beast. The Rosebank underground.
These are by and large poets for hire. Their dead poetry repeats itself into a deadening crescendo utterly devoid of the beauty of authentic black rage.
Then there is the BC of monuments and icons. This is primarily promoted by institutional custodians of BC like Azanian People’s Organisation (AZAPO).
This kind of BC is mute and deaf on the prevailing black condition; it finds refuge in past glories and burdens the dead with the projects of now. It thrives on “ifs”, and exists in an inconsolable sorrow devoid of the impatience and appetite for “Bolekaja!”[1].
This BC cannot inspire blacks to rebellion and fire.
Then there is the BC of BEE, the least said about this the better (of course this version has strong affinities with the first two alluded to above).
BEE is about a new class of plunderers who use their black skin and our black collective experience of sorrow to insert them in the economic mainstream built and still sustaining itself on stolen black land, labour and the African “being”.
These new agents of accumulation by theft and dispossession provide legitimacy to white monopoly capitalism, which must be vanquished if blacks are to have a chance to liberation.
Capital in our country needs to be brought to the justice and answer for its sins and atone for near death agony it inflicted/afflicts on the black body.
The last version is what I’d like to think of as the real living BC, which resides within the excluded multitudes. It’s a bc of the black margins.
This BC finds concrete expression in the young girl of Khutsong hurling a rock at an oncoming Caspire in an act of courageous defiance and rage against the arrogance of post apartheid democratic power which looks and acts like the apartheid monster.
Its stones against bullets again, produced by the arrogance of state power instead of theuncompromising commitment to the art of persuasion/engagement/listening/dialogue/response/respect, these are the birth mark of true freedom.
This living BC resonated with the thousands which partake in what the media calls “service delivery protests”. For me BC and Biko lives in those cracks of the great unwashed every time they cry ya basta! From Khutsong to Chiapas.
It may be opportune to remind ourselves of how Biko viewed this matter of a philosophy of black liberation:“Blacks are out to completely transform the system and to make of it what they wish.
Such a major undertaking can only be realized in an atmosphere where people are conscious of the truth inherent in their stand. Liberation, therefore, is of paramount importance in the concept of black Consciousness, for we cannot be conscious of ourselves and yet remain in bondage.
We want to attain the envisioned self, which is a free selfI realize that I have been presumptuous on a number of points, but I have now gone too far to halt myself, so im going to ask, is the BCC at the beginning again?
In other words at the point of re-imagining BC? My question really is this, what does the BCC mean by BC? Implicit in this question is both a philosophical and practical consideration, what does BCC wants to achieve with its BC?
A related but side and inconsequential issue is this, what is BCC’s BC attitude to the ANC’s politics of non-racialism and integration (as a theory and now as practice of party in government).
Im sure you also may have to allude to the existing political formations such as Azapo, SOPA and BPC which proclaim bc as their guiding philosophy or ideology (a rather oppression term really, this ideology business).
I think it a little passé to raise the old question of the unity of thought and action. But I think I need to be explicit in case its not take care of in the broad set of “identity” questions I ask above.
In my engagement with members of your collective it seem to me that one can read a few contradictory attitudes towards this question of the unity of action and thought or lack thereof.
I heard, I hope correctly, for instance that action is already implicated in thought. This means there is no action, which is not preceded by thought.
I agree that this is generally a truthful assertion. But is it automatic that thought ends in action, or thought here is also action? A dialectical unity? But then how do we judge effectiveness? Or there is not physical materiality about this process?
Then of course I think there are certain forms of “thought” which are anti-thought and action, such as formulistic Eurocentric “logical” philosophy. I also recognize that Nazis, colonialists and imperialists have their own intellectuals and philosophers.
So from this point of view there is nothing progressive about philosophy a prior. I would not now want to raise my pet hate subject - the anti-black origins of most of western philosophy (how do you deal with this?).
I think a bit of Foucault quickly shows how everything is implicated in power, self interest and subjectivity. But of course im not interested in abstracted philosophical assertions, I'm interested in the specificity of your collective’s “thought” process and its relation to “action” aimed at the structures of oppression and denigration of black people... Surely, the sum total of your “action” can not be reduced to creating spaces for “critical dialogue”, although I would under duress accept such engagement as as action too.
