Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-r5fsc Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-24T03:30:32.608Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Maskanda, Umkhosi wokukhahlela and the Articulation of Identity in South Africa

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 August 2020

NANETTE DE JONG  and
KING MADZIKANE II THANDISZWE DIKO
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Umkhosi wokukhahlela is an annual ceremony in the KwaBhaca Great Kingdom (Eastern Cape, South Africa) that celebrates virginity among young women and girls. Not regularly practiced for decades, it has recently made a comeback, having been strategically adopted by King Madzikane II as a tool of empowerment in the fight against the HIV pandemic, the rise in teen pregnancies, rape and school dropouts, as well as the abuse of women in general. This article investigates the return of Umkhosi wokukhahlela through Antonio Gramsci’s notion of ‘articulation’. As we shall see, the ritual is a particularly engaging and thoroughgoing example of how local communities intertwine the past with the present to reshape their own identity, borrowing from tradition to articulate specific life lessons germane to the present – and future – of the Bhaca people.

Type
Article
Information
Journal of the Royal Musical Association , Volume 145 , Issue 1 , May 2020 , pp. 167 - 190
Copyright
© The Author(s), 2020. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of The Royal Musical Association

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

This work was supported by the European Union (HUM/2010/1-271) and the Newcastle University School of Arts and Cultures Strategic Research Fund. We wish to thank Ian Biddle, Justin D. Burton, Ali Colleen Neff and audiences at the University of Edinburgh, Newcastle University and the University of Canberra for their thoughtful comments in response to earlier versions. We are also grateful to the editor of JRMA and the reviewers (one of whom was Barbara Titus of the University of Amsterdam) for their helpful suggestions.

References

1 KwaBhaca is located in South Africa’s Eastern Cape province, formerly the Transkei region, situated between the cities of Kokstad and Mthatha.

2 Alelisiwe, ritual participant, 12 years of age. Interview, 2016.

3 King Madzikane II and the elder sisters made the request that the confidentiality and privacy of young ritual participants be maintained. As a result, we share the participants’ first names only in this article. Assurances that authors would use only first names in the published article were discussed with participants and their families prior to the interviews and at the start of focus-group discussions.

4 Leon De, Kock, ‘South Africa in the Global Imaginary: An Introduction’, Poetics Today, 22 (2001), 263–98 (p. 285)Google Scholar.

5 Selections from the Prison Notebooks of Antonio Gramsci, ed. and trans. Quintin, Hoare and Geoffrey, Nowell-Smith (New York: International Publishers, 1971), 168 Google Scholar.

6 Nanette De Jong and King Madzikane II, ‘Umkhosi wokukhahlela in the Fight against HIV/AIDS’, paper delivered at the Conference on Music and Community in the Fight against HIV/AIDS, 12 November 2013, Newcastle University.

7 Nanette De Jong and King Madzikane II, ‘Reclaiming Umkosi wokukhahlela: Tradition and Modernity in KwaBhaca Great Kingdom’, paper delivered at the Conference on Tradition versus Modernity in Contemporary Africa, 24–25 October 2013, Plzeň, Czech Republic.

8 King Madzikane II. Interview, 2015.

9 Coplan, David B., ‘Sounds of the “Third Way”: Identity and the African Renaissance in Contemporary South African Popular Traditional Music’, Black Music Research Journal, 21 (2001), 107–24 (p. 112)Google Scholar.

10 Ibid.

11 Barbara Titus and Kathryn Olsen, ‘Double Take: A Dialogue on Zulu Popular Music on a World Music Platform’, paper delivered at the Conference of the Industrial Association for the Study of Popular Music (IASPM), Rhodes University, Grahamstown, 14 April 2011.

12 Stuart, Hall, ‘Notes on Deconstructing “the Popular”’, People’s History and Socialist Theory, ed. Ralph, Samuel (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1981), 227–40 (p. 228)Google Scholar.

