The common objection to the work of many African artists is simple: they oversimplify reality and dehumanise the African experience to please a so-called global audience. As a result, their content is predictable and monotonous. In fact, it is not just an insult but, to a large extent, also a lie. What I mean is […]
Lifestyle
Posted inGeneral, Lifestyle, News/Politics
Bribing politicians to honour gay rights
In November 2012, Malawi’s first female president, Joyce Banda, temporarily suspended anti-gay laws, urging debate. Instead of acknowledging these laws as inhumane, reports suggest that Malawi feared losing money from liberal Western donors who insist that sexual minorities be protected. Gay rights are in vogue for Western funders, the European Union has already given 1.8 million […]
Posted inLifestyle
Local erotic fiction goes global
In the same week that South Africa’s first mainstream erotic novel for women hit shelves, a major publishing deal was announced that is poised to take local erotica worldwide. There are those who chose to link these two events with the horrific rape and murder of Anene Booysen — the implication being that women’s erotic […]
Posted inLifestyle
Should we let Justin Bieber take the ‘reigns’?
I should have averted my eyes, I know. It’s my own fault for looking, and I’d only bought a copy of heat because I’d already read this week’s You. But once you’ve read a statement like “Move aside, Lady Gaga: Justin Bieber has taken the reigns as the most powerful person on Twitter!” you just […]
Posted inGeneral, Lifestyle
A sci-fi novel that shaped a generation
When William Gibson’s science-fiction, “cyberpunk” novel Neuromancer, was published in 1984, ultimately winning the three most sought-after awards in the science-fiction world (The Nebula Award, The Philip K Dick Award and the Hugo Award) few people could prognosticate that it represented an imaginative projection of such magnitude that it would shape the way an entire […]
Posted inGeneral, Lifestyle
There simply is no space
I find it odd that people today will log into various platforms of social networking to ”consume” new music yet you ask them what their favourite band is and they draw a blank. Look at your twitter timeline or go onto Facebook and just study for a day or so the amount of new music […]
Posted inGeneral, Lifestyle
Libraries and violence
You know that sensation when you mistakenly walk into the other sex’s dressing room and there is that sudden fluster and flurry of clothing being pulled back up and stifled or not stifled squeals? Of course you do. Well, for the purposes of description, entering a decent library can be the exact opposite, especially when […]
Posted inGeneral, Lifestyle
Fleeing China
It was the very recent death of his mother that emerged in him during this time, this fleeing from snow-swept China. Now in New Zealand, he felt his creative fingertips for the first time in months. He re-discovered the warmth of Marion’s hands and laugh again, the hearth which had always been there, the arms […]
Posted inLifestyle, News/Politics
Die Antwoord — are we missing the misogyny?
By Talia Meer As critical dialogues about race in the Antwoord’s ”Fatty Boom Boom” video emerged, I was certain that a gendered analysis would soon follow. I was wrong. While South African commentators have critiqued the use of blackface in the video — UCT’s Adam Haupt deftly contextualises Die Antwoord within histories of class and […]
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Has the end of the world been rescheduled?
I must admit I was one of the millions of naïve people worldwide who was duped by the Mayan’s so-called “end of the world” prophecy. Not only duped, but my marriage was almost destroyed. From December 20 2012 right through to the 23, I insisted on sleeping alone on the sofa in our lounge. I […]
Posted inGeneral, Lifestyle
Diagnosing Santa Clause
“What if Santa came to hospital?” read my online update. “What diagnosis would you give him?” A team of friends gathered around to deliberate. The options were plenty; but the prognosis looked poor. Friend One went deep. “Terribly low self-esteem, of course,” she quipped, “he does feel the need to buy his friends”. Could the […]
Posted inLifestyle
An inconvenient truth…animal cruelty is forever
By Steven Hussey There are few topics as emotive as animal abuse. The daily evidence I can see of this is no farther than on my Facebook wall, with people calling for the senseless nuclear obliteration of China in support of some powerless petition to stop animal cruelty in rural areas there, of dogs in […]