If I were to walk ahead of your response on this one, I would say, im inspired by the likes of originators of the negritude movement (Suzanne Ceseair, Aime Cessaire, less so the likes of Sengor). These pioneers “culled” a lot of fire from the Surrealists and giving that philosophical movement some flames of rebellion in exchange, in the process created the possibility to act against all sorts of colonialisms.
I also remember well, old Karl Marx admonishing his German fellow philosophers for being obsessed with interpreting the world when the point was to change it.Allow me go religious a little.
You see, I grew up in a religious family even if I later I went agnostic- I have done my time in the trenches in the service of god, so there must be some residual matter of this past in me, I agree with Terry Eagleton, we cant be but what we are. So I beg your indulgence, just to draw a parallel if not a lesson from the holy book. I
n the book of James, James he postulates on matters of “Faith and Actions” (I hope to substitute “faith” for theory if not philosophy), he teachers us that; “ suppose there are brothers and sisters who need clothes and not have enough to eat. What good is there in you saying to them, “God bless you! Keep warm and eat well!”- if you don’t give them the necessities of life? So it is with faith: if it is alone and includes no actions then it is dead…. So then as the body without the spirit is dead, so also faith without actions is dead”.
I think it was Lenin who said he has yet to see a successful revolution without a revolutionary theory, but he also laughed at the idea of theory without action. Cabral said something alone those lines when he theorized on the issue “theory and practice”.
I find Paulo Ferere much useful on this score, personally. His dialogical method, of cause is not perfect, but shows that there is no possibility of learning or clarification, or even building critical consciousness without doing.
Action allows reflection on the concrete, leading to improvement and critical awareness.
This is the revolution!
Of course those students who started SASO in the late 60’s were deep into philosophy but they understood oppression as a concrete truth, deeply implicated power. Racial capitalism or apartheid is as concrete as the N1.
The SASO students understood very well that oppression couldn’t be dislodged by philosophic disputations alone.
It’s my contention that no one has yet contributed to changing the world for the better by simply holding a “correct philosophy”.
In fact under certain circumstances, to “philosophize” is a great sign of betrayal and cowardice. My view in fact is that its of little use to philosophize outside action aimed at dislodging the white supremacist edifice deeply ingrained in the structures of politics, economics and even the whole cultural plain (here I understand culture in its broadest sociological sense).
To try play philosophers without action is actually a self-serving and a safe option which also provides an alibi for doing nothing, it’s not unlike the “superfluous men” on the 19 century Russia.
This reminds me of the warnings from the pen of the mad one- Dambudzo Marechera, in his majestic “The Black Insider”( one can read that book from the back to the front because it doesn’t matter where you start really, it has no begging, middle or ending)- it’s a scream of consciousnesses shouting impatiently at you.
Somewhere Dambudzo writes;‘An excessive indulgence of the senses and thoughts… leads to the kind of decadence which can paralys all action. To tick all the orifices of pleasure and stimulate all the possible orgasms of intellectual heights would be to sort of contrast demanded by this sordid war”.
ncidentally, I happen to think that black people the world over live in a state of one sided sordid war which has not given us respite since the disastrous encounter with the white world starting with slavery, moving to colonialism, and imperialism to day.
I'm permanently flabbergasted by the patience and laxity from the black world living through this living hell. Only we blacks can afford this type of absent-mindedness in the middle of war of decimation. We are wont at keeping us busy with inane, irrelevancies; this is the curse of our black skin.
Somewhere else in the same text Dambudzo raises a matter which I think is relevant to this letter and to people like us;“…we use to joke about being fucked out by everything but never to the extent of seeing the uttermost truth at the center of the jest.
There was the gulf –as we saw it- between student thinking and activities and the workers-themselves whom I did not feel we had any qualifications to lead in anything. I had seen how “education” had given us too early a veneer of experience which our own elders mistook for mature and solid knowledge of a world that has rapidly ceased to be ours and had become a whiteman’s play ground for investment, good living, and casuals tormenting of Caliban”.