13 Coplan, ‘Sounds of the “Third Way”’, 121.

14 See, for instance, David, Rycroft, ‘Evidence of Stylistic Continuity in Zulu “Town” Music’, Essays for a Humanist: An Offering to Klaus Wachsman, ed. KPW Festschrift Committee (New York: Town House Press, 1977)Google Scholar, 216–60; Carol, Muller, ‘Chakine – The Teller of Secrets: Space, Song and Story in Zulu Maskanda Performance’, Oral Literature and Performance in Southern Africa, ed. Duncan, Brown (London: James Currey, and Pietermaritzburg: University of Natal, 1999)Google Scholar, 220–34; Kathryn, Olsen, ‘Politics, Production, and Process: Discourses on Tradition in Contemporary Maskanda’ (MA thesis, University of Natal, 2000)Google Scholar; Coplan, , ‘Sounds of the “Third Way”’; Olsen, ‘“Mina ngizokushaya ngengoma” / “I Will Challenge You with a Song”: Constructions of Masculinity in Maskanda’, Agenda, 49 (2001), 51–60 Google Scholar; Tom Collins, ‘Constructing Maskanda’, SAMUS: South African Music Studies, 26–7 (2006–7), 1–26; Titus and Olsen, ‘Double Take’.

15 Louise, Meintjes, Sound of Africa! Making Music Zulu in a South African Studio (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2003)Google Scholar; Barbara, Titus, ‘Global Maskanda, Global Music Historiography? Some Preliminary Enquiries’, SAMUS: South African Music Studies, 28 (2008), 43–54 Google Scholar.

16 Coplan, ‘Sounds of the “Third Way”’, 121.

17 Jon Pareles, ‘Music Review: Shiyani Ngcobo: Serious Music and Seriously Danceable’, New York Times, 12 February 2007.

18 Daphna, Golan, ‘The Life Story of King Shaka and Gender Tensions in the Zulu State’, History of Africa, 17 (1990), 95–111 Google Scholar.

19 Bernth, Lindfors, ‘Hottentot, Bushman, Kaffir: The Making of Stereotypes in Nineteenth-Century Britain’, Encounter Images in the Meetings between Africa and Europe, ed. Mai, Palmberg (Uppsala: Nordic Africa Institute, 2001), 54–75 (p. 73)Google Scholar.

20 Ibid., 66.

21 Ibid.

22 Golan, ‘The Life Story of King Shaka and Gender Tensions in the Zulu State’; Golan, , ‘Inkatha and its Use of the Zulu Past’, History of Africa, 18 (1991)CrossRefGoogle Scholar, 113–26; Lindfors, ‘Hottentot, Bushman, Kaffir’.

23 Chris, Ballantine, Marabi Nights: Early South African Jazz and Vaudeville (Johannesburg: Ravan Press, 1993), 8 Google Scholar.

24 Gillian, Rose, ‘Place and Identity: A Sense of Place’, A Place in the World?, ed. Doreen, Massey and Pat, Jess (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996), 87–132 Google Scholar.

25 Nanette De, Jong, ‘South Africa, Black America, and Jazz: A Transatlantic Dialogue’, Jazzforschung / Jazz Research, 41 (2009), 83–92 Google Scholar (p. 89).

26 Gerhard, Mare, Brothers Born of Warrior Blood: Politics and Ethnicity in South Africa (Johannesburg: Ravan Press, 1992)Google Scholar; Political Economy and Identities in Kwa-Zulu-Natal: Historical and Social Perspectives, ed. Robert, Morell (Durban: Indicator Press, 1996)Google Scholar.

27 Annemi, Conradie, ‘Remaking Culture for Sale: The Strategic Commodification, Construction and Performance of “Traditional” Cultural Identity in South African Cultural Villages’, Inculturalism: Meaning and Identity, ed. Daniel, Boswell, Roger, O’Shea and Efrat, Tzadik (Leiden: Brill, 2013), 65–76 (p. 66)Google Scholar.

28 Janis, Westhuizen, ‘Marketing and the “Rainbow Nation”: The Power of the South African Music, Film and Sport Industry’, Africa’s Challenge to International Relations Theory, ed. Dunn, Kevin C. and Shaw, Timothy M. (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2001), 64–81 Google Scholar.

29 Leslie, Witz, Cirai, Rassool and Gary, Minkley, ‘Repackaging the Past for South African Tourism’, Daedalus, 130/1 (winter 2001), 117–296 (p. 280)Google Scholar.

30 Coplan, ‘Sounds of the “Third Way”’, 109.

31 Olsen, ‘“Mina ngizokushaya ngengoma”’, 57.

32 Elirea, Bornman, ‘National Symbols and Nation-Building in the Post-Apartheid South Africa’, International Journal of Intercultural Relations, 30 (2006), 383–99Google Scholar.

