“Three generations of white South African men were bound together at that table. Vermuelen was the first generation. He defined Africa, made it safe for Basson to defile. I was the last generation, the last to grow up in segregated neighborhoods. Between us was the silent photograph of Wouter Basson. Like a distant father, Basson was absent at the dining table.” – Henk Rossouw (Hole in the White ‘Hood). Also Mahmood Mamdani on Bantu Education at UCT, Gael Reagon on sisterhood, Binyavanga Wainaina on dis-covering Kenya, Gaston Zossou on African intellectuals and more…
Cover:
Strange Fruit by Lewis Allen
DeAesthetic. Writing with and from the Black Sonic by Tumi Mogorosi (Iwalewa Books, 2024)
DeAesthetic. Writing with and from the Black Sonic presents essays by Johannesburg-based artist, jazz percussionist and thinker Tumi Mogorosi. The essays focus on the Black Sonic as a dislocated episteme, which identifies the aesthetic as a limitation. In their de-centring, the texts fundamentally open a way to write and read beyond hegemonic knowledge validations. As a reading that straddles between Brenda Fassie, Louis Armstrong, Louis Moholo-Moholo and Sade, they are in visual conversation with symbols created by Emeka Alams of Gold Coast Trading Company.