My point is that we (western educated black middle classes) are already deeply implicated in whiteness, our souls and minds are held captive by whiteness. Our philosophies are by and large alien. We have nothing to say to the great multitudes of our people except to give them disdain and scorn- we call them “the masses” with no sense of irony.
I have heard some of you say, “the masses think….”, and generally this would be to create a caricature- a mass of undifferentiated beings gravitating in colossal confusion and ignorance, and then we self congratulatingly arrogate clever philosophic position to “ourselves” – we are the philosophers!
The end result of this snobbish and vulgar valorization of our philosophic prowess leaves the “masses” all looking like Zuma.
This in my mind is the perfect colonial representation of the black world. Marechera on the other hand displays a liberating self-awareness of the place and general uselessness of the “educated” classes. Cabral, was crude but in my mind hugely correct to call for a “class suicide” of the “educated” anti-colonial African classes.
No one listened and we have reproduced what Chinuweizu correctly calls: “the black colonialists”- with no discernable exceptions all our African political, academic, intellectual and business leaders are black colonialist!
This brings me inevitably to politics. And here I understand politics narrowly as the exercise of power at state/government level.
I wish to raise a few questions, here. Firstly, does the BCC have any shared conceptual clarity on the “nature” or “character” of the post apartheid state?
I argue that there has been no rapture in this post apartheid state from the white supremacist one which was designed for serving white interest, the only substantial difference is that now this colonial, racist state is managed by black former liberation movement cadres. This reduces these managers of the racist state to indunas of whiteness.
Secondly, and I think we reflected a little on this, does the BCC have a general attitude to the state qua state? If so what?
This is really a ‘question of power’, to borrow from Bessie Head.
I was reminded of the sterile exchange we had with a member or sympathizer of BCC the last time- it went on like this (im paraphrasing)-
“The state has failed everywhere?”. person 1
“No the state can and must be subordinated to serve the interest of the people”, person 2.
“no there is no record of the state ever serving the people” person 1
“what about Venezuela and Bolivia…” person 2
“oh! Venezuela is going to save us all now. Hahahaha”- person 1
“ok, the Ven experiment is flawed buts it’s the real and existing example of what can be done”, person 2
“oh! No! my lord! Examples are poor substitute for argument, all which is need to is just to provide a counter example”- person 1 (reclining on his chair with the smile that talks victory).
The poverty of the above encounter, resides not in the bad formulation of argument and counter argument, in my book, but on the politics/philosophic perspectives informing the interlocutors (of course the arguments can be improved a lot and shed some more light).
For instance is person 1, making a universal statement which they purport to be true in all situations? Then of course this becomes abstract disputation, which would not yield to evidence.
Then we have abandoned philosophy and have entered the world of ideology. Is the second person on the other hand postulating that the state is necessarily a good thing in all situations over time and space? I think not. But I think the above drunken exchange points to sterility of a kind of argumentation devoid of “people centered” perspectives.
The issue of the state or non state can no longer be debated outside the history of the state and the different perspectives/ideologies informing the theorization of the state.
To argue against the state without distancing one from the likes of Milton Friedman and his latter day apostles in the form of the World Bank, IMF, the WTO and other agents neo-colonialism is to be in the side of death by default. There have always been various anti state positions, and one must be aware of this to avoid confusion.
For instance I find the example of Zapatistas and theory of “changing the world without taking power” ala John Holloway quite seductive, but I realize that one must deal with the impressive current now sweeping Latin American, signified by the state driven left transformations ala Bolivia. Ecuador, Venezuela etc. then there is the Chiapas example and multiple peasants and other movements of the excluded.
These are some of my initial thoughts, questions and postulations. And I realize this intervention made more “pragmatic” than “analytical”. It’s the 31st of December in the morning, I see the sun is shining bright outside, Im preparing myself to go get some drinks, meat and fireworks. 2007 was indeed a year of the Zunami. Let 2008 be better for black people the world over.
I think Mao Tse Tung was on to something when he penned this poem:"So many deeds cry out to be doneand always urgentlythe world rolls ontime pressesthen thousands and years are too longseized the dayseize the hour
Ona move!
Andile Mngxitama
31.12.2007
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