Thursday, 19 December 2013

#AftertheSunset




So I went to this cool film screening this past Tuesday hosted at Radar Advertising Agency in Cape Town.  The organisers, Tiisestso Molobi and Mangaliso Sobukwe, decided to give the screening the apt title “After the Sunset.”  We were also lucky enough to have a conversation after the screening hosted by Dr Olusengun Morakinyo with Mme Nozizwe Madlala-Routledge as the honoured guest.  The film on show was a two and a half hour documentary, “Death of Apartheid.”

A few things struck me as interesting as I was watching the film:

Wednesday, 4 December 2013

Kwela from Hip Hop to Poetry Sessions: Tshwane Street Culture & Music.





My life as a performing poet has seen me travel across South Africa in search of poetry sessions where I can share poesy with those willing and able to hear and listen.  During these travels, I have observed similarities in the cultures, or sub-cultures, and music of said sessions.  These include a preference for hip-hop culture and dress as well as hip-hop music, particularly conscious rap.  These observations have led to the current endeavour or excursion, in which I ask the questions, “Has American hip-hop culture and music impacted on South African street music and culture?” and “Is this influence a new occurrence?  Are there other examples of South African musical culture being influenced by American music and culture?”  Another question that glared at the writer from the onset is, “What philosophical socio-political questions are raised by this transcultural exchange?”

Tuesday, 3 December 2013

Vote For @thabisonkoana Your Favorite #wordsmith !!

SA Blog Awards Badge

"Freedom"






Yothu Yindi
“Freedom”
By Thabiso wa ga Nkoana

When thinking of world music, it is often the case that people envisage an obscure sound, created on some rudimentary instruments and recorded by an old, bearded, scruffy looking, white, male, music scholar.  A sound that seems not to have a place in this MTV crazed society of ours.  This is not the case with Yothu Yindi’s 1993 offering Freedom.

Sunday, 24 November 2013

The Issue at Hand.






The Issue at Hand … Is less about race than it is about the economic and political system that rules currently.  I’m speaking here about capitalism.  Kindly note that I’m purposefully writing from the top of my head, I want to speak as a layperson, with no references to reports, academic writings or history books.  It is true that I have been blessed with a better education than “the average South African” – whatever that means - so my reference to “lay” might be somewhat misleading.  You will agree however, that a formal education is but a speck in the endless tapestry that is education.  So perhaps my claim of an unqualified opinion is not so far fetched.

Monday, 11 November 2013

BAD FEELINGS.





I’ve been hearing a lot about this phenomenon called white guilt lately, in various discussions and debating forums, in newspaper opinion pieces, etcetera.  My understanding of what this guilt should be is in a document known as the “guilt-list”. 
In 2000 Carl Niehaus and Mary Burton suggested that white South Africans apologise collectively to Africans for the wretchedness that was apartheid.  Part of the document reads,

We acknowledge the white community's responsibility for apartheid since many of us actively and passively supported that system. Some white people were deeply involved in the struggle against apartheid but they were very few in number. We acknowledge our debt to fellow black South Africans since all whites benefited from systematic racial discrimination. We therefore believe that it is right and necessary to commit ourselves to redressing these wrongs.”

Friday, 25 October 2013

The Big Splurge.






greetings and salutations,

i've often thought about the question of conspicuous consumption and have come with one simple answer ... hunger.

way i see it, when someone hasn't eaten for days or weeks and you take them to a royal buffet, they will inevitably over do it, to the point of gluttony.

Monday, 21 October 2013

Msholozi, My President.




I can just imagine all Jacob Zuma naysayers rolling their eyes and releasing a deep grunt of indignation from the depths of their person as they read the current title, "Here we go again!  Another defender of the corrupt, uneducated, singing and dancing rapist who stole the presidency from the intellectual Mbeki."  Nonetheless, I proffer my humble opinion on this ... strange fellow.

Sunday, 13 October 2013

A Calm Quest.







Time passes like spirits dancing in a fire
Light travels as emotions landing on a shore
Such is love.

Sound creates creatures craving creeks
Colour saves sentiment soaring in silence
Such is unity.

Saturday, 6 July 2013

Sorrowful Vengeance.






Motswala said revenge is not a good idea
it carries a hefty sentence
I carry that sentence
with a lengthy purpose
to make evil less intense
for the good without a cent
make a world without cents
or pences
let me not overextend
like the price of that brent

Freedom History…





There was once a time when people cried in unison
Disunion

There was once a time when they were told,
“Voetsek van my jaard!”
Ao tle,
Botloko yana?
Lefatsheng la mma?
Thina be sithi so dla sonke
Na bo Van Riebeeck
Bonke

Friday, 14 June 2013

Full of Shit.


"People run away as Turkish riot policemen fire teargas on Taksim square on June 11, 2013." - www.rt.com
I have watched with astonishment the developments in Cape Town regarding the protestations against the bucket toilet system.  A couple of things about the situation have got me wondering about the true state of South African society.  Perhaps it would be fitting to explain exactly what transpired for those whom, for whatever reason, might not be aware of said developments.  Initially, a group of protestors threw bags of human faeces at the entrance steps of the Western Cape legislature.  This was followed, a few days later, by the spilling of contents of full buckets from the bucket toilet system being used in many Western Cape ghettos, onto a bus that Western Cape premier Helen Zille was travelling on.  At this point we cannot be sure if the same group or another did this. All this excrement throwing simply because people don't have flushing toilets.

Sunday, 2 June 2013

Response to Ntate Lefifi Tladi







Thobela Ntate Tladi,

Leina lame ke Thabiso, wa ga Nkoana.  Ke Sedingwane, Makolometsha, ngwan’a noka e kgolo, Peba. I am a self-proclaimed wordsmith who recently won the best poetry performance at the Zabalaza theatre festival ya Baxter Theatre as well as the slam poetry competition ya Slipnet held in Stellenbosch.  I have been writing and reciting poetry for the better part of the last fifteen years of my life.  I have a blog (thabisonkoana.blogspot.com) in which I post some of my poetry and any essays I write for college purposes, which I deem to be of benefit for the general public – all about topics in music, musicology or ethnomusicology.  I am the eldest son of a man and woman who are workers, blue collar, from Hammanskraal and Kagiso respectively: a man and a woman who played important roles (directly and indirectly) in the political liberation of Azania.  I was born in Kagiso myself and raised in Diepkloof. 
It is very important that you know exactly who I am so as to be able to contextualise this letter and my work. 

Sunday, 19 May 2013

Metaphysical Introspection.









There is a time so freakish in its' dawning,
its' devilish grasp relentlessly chokes all of life’s charms.
This scorching time burns the soul so intensely
that it cries for Hades' hellish flames
eternal, yet comforting by comparison.
Like a sedated beast, the heart lies dormant during this time
shocked by the darkness of such reality.
This time is summoned, recruited from its' stagnant pool of despair
through a portal of misunderstanding
and sucked into a black hole; formerly our soul
by the too much feared action of introspection.

Thabiso Nkoana©2000

Poetry.








There are words with such power
they echo in the far reaches of my soul,
from those arid spaces that lack any signs of life,
to those enveloped with ecstasy and love.

There are words with such heat
they infuse all my emotion into one flaming ball of anger,
or melt icicles of pain in even the most hardened heart.

There are words with such majesty
they grace my being with an angelic flow
creating tides of arrogance
that drown all inhibitions and fears.

Of all these words
the best are simple,
for simplicity is the mother of all things great.

Thabiso Nkoana©2000