AA 2012 Supplementum 1
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Item Open Access Acculturation as translation: mimicry, satire and resistance in Chewa dance(University of the Free State, 2012) Nthala, GrantEnglish: communities of Malawi, Zambia, Mozambique, Tanzania and Zimbabwe. With this particular dance – and indeed with many others – historical connotations, cultural reverberations, and systemic institutionalisation come into play. The hierarchical organisation of the Chewa dance systems and the orderly and enigmatic tendencies of the dance displays are reminiscent of historical phenomena linked to the Chewa diaspora. In essence, mimicry, satire and other forms of enactment (often dramatic) in Chewa dance subtly or candidly unearth acculturative elements within the Chewa ethnicity. This article seeks to illustrate that the Chewa dances gulewamkulu and mganda constitute theatre and that their performance demonstrates a manifestation of traditional Chewa cultural features that have been altered or modified by borrowing from or adapting to other Bantu-related and European cultures.Item Open Access After universalisms: music as a medium for intercultural translation(University of the Free State, 2012) Viljoen, MartinaEnglish: Postmodernity is characterised by the fundamentalisation of plurality. As Aleida Assmann (1996: 99) finds, difference is affirmed in the form of deviance, gaps, and radical alterity. Within this intellectual milieu, the acknowledgment of alterity and the acceptance of difference have become foremost ethical claims (Assmann 1996: 99). Appropriating the thought of Goethe, she finds that the emphasis shifts from the embrace of the One to an encounter with the mode of the Two (Assmann 1996: 100). This encounter is marked by awe and surprise, but also by the shrouding of each of the Two as if cloaked in eternal solitude. The question posed in this article is whether Assmann’s viewpoints may enhance a reading of a work from the South African art music repertoire, Hans Huyssen’s Ciacona & Tshikona (2007). Engaging with a broader selection of viewpoints on cultural translation, it is asked whether Assmann’s (1996: 99) notion of otherness is a productive context for mediating a meaningful encounter between cultures and whether, as such, it is relevant to an interpretation of Huyssen’s work. A speculative interpretation of Huyssen’s Ciacona & Tshikona reveals that the work is suggestive of a complex heredity being translated into an ‘impure’ new South African contextuality.Item Open Access Art historiography and Bild-wissenschaft: new perspectives on some objects by the Venda sculptor, Phutuma Seoka(University of the Free State, 2012) De Villiers-Human, SuzanneEnglish: It is argued that the apparatus of western art history has been sharpened by the current media consciousness. Typical art historical tools are self-consciously harnessed in the process of scrutinising objects which resist and expand these methods and theories. The focus is on some objects of Venda polychrome sculpture which “took the South African art world by storm” in the 1980s when these specimens of rural craftsmanship in wood were deemed fit to enter the gallery circuit. An analysis of the Venda sculptors’ religious and social knowledge of the use of patterned decoration on ritual tools in wood, and of performances by firelight of myths of origin with wooden dolls during initiation rituals, informs my alternative interpretation of the modern polychrome sculptures steering away from issues of cross-cultural aesthetics, the dialectic of modernism and traditionalism and post-colonial studies. Rather, I interpret the works as medium-self-conscious objects which extend their own cultural and social agency to communicate more widely to a non-initiate audience which may include visitors to an art museum. This shift of focus from a history of art to a history of media effects an altered perspective on the objects themselves and on the methods used to interpret them.Item Open Access Contextualising ethics in the practice of translator education: the case of the indigenous value system of the Basotho(University of the Free State, 2012) Marais, KobusEnglish: This article develops the suggestions made in recent publications on translation studies concerning the role of the translator as an agent. The article discusses agency as a central theme in translation, and points out that it is not a value unto itself, but that it must be conceptualised within a value system. This value system, it is contended, is inculcated during the years of study at tertiary institutions. This suggests that the value system must be incorporated into the curriculum, the choice of which is left in the hands of the lecturer. Following the lead of Tymoczko, who argued for the internationalisation of translation studies, the indigenous Basotho value system and the concept of ubuntu, with its concomitant values, are explored as values that may be of interest to translation studies. If the study of translation is to be contextualised, so does ethics in translator education. The article reconsiders the implications of critical studies for ethics, arguing that it creates an impasse for human ethical action. As a value system that nurtures society and individuality, ubuntu may be a valuable alternative.Item Open Access Indigenisation and history: how opera in South Africa became South African opera(University of the Free State, 2012) Roos, HildeEnglish: In South Africa, the exposure of opera to local cultures and circumstances has in time resulted in a number of opera productions that have departed from Western aesthetic norms and prompted innovations to the genre. These innovations can be traced in newly created operas as well as in the production of a number of operas from the standard canon that have been ‘translated’ to local contexts and social realities. This article explores the historical trajectory of opera production in South Africa from 1801 to the present through the lens of indigenisation and shows that, in its most subtle form, this phenomenon can be traced in local opera productions long before the issue of the reflection of indigenous cultures in opera became relevant. In constructing this history, the author hopes to identify moments when one musical element became another, or changed sufficiently to become a similar, but different element. Clearly, in discovering the South African roots of opera and understanding the many projects that currently characterise the opera scene in this country, the issue is not only one for cultural or textual analysis, but also, very pertinently, a matter for historiography.Item Open Access Luc Peire’s Mwinda Mingi (1955): a Belgian abstract painting on the Congo(University of the Free State, 2012) Vermeulen, JulienEnglish: As a young artist Luc Peire (1916-1994) was influenced by expressionism, but by 1955, when he painted Mwinda Mingi, his work had become predominantly abstract. The Lingala-title suggests this shift may have taken place during his journey in the Congo and critics have often claimed that the painter’s perception of African village life had a decisive impact on his new style. This assumption however requires a profound analysis taking into account the broader context of Belgian colonial art, Peire’s contacts with modernist artists, the circumstances of his isolated life as a painter-in-residence, the gradual development of his abstract idiom and the ambivalent reception of his new work among expatriates and Belgian critics. The catalogue raisonné of his oeuvre mentions 1398 oil paintings, sixty of which have been inspired by Africa.Item Open Access Music and (re-)translating unity and reconciliation in post-genocide Rwanda(University of the Free State, 2012) Barz, GregoryEnglish: This article focuses on the ability of a historically important musical instrument in the East African country of Rwanda, the inanga, to contribute to the (re-)translation of issues related to unity and reconciliation efforts after the genocide of 1994. By concentrating on the transmission of tradition from Kirusu Thomas to Sophie Nzayisenga, from father to daughter, I underscore the significant changes in cultural contexts for historical and contemporary inanga performance while also positioning the instrument within the dominant cultural metaphors of ‘blockage’ and ‘flow’. Throughout the article, I draw on inanga song texts to demonstrate the role of the inanga as cultural translator.Item Open Access Music production in the intercultural sphere: challenges and opportunities(University of the Free State, 2012) Huyssen, HansEnglish: As a South African composer working in a culturally, politically and ecologically heterogeneous environment, I deliberately refer to musical ‘differences’ in many of my works. The artistic vision developed in these works finds expression in the fusion of ‘differences’ and often highly disparate materials into unified forms of expression. In this article I respond to Kofi Agawu’s contestation of ‘difference’ from a complexity perspective indebted to Edgar Morin’s reflections on diverse systems and Paul Cilliers’s interpretation of non-foundational complexity. I use informed performance practice to respond to the overarching topic of this volume – translation – and offer a discussion of my composition The Songs of Madosini (2002) as an instance of cultural translation.Item Open Access