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Shameless
Thandiwe lives by her own rules. She shamelessly sells her body on the South African streets of Yeoville and views her job as no different from those of young black graduates who take up affirmative action posts as perpetual juniors under soul-destroying mentors. Thandiwe's searing views on the post-apartheid corporate world become public when she is approached by Kwena, a young film-maker who is interested in telling the stories of prostitutes and the shameful secrets of many. For Thandiwe, that personal story begins in the poor, rural village where Thandiwe and her best friend Zonke grew up, facing the many challenges of a vulnerable childhood together. They both fend off unwanted sexual attention and Thandiwe loses her mother in a freak accident, leaving her an orphan. When she runs away from her guardians to avoid circumcision, Thandiwe arrives in Jo'burg and soon launches her unconventional career. While Zonke pursues a more sheltered and conventionally successful course of action, Thandiwe has to fight fiercely for her independence, even at the risk of endangering her own life.
We Kiss Them with Rain
The terrible thing that steals 14-year-old Mvelo's song leads to startling revelations and a hopeful outcome. Great book club read.
They Got to You Too
Hans van Rooyen is a former police general raised by two women who survived the 1899 South African War. He finds himself being cared for in an old age home by the daughter of liberation struggle activists. At 80, he carries with him the memories of crimes he committed as an officer under the apartheid government. Having eluded the public confessions at the TRC for his time in the Border Wars, he retained his position in the democratic South Africa, serving as an institutional memory for a new generation of police recruits. Zoe Zondi is tasked to care for the old man. Her gentle and compassionate nature prompts Hans to review his decision to go to the grave with all his secrets. Zoe has her own life story to tell and, as their unlikely bond deepens, strengthened by the isolation that COVID-19 lockdown brings, they provide a safe space for each other to say the things that are often left unsaid.
A Home on Vorster Street
Who bears witness to our lives? As a young girl, Razina Theba makes her way every day to the tiny family flat on Vorster Street in Fordsburg. It is here, just outside of the Johannesburg city centre, where she grows up, playing in the Yard with countless cousins, learning to enjoy perfect syrupy paan and the best way to brew chai for her bajee. It is also where she observes her family's harassment by the Security Branch, as well as her parents' determination to make their business at the Oriental Plaza a success. In A Home on Vorster Street, Razina witnesses the ebb and flow of a tight-knit neighbourhood trying to survive the forces of apartheid and, ultimately, where she learns of the value of family love and the enduring comfort it provides. At times funny and charming and, at others, painful and tender, this dazzling collection of stories is a spirited exploration of a colourful Indian-Muslim family bound by loyalty to their culture, community, religion and each other.
Tracing the (Post)Apartheid Novel beyond 2000
This anthology comprises of interviews with contemporary South African authors, offering vignettes of their lives and summaries of their works. In curating this book, Danyela Demir and Olivier Moreillon step beyond pure literary theory and analysis. They welcome the authors to speak and assess the literary panorama in which they live and co-create. However, Demir and Moreillon also trace concepts and terms that describe the current South African literature, such as post-transitional literature and literature beyond 2000. By adopting a world-literary approach to (post)apartheid literature, this book contributes to debates on contemporary South African writing. In addition, Tracing the (Post)Apartheid Novel Beyond 2000 seeks to raise awareness of the imbalance in both critical and public attention between literary ‘big names’, such as André P. Brink, J.M. Coetzee, Nadine Gordimer and Zakes Mda, who are popular worldwide, and the younger and newer generation of South African writers, who go largely unnoticed. Print edition not for sale in Sub Saharan Africa.
Black Widow Society
In 1994, when South Africans were finally seeing the light of freedom and independence, three well-respected businesswomen – Talullah Ntuli, Edna Whithead and Nkosazana Dlamini – formed the Black Widow Society, a secret organisation aimed at liberating women trapped in emotionally and physically abusive relationships by assisting in ’eliminating’ their errant husbands. For fifteen years the Black Widow Society operated undetected, impeccably run by The Triumvirate with the help of their suave and mysterious hired gun, Mzwakhe Khuzwayo, a slick ex-convict meticulous in his responsibilities. But as the secret organisation recruits more members, the wheels of this well-oiled machine are threatening to fall off. Will Talullah’s controlling streak or Nkosazana’s unfettered material aspirations jeopardise the future of the Black Widow Society? Or perhaps one of the new recruits, unsettled by the reality of the elimination of her former husband, will lose her nerve and expose the workings of the group after all this time? As the tension mounts, Black Widow Society builds to a chilling and bloody climax that will keep you guessing and riveted until the very last page.
Memorializing the Past
This work is a meditation on the shaping of time and its impact on living with and understanding atrocity in South Africa in the wake of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC). It is an examination of the ways that the institutionalization of memory has managed perceptions of time and transition, of events and happenings, of sense and emotion, of violence and recovery, of the past and the new. Through this process a public language of memory has been carved into collective modes of meaning. It is a language that seems deprived of the hopes, dreams, and possibilities for the promise of a just and redemptive future it once nurtured.Truth commissions are profoundly implicated in the soci...
New News Out of Africa
An award-winning correspondent on PBSs "The News Hour with Jim Lehrer" offers a fresh and surprisingly optimistic assessment of modern Africa, revealing that there is more to the continent than the bad news of disease, disaster, and despair.
Shades of Difference
Shades of Difference addresses the widespread but little studied phenomenon of colorism—the preference for lighter skin and the ranking of individual worth according to skin tone. Examining the social and cultural significance of skin color in a broad range of societies and historical periods, this insightful collection looks at how skin color affects people's opportunities in Latin America, Asia, Africa, and North America. Is skin color bias distinct from racial bias? How does skin color preference relate to gender, given the association of lightness with desirability and beauty in women? The authors of this volume explore these and other questions as they take a closer look at the role Western-dominated culture and media have played in disseminating the ideal of light skin globally. With its comparative, international focus, this enlightening book will provide innovative insights and expand the dialogue around race and gender in the social sciences, ethnic studies, African American studies, and gender and women's studies.