33 Coplan, ‘Sounds of the “Third Way”’, 114.

34 ‘Bat Centre Music Performances’ (2011), <http://showme.co.za/durban/evetns-entertainments/bat-centre-music-performances> (accessed 23 July 2014).

35 Coplan, ‘Sounds of the “Third Way”’, 114. Another popular South African music form that, like maskanda, became closely associated with Zulu tradition is mbaqanga. Mbaqanga as a term came into wide use as a label for the local style of African jazz during the 1950s. When in 1960 jazz was decreed by the apartheid government to be a ‘public hazard’, a campaign of censorship ensued, limiting opportunities to play or record jazz. The government instead sanctioned the playing of ‘traditional’ music, at which time mbaqanga was reapplied to such groups as Mahlathini and the Queens, a group that had become known as ‘the leopard-skin-bedecked Mahlathini and his Zulu headdressed, beaded beauties’, which performed ‘antiphonal Zulu vocals […] backed up by an electric guitar band’ (Coplan, ‘Sounds of the “Third Way”’, 110). Mbaqanga’s link to ‘Zuluness’, therefore, was part of a ‘reinvented performative traditionality’ (ibid.) that, as Louise Meintjes writes, continues today. Contemporary mbaqanga musicians, in their continued attempt to ‘sound Zulu’ further purport an ‘undecidability about the agency entailed in the category of Zuluness’ (Meintjes, Sound of Africa!, 207), which shifted ‘between Zulu as victim and perpetuator of violence, Zulu as object and subject of death, Zulu as themselves and as Other, Zulu as difference with which they identify, and Zulu as rhetorical category’ (ibid.). The Bhaca’s integration of maskanda in the ritual Umkhosi wokukhahlela points to yet another example of the complexities behind notions of ‘Zuluness’.

36 Mazisi, Kunene, Emperor Shaka the Great: A Zulu Epic, African Writers, 211 (London: Heinemann, 1979)Google Scholar; Daphna, Golan-Agnon, Inventing Shaka: Using History in the Construction of Zulu Nationalism (Boulder, CO: Lynee Rienner, 1994)Google Scholar; Morris, Donald R., The Washing of the Spears: A History of the Rise of the Zulu Nation under Shaka and its Fall in the Zulu War of 1879 (New York: Random House, 1994)Google Scholar; Mahoney, Michael R., The Other Zulus: The Spread of Zulu Ethnicity in Colonial South Africa (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2012)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

37 Molefi Kete, Asante, Maulana Karenga: An Intellectual Portrait (Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, 2013)Google Scholar. This publication is not paginated.

38 Asante, Maulana Karenga.

39 King Madzikane II. Interview, 2015.

40 Ibid.

41 Richard, Middleton, ‘Articulating Musical Meaning / Reconstructing Musical History / Locating the Popular’, Popular Music, 5 (1985), 5–43 (p. 11)Google Scholar.

42 Chuma, male ritual attendee. Interview, 2016.

43 King Madzikane II. Interview, 2014.

44 Max, Gluckman, ‘Zulu Women in Hoecultural Ritual’, Bantu Studies, 9 (1935)Google Scholar, 255–71; Absolom, Vilakazi, Zulu Transformations: A Study of the Dynamics of Social Change (Pietermaritzburg: University of Natal Press, 1962)Google Scholar; Virginia Van der, Vliet, ‘Growing Up in Traditional Society’, The Bantu-Speaking Peoples of Southern Africa, ed. William David, Hammond-Tooke, 2nd edn (London and Boston, MA: Routledge, 1974)Google Scholar, 211–34; Eleanor, Preston-Whyte, ‘African Teenage Pregnancy: Who’s Problem?’, Questionable Issue: Illegitimacy in South Africa, ed. Sandra, Burman and Eleanor, Preston-Whyte (Cape Town: Oxford University Press, 1992)Google Scholar, 226–46; Christine, Varga, ‘South African Young People’s Sexual Dynamics: Implications for Behavior Responses to AIDS/HIV’, Resistances to Behavioral Change to Reduce HIV/AIDS Infection in Predominantly Heterosexual Epidemics in Third World Countries, ed. Caldwell, John C., Pat, Caldwell and John, Anarfi (Canberra: Health Transition Centre, Australian National University, 1999), 13–34 Google Scholar.

