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Umthonyama

Umthonyama explores the politics of black queer visibility and contested belonging within the evolving culture of amaXhosa people. Black queer performance practitioners, are practically and theoretically foregrounded in this thesis to demonstrate the sophisticated ways in which we become visible, cr...

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Main Author: Lallie, Lungile
Other Authors: Mtshali, Mbongeni
Format: Thesis
Language:English
Published: Little Theatre 2024
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access_status_str Open Access
author Lallie, Lungile
author2 Mtshali, Mbongeni
author_browse Lallie, Lungile
Mtshali, Mbongeni
author_facet Mtshali, Mbongeni
Lallie, Lungile
author_sort Lallie, Lungile
collection Thesis
description Umthonyama explores the politics of black queer visibility and contested belonging within the evolving culture of amaXhosa people. Black queer performance practitioners, are practically and theoretically foregrounded in this thesis to demonstrate the sophisticated ways in which we become visible, create space, and locate ourselves within the culture. Black queer erasure is furthermore complicated by examining how Xhosa contemporary popular culture and music is influenced by Xhosa religious practice, which then becomes a fertile site for both the subversion and reimagining of new cultural identities and belonging. I draw chiefly on José Esteban Muñoz's concept of 'disidentification' and Viktor Shklyovsky's concept of 'defamiliarization' as theoretical and formal approaches in my enquiry. To these ends, my thesis production, Umthonyama --cyclical, durational live-art installation, work -- is stylized as a queer 'homily' that rehearses and celebrates a queer genealogy of black Xhosa identity felt and contested at the level of the intimate body. Citing the aesthetics and politics of black artists such as Athi-Patra Ruga, Thandiswa Mazwai, Camagwini, and Ntombethongo, the installation acts as the central site of experience, encounter, collision, for reframing neocolonial codes of spiritual, traditional, and popular modes of emerging Xhosa culture
format Thesis
id oai:open.uct.ac.za:11427/39594
institution University of Cape Town (South Africa)
language eng
last_indexed 2026-06-10T12:41:18.125Z
license_str Not specified — see source repository
provenance_str_mv Harvested via OAI-PMH from UCTD — University of Cape Town Open Access Repository
publishDate 2024
publishDateRange 2024
publishDateSort 2024
publisher Little Theatre
publisherStr Little Theatre
record_format dspace
source_str UCTD — University of Cape Town Open Access Repository
spelling oai:open.uct.ac.za:11427/39594 Umthonyama Lallie, Lungile Mtshali, Mbongeni Performance Umthonyama explores the politics of black queer visibility and contested belonging within the evolving culture of amaXhosa people. Black queer performance practitioners, are practically and theoretically foregrounded in this thesis to demonstrate the sophisticated ways in which we become visible, create space, and locate ourselves within the culture. Black queer erasure is furthermore complicated by examining how Xhosa contemporary popular culture and music is influenced by Xhosa religious practice, which then becomes a fertile site for both the subversion and reimagining of new cultural identities and belonging. I draw chiefly on José Esteban Muñoz's concept of 'disidentification' and Viktor Shklyovsky's concept of 'defamiliarization' as theoretical and formal approaches in my enquiry. To these ends, my thesis production, Umthonyama --cyclical, durational live-art installation, work -- is stylized as a queer 'homily' that rehearses and celebrates a queer genealogy of black Xhosa identity felt and contested at the level of the intimate body. Citing the aesthetics and politics of black artists such as Athi-Patra Ruga, Thandiswa Mazwai, Camagwini, and Ntombethongo, the installation acts as the central site of experience, encounter, collision, for reframing neocolonial codes of spiritual, traditional, and popular modes of emerging Xhosa culture 2024-05-13T10:25:52Z 2024-05-13T10:25:52Z 2023 2024-05-13T10:11:29Z Thesis / Dissertation Masters Masters http://hdl.handle.net/11427/39594 eng application/pdf Little Theatre Faculty of Humanities
spellingShingle Performance
Lallie, Lungile
Umthonyama
thesis_degree_str Master's
title Umthonyama
title_full Umthonyama
title_fullStr Umthonyama
title_full_unstemmed Umthonyama
title_short Umthonyama
title_sort umthonyama
topic Performance
url http://hdl.handle.net/11427/39594
work_keys_str_mv AT lallielungile umthonyama