Page 407 - The ISA Handbook in Contemporary Sociology

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378 THE ISA HANDBOOK IN CONTEMPORARY SOCIOLOGY

he could not adjust to the traditionalist 2 Disvaluation : the decline of respect, of commu-
machismo of the compound, which demanded nity and traditions, the role of traditional healers
of him traditional Zulu rituals and bare-fisted or inyangas in the hostel; kinship feuds amongst
fighting. This, together with his talent for returning exiles; the woman who, despite advice
to the contrary, goes to the city, her loneliness,
guitar and his abhorrence of the bawdy
alienation and madness; the movement of people
maskanda songs of the compound inmates,
searching for land to settle their cattle; powerless
drove him out of the total institution. He also
elders; problem of two wives; problems of deceiv-
avoided the expanding shack lands of
ing husbands; the greed of the local black
Mkumbane with their vibrant drinking-house middle-classes; Ethiopian religions of the poor vs.
or shebeenculture, and chose the rental of a other Christian sects.
room from an Indian family in town and, as 3 Loss of voice : the violence of urban language,
his immediate cultural formation, a black English as power, the inclusivity of songs and
church. There his music was deployed for the their participatory patterns; the transgressive, free
praise of the Lord. and easy interaction and activity of life in the
In 1949, his Boxing Club mobilized his shanty-towns of Mkumbane; oral and epic forms
against the mundane command language of
prowess as a fighter to participate as a Zulu
the Mill.
in the Zulu–Indian carnage in Durban. The
4 Gender : men vs. women; the meaning of being
resistance to Apartheid legislation between
a man; the crumbling worlds of women on the
1948 and 1954 ‘pushed’ him into the African
land; men as warriors; women as mothers of the
National Congress as ‘Luthuli’s soldier’. It community and nation; women as militants and
was his voice that led many gatherings into heroines.
the chants and songs of a mobilizing African 5 Struggle : perseverance like that of the Bible’s
population. It was his voice that in turn raised Job; survival through tricking and sparring like
his status on the shop floor high enough to the Uhlakhanyana ‘trickster’ of traditional folk-
tell the izinduna that unless they listened, tales; buffooning the bosses and whites; union-
they would die. It was his status as a boxer ism and heroism (but also the sending up of trade
unionists and their briefcases); solidarity or as it
that elevated him higher with the rank and
is expressed in isiZulu: umadlandawonye.
file. After the repression of the 1960s, Baba
6 Khalo : suffering, jail, exile, prison and lament
Khumalo continued to lead on the shop floor:
about deaths and mourning.
by then, dissonance had turned to alterity. In
the late 1970s and early 1980s, he was one of All those became symbolic markers to dis-
the old men who led the factory into trade tinguish their grievance, and to mark out a
unionism. His experience, his cultural reso- shift of cultural formations from dissonance
nance and his seniority made him central to and alterity to a radical challenge of manage-
both the organization of his union and the rial and Apartheid prerogatives.
growing cultural movement. The narrations of defiance in the plays,
Baba Khumalo is just one example of the poems, stories, songs and performances of
thousands who created the ‘cultural capital’ these people created a possibility for thou-
of the movement. Such men (86% of our sands of ordinary workers to develop their
group was male, due to black women’s prob- own languages of defiance and use elements
lems in committing themselves for many to transcribe their own experiences. Whereas
after-hours commitments) created a unique the political and organizational leadership
self-definition. was given by the shop steward movement,
The main themes of the symbolism were its emotive and cultural strains were given
as follows: by these creative brokers. The prominence
gained by these grassroots intellectuals with
1 Exploitation and alienation : the hardship of their oral lore had its own price, however.
working life:being used;being beaten;being turned Table 25.1 provides an index for this over
into things; being chased about; being humiliated. six years.