Kwaito: From Past to Present
In 1994, Nelson Mandela was elected as President of South Africa in the nation’s first democratic election, marking the official end of South Africa’s 46-year period under the apartheid regime. In that same year, renowned Kwaito music group, Boom Shaka, released their debut album featuring hit single, “It’s About Time.” Just as apartheid was coming to an end, a new genre of music was on the rise. Born in the townships of Soweto, Kwaito fuses elements of traditional South African music with other genres throughout the African diaspora such as house, hip hop, and dancehall. Traditionally characterized by its slow tempo house beats, Kwaito has evolved into various subgenres that also experiment with the house sound.
The music is often understood as a genre that grew directly out of navigating freedom and democracy in post-apartheid South Africa. In Kwaito’s Promise: Music and the Aesthetics of Freedom, Gavin Steingo describes Kwaito as “the expression of freedom in the post apartheid period.” (2016, p.2) Xavier Livermon mirrors this interpretation of Kwaito as he describes it as the “music form through which young Black South Africans refashion themselves away from the ossified identities of apartheid” (2008, p. 273) While other South African genres explicitly engage political tensions, Kwaito is distinct in its intentional disregard of politics in the traditional sense of resistance. Instead, the genre deals with the newfound pleasures and possibilities afforded by the post-apartheid era. These sentiments can be heard in “It’s About Time”:
This celebratory tone was often criticized by the older generation of South Africans who viewed the genre as empty of any meaningful political impact. As mentioned by Steingo in Kwaito’s Promise, critics have described Kwaito as “‘music with no meaning or purpose,’” and “‘music that infects our youth with a sense of recklessness,’” among other things. (Steingo, 2016, p. 4)
However, these critiques rest on a strict definition of what is and isn’t political. In Kwaito’s Promise, Steingo condemns the tendency to dismiss things that aren’t overtly political as empty of any political implications. Esinako Ndabeni shares this sentiment and goes on to consider the politics of Black joy as she argues, “when one considers the political significance of black people deciding to take a moment to enjoy themselves, these choices cannot be characterized as simply ‘apolitical’”(Ndabeni, 2018, p.12)
Critiques of Kwaito also reflect the many ways in which the experiences of South African youth differ from those of their elders. While the older generation has a vivid memory of the struggle against apartheid, the youth, born towards the end or after apartheid are navigating the outcome of their elders’ struggles — which is a new struggle in itself.
No longer restrained by the need to comment on racial injustice and political freedom, [Kwaito] expressed a new set of dreams.” (Impey, 2001, p. 45)
In After Robot: Kwaito Music in Johannesburg, Kwaito star Zola identifies a key difference between the older and younger generation, saying “They were fighting for freedom. We are fighting for identity.” (25:05) This fight for identity is prevalent throughout all elements of culture of post-apartheid South Africa — it can be seen in the fashion, felt in the dances, and heard in the music. But what does this fight for identity look like for Black South Africans whose identities lie on the margins? How is this fight nuanced by the threat of intersecting forms of oppression?
When South Africa approved its new constitution in 1996, they became the first country in the world to constitutionally outlaw discrimination based on sexual orientation. This helped establish South Africa as the progressive, rainbow nation that Mandela promised upon election. In 2006, South Africa became one of the first countries to legalize same-sex marriage.
However, these legal provisions have failed to fully address the unique struggles and needs of Black queer South Africans. Corrective rape is a growing crisis in the nation particularly for Black Lesbians who are raped in effort to “correct” their sexual identity (Martin, Kelly, Turquet & Ross 2009) Furthermore, a report conducted by the South African Institute of Race Relations in 2017 found that Black queer people are at a higher risk of physical violence than other races.
In addition to threats of violence, Black queer people have also faced social and cultural exclusion. In an analysis on the construction of gay leisure space in Cape Town, Gustav Visser argues that overlapping systems of oppression linked to apartheid have created a “generation of an essentially White middle-class gay male leisure space in De Waterkant and ultimately exclude other class, gender and race groups” (Visser, 2003, p. 131). Legal steps toward LGBT acceptance have largely gone toward the benefit of White men.
These inequalities go beyond the law as they are ingrained in culture. In “Queer (y) ing freedom: black queer visibilities in post-apartheid South Africa,” Xavier Livermon (2012) argues that while legislation is important in achieving full acceptance, “definitions of freedom must expand beyond the legal, political, and the economic.” (p. 299)
While Kwaito provided an outlet through which definitions of freedom could be explored, the genre made room for a particular expression of freedom that didn’t necessarily include the representation of the Black queer community. Since its inception, Kwaito has been a genre dominated by male artists and characterized by a hyper masculine aesthetic. In an ethnographic analysis of Black queer nightlife in Soweto, Xavier Livermon notes the masculine associations of kwaito as he mentions, “a specific genre of music (in this case, kwaito) guarantees that a particular type of man, one who enacts a hypermasculine ‘rough’ performance, will be present.” (2014, p. 514) This performance often involved misogyny along with the sexual objectification of women.
While Black queer women like Lebo Mathosa had a significant impact on the genre and in many ways subverted the genre’s patriarchal nature, these examples were infrequent in comparison to the large number of masculine heterosexual men that dominated the genre. Visibly queer Kwaito artists are even harder to find in the early years of the genre.
However, as the genre has evolved, so too has the diversity of the artists. The legacy of Kwaito can be heard in the work of more modern South African artists who are experimenting with various house sounds. One of the latest Kwaito-inspired sub-genres to emerge is Gqom. Originating in Durban, South Africa, Gqom draws on elements of Kwaito, hip hop, house, and electronic music. It is characterized by sped up, minimal, bass-heavy house beats.
However, even more interesting than the sound of the music, are the performers who are using Gqom and Kwaito to make space for marginalized identities historically left out of South African popular music. This blog explores the creative ways that queer artists are embarking upon this task. Through a close read of recent work from South African duo FAKA and South African rapper, MX Blouse, this blog examines the ways that music is used as a tool of disruption. Xavier Livermon argues that “black queers forge possibilities for belonging through deliberate destabilizations of heteronormative notions of black identity” (p. 299) This blog explores modern examples of how this occurs. Through the audiovisual performance of Kwaito and its variants, Black Queer South Africans expand the political utility of the genre as they disrupt heteronormative expressions of freedom in post-apartheid South Africa.
