Just as we regard colonialisation as a process, decolonialisation is also a process. In the process of decolonisation, we aim to undo the legacies and the effects of colonialisation. We aim to restore the dignity, cultural identity, self-determination, and sovereignty of indigenous peoples. We also aim to address the current visible effects of colonialisation on the social, economic, and political life of a black man.
The purpose of this piece is to encourage and start a conversation of Blackness and decolonisation. I aim to achieve this through two imperative black activists: Bell Hooks and Steve Biko. The twelve-episode series of Shaka iLembe is used in this piece to highlight the imperative direction taken by the drama and film industry in South Africa (SA). A direction of decolonialisation and self-pride.
Images have ideological intent. They carry messages which we adopt to relate in real life situations. It is logical to do so because images themselves are perceptions and thoughts of the author, who is human like all of us. Therefore, it does not seem illogic and naive to learn a thing or two in the images we consume. However, there exist a dangerous tendency to underestimate the power images have in controlling the minds of the people who consume them. This then allows me to introduce the prevailing status quo in SA: Black minds are in the hands of the oppressor and see the world through the lenses of white supremacy.
The portrayal of black people on screens as been one that ensures the continuation of white supremacy in black minds. One that strips off the existence of Blackness to replace it with the inferiority and superiority of race ideology. Perhaps, Bell Hooks puts it better in her book titled “Black Looks: Race and representation” when she says,
“We are most likely to see images of black people that reinforce and reinscribe white supremacy. Those images may be constructed by white people who have not divested of racism, or by people of colour/black people who may see the world through the lens of white supremacy-internalized racism” (Hooks, 1992)
Taking Black Consciousness as a philosophy, we soon realize the importance of black unity, religion, and cultural identity. But to get a firm grip understanding of this philosophy, to understand the intentions and strategies of colonialism and Apartheid is a prerequisite. The perpetrators of these systems aimed to divide and conquer black communities for the purposes of exploitation, which was a success. The strategy was to disfigure the culture and history of the black man such that the black man loses a sense of who he is. Black consciousness emerges as an internal group response to the victories of colonialism and apartheid. What then is the philosophy of Black consciousness?
“Black consciousness is an attitude of mind and a way of life, the most positive call to emanate from the black world for a long time. Its essence is the realisation by the black man of the need to rally together with his brothers around the cause of their oppression-the blackness of their skin-and to operate as a group to rid themselves of the shackles that bind them to perpetual servitude” (Biko, 1978).
We negotiated for a settlement in the years leading to 1994 while we were a fragmented black society. Back then, the Zulu nation was not in ropes with the African National Congress (ANC), but they were demanding a Zulu independent state just like the Afrikaner Weerstandsbeweging (AWB) demanded an Afrikaner Volkstaat/Boerestaat. We went to the table to negotiate with an enemy whilst the black social fabric was in pieces, and so we lost. This leads me to introduce the second status quo in SA: Apartheid did not die, it was privatised. This is a simple thesis presented by Dr Mpofu-Walsh in his book titled: The new Apartheid.
The introduction of Shaka iLembe to our screens was a step forward towards the liberation of black people in images. Other telenovelas and series like Isibaya, Umkhokha: The curse, Queen Modjaji, and other African story telling series are also a step towards black emancipation. These images of telling the true story of Africans by Africans overturns the first status of mind oppression. They encourage Blackness and join the mission of Africans writing their own history and not the history which began by the arrival of Van Riebeek in 1652.
The film and drama industry in South Africa has been conscious in the stories they tell on screens and whether they speak to the audience or not. The industry has taken seriously the business of black representation on screens which alone carries a multiplier effect of defining Blackness. For instance, these images with Blackness ideological intent unwire the legacies of colonialisation and addresses the stereotypical-racist representation of Blackness we find in the status quo.
ILembe has been displayed on screens as a cruel tyrant who terrorized societies and even his people for sadistic purposes. When Shaka iLembe blessed our screens on Mzansi Magic, we saw a different King and what exactly was the ancestral purpose of having uMenzi kaNdaba as a king of the Zulu nation. What made it even more meaningful was the use of the Zulu language to pass this message. This therefore reveals the intention of the white colonialist settler to misrepresent and disfigure the history of indigenous people-blacks. I further believe that this attitude in the industry must be distributed proportionately in relation to African heroes and activists like Hintsa, Moshoeshoe, and Dimbanyika.
Therefore, the argument I present in this piece yet again is how we should understand decolonisation as a process. A process not only related to political emancipation and representation but a process that affects every aspect of a black man’s life. Equally important, the liberation of every black man is depended on what his society teaches him. What conversations are held in gatherings and how we infuse blackness pride in these conversations. The white man can not colonialise us and decolonialise us in the same breath, at some point we have to do it ourselves.
-MediaHouse150