45 For more information on uMkosi womhlanga, see Ghislaine, Povey and Wyk, J. van, ‘Culture and Event Experience’, Events Management, ed. Peter, Robinson, Debra, Wale and Geoff, Dickson (Wallingford: C.A.B. International, 2010), 1–18 Google Scholar, and Gugulethu Sebenzile, Nkosi, ‘ Umkhosi womhlanga (Reed Dance) as a Tourism Enterprise in KwaZulu-Natal: Perceptions, Policies and Practices’ (Ph.D. dissertation, University of Zululand, 2013)Google Scholar. For more information on Umhlanga, see Lomagugu Precious, Masango, ‘Reading the Swazi Reed Dance (Umhlanga) as a Literary Traditional Performance Art’ (Ph.D. dissertation, University of Witwatersrand, 2009)Google Scholar, and Enongone Mirabeau, Sone, ‘Aesthetics from the Swazi Perspective: The Case of the Swazi Umhlanga/Reed Dance’, Muziki, 7/1 (2010)Google Scholar, 130–9.

46 UNAIDS was set up by the United Nations to help combat AIDS globally. It leads the world’s most extensive data collection programme on HIV, and is responsible for organizing authoritative, up-to-date information on the epidemic, including its challenges and progress.

47 King Madzikane II. Interview, 2013.

48 Lisanne, Brown, Kate, Macintyre and Lea, Trujillo, ‘Interventions to Reduce AIDS/HIV Stigma: What Have We Learned?’, AIDS Education and Prevention, 15 (2003), 49–69 Google Scholar.

49 Rosemary, Mwangi, ‘Kenyan Women Living with HIV/AIDS: A Mixed Methods Study’ (Ph.D. dissertation, Azusa Pacific University, 2013)Google Scholar.

50 Tshepiso, Bhaca mother who is HIV-positive; two of her three daughters participate in Umkhosi wokukhahlela. Interview, 2016.

51 Donald, Skinner and Sakhumzi, Mfecane, ‘Stigma, Discrimination and the Implications for People Living with Aids in South Africa’, SAHARA-J: Journal of Social Aspects of HIV/AIDS, 1 (2004), 157–64 (p. 158)Google Scholar.

52 Jane, Goudge, Lenore, Manderson, Bulelwa, Ngoma and Helen, Schneider, ‘Stigma, Identity and Resistance among Young People Living with HIV in South Africa’, SAHARA-J: Journal of Social Aspects of HIV/AIDS, 6 (2009), 94–104 Google Scholar (p. 102).

53 King Madzikane II. Interview, 2016.

54 Anonymous interviewee, 2013.

55 Ibid.

56 Anonymous panel member. Interview, 2016.

57 Ibid.

58 Anonymous visiting chief. Interview, 2013.

59 Anonymous panel member. Interview, 2016.

60 Ibid.

61 Anonymous panel member. Interview, 2016.

62 Alelisiwe. Interview, 2016.

63 Siphephelo. Interview, 2016.

64 Anonymous ritual participant. Interview, 2016.

65 Bongile. Interview, 2016.

66 Anonymous ritual participant. Interview, 2016.

67 Langalibalele. Interview, 2016.

68 Ibid.

69 Anonymous interviewees. Interview, 2016.

70 De Jong and King Madzikane II, ‘Umkhosi wokukhahlela in the Fight against HIV/AIDS’.

71 Ntombifuthi, 18-year-old ritual participant. Interview, 2016.

72 King Madzikane II. Interview, 2016.

73 Chuma, male leader attending event. Interview, 2016.

74 King Madzikane II. Interview, 2016.

75 King Madzikane II. Interview, 2014.

76 James, Clifford, ‘Traditional Futures’, Questions of Traditions, ed. Mark, Phillips and Gordon, Schochet (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2004), 152–68 (p. 153)Google Scholar.

77 King Madzikane II. Interview, 2013.

78 Olsen, ‘“Mina ngizokushaya ngengoma”’, 51.

79 Lawrence, Grossberg, We Gotta Get Out of This Place: Popular Conservatism and Postmodern Culture (New York: Routledge, 1992), 54 Google Scholar.

80 Ibid., 60.

81 King Madzikane II. Interview, 2013.

82 Rona Tamiko Halualani, In the Name of Hawaiians: Native Identities and Cultural Politics (Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press, 2002), xxii.

