Go to AfricaBib home

Go to AfricaBib home AfricaBib Go to database home

bibliographic database
Line
Previous page New search

The free AfricaBib App for Android is available here

Periodical article Periodical article Leiden University catalogue Leiden University catalogue WorldCat catalogue WorldCat
Title:The beat that beat apartheid: the role of music in the resistance against apartheid in South Africa
Author:Schumann, Anne
Year:2008
Periodical:Stichproben - Vienna Journal of African Studies
Volume:8
Issue:14
Pages:17-39
Language:English
Geographic term:South Africa
Subjects:popular music
anti-apartheid resistance
political songs
External link:https://stichproben.univie.ac.at/fileadmin/user_upload/p_stichproben/Artikel/Nummer14/Nr14_Schumann.pdf
Abstract:To properly understand the processes that have led to the transition from apartheid to majority rule in South Africa, it is essential to not just analyse the developments at the negotiating tables of politicians, but also to understand popular music initiatives for, and responses to political change. Studying popular music expressions is instructive, since music may reveal popular sentiments as well as the political atmosphere. Just as the apartheid era was not characterized by the same degree of political repression throughout its duration, so the musical response changed over time. This paper uses the German playwright Berthold Brecht's idiom 'art is not a mirror held up to reality, but a hammer with which to shape it' to show how the political use of music in South Africa changed from being a 'mirror' in the 1940s and 1950s to becoming a 'hammer' with which to shape reality in the 1980s. In South Africa, music went from reflecting common experiences and concerns in the early years of apartheid, to eventually function as a force to confront the State and as a means to actively construct an alternative political and social reality. Bibliogr., notes, ref., sum. in English and German. [Journal abstract]
Views
Cover