83 King Madzikane II. Interview, 2013.

84 Mamaduma. Interview, 2014.

85 Selections from the Prison Notebooks of Antonio Gramsci, ed. Hoare and Nowell-Smith.

86 Grossberg, We Gotta Get Out of This Place, 4.

87 ‘On Postmodernism and Articulation: An Interview with Stuart Hall’, ed. Lawrence Grossberg, Stuart Hall: Critical Dialogues in Cultural Studies, ed. David Morely and Kuan-Hsing Chen (London and New York: Routledge, 1989; 2nd edn, 1996), 131–50 (p. 141).

88 Ibid.

89 Clifford, ‘Traditional Futures’, 479.

90 Ibid., 478, 480.

91 Middleton, ‘Articulating Musical Meaning’, 9.

92 King Madzikane II. Interview, 2014.

93 Selections from the Prison Notebooks of Antonio Gramsci, ed. Hoare and Nowell-Smith, 330–1.

94 Chuma. Interview, 2016.

95 Hall, ‘Notes on Deconstructing “the Popular”’, 31.

96 Ibid.

97 Clifford, ‘Traditional Futures’, 477.

98 Michael, Burawoy, ‘Afterword: For a South African Sociology’, Globalisation and New Identities: A View from the Middle, ed. Peter, Alexander, Marcelle, Dawson and Meera, Ichharam (Johannesburg: Jacana Media, 2006), 307–12 (p. 310)Google Scholar.

99 John, Clarke, ‘A World of Difference? Globalization and the Study of Social Policy’, Rethinking Social Policy, (2000), 201–16 (p. 209)Google Scholar.

100 Adrian, Hadland, Eric, Louw, Simphiwe, Sesanti and Herman, Wasserman, ‘Introduction’, Power, Politics and Identity in South African Media: Selected Seminar Papers, ed. Hadland, , Louw, , Sesanti, and Wasserman, (Cape Town: HSRC Press, 2008), 1–16 (p. 4)Google Scholar.

101 Abebe, Zegeye, ‘Introduction: Imposed Ethnicity’, Social Identities in the New South Africa, ed. Zegeye, (Cape Town: Kwela Books and SA History Online, 2001), 1–23 (p. 1)Google Scholar.

102 Witz, Rassool and Minkley, ‘Repackaging the Past for South African Tourism’, 281.

103 Coplan, ‘Sounds of the “Third Way”’, 121.

104 Mamaduna. Interview, 2014.

105 Richard, Middleton, Studying Popular Music (Milton Keynes: Open University Press, 1990), 9 Google Scholar.

106 Anonymous youth leader. Interview, 2016.

107 George, Petros, Collins, Airhihenbuwa O., Simbayi, Leikness, Shandir, Ramlagan and Brandon, Brown, ‘HIV/AIDS and “Othering” in South Africa: The Blame Goes On’, Culture, Health and Sexuality, 8 (2006), 66–77 (p. 74)Google Scholar.

108 Anonymous Bhaca woman. Interview, 2016.

109 Anonymous Bhaca woman. Interview, 2016.

110 Chuma. Interview, 2016.

111 King Madzikane II. Interview, 2016.

112 Stuart, Hall, ‘The Whites of their Eyes: Racist Ideologies and the Media’, Silver Linings, ed. George, Bridges and Rosalind, Brunt (London: Lawrence & Wishart, 1981), 28–52 (p. 32)Google Scholar.

113 Thandi, ritual participant. Interview, 2016.

114 King Madzikane II. Interview, 2016.

115 Chuma. Interview, 2016.

116 King Madzikane II. Interview, 2016.

117 King Madzikane II. Interview, 2013.

118 Bill, Ashcroft, Post-Colonial Transformation (New York: Routledge, 2001), 98 Google Scholar.

119 Herman, Touo, ‘African Youth and Globalization: The Experience of the Ethics Club in the Process of Social-Political Integration of the Youth in Cameroon’, African Anthropologist, 17 (2013), 1–140 (p. 11)Google Scholar.

120 Catherine, Bell, Ritual Theory, Ritual Practice (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992)Google Scholar.

121 King Madzikane II. Interview, 2014.

122 Chuma. Interview, 2016.

123 King Madzikane II. Interview, 2015.

124 Middleton, Studying Popular Music, 16.

125 Sogoni, Bhaca woman. Interview, 2014.