by Victor Dlamini on Mar 29th, 2012
Two of the most moving events that I have attended this year have been school events, and the most impressive people have been the young children. Young, bright-eyed, positive, hopeful and so full of enthusiasm, these young school children sound and act as if they have sipped from the well of wisdom and compassion.
First up was the Grade 8 evening at Wendywood High School and last week I was at King David School in Sandton for the induction of the Johannesburg Mini Council. In a country where cynicism is often in oversupply, it is heartening to see such an overwhelming sense of purpose among school children of such a tender age. We hear so often talk of the lost generation and frightening stories of poorly disciplined kids, but these kids are the antidote. They wear their confidence with an infectious chutzpah and it is obvious they see themselves as young giants capable of heroic deeds.
The members of the mini council have a diary full of duties, on top of which they have their Grade 7 responsibilities. Still, they go about these extra duties with a palpable sense of civic pride. This augurs well for the future as these kids will be tomorrow’s leaders. At the induction of the new council, the first speech was delivered by the deputy mini mayor. By the time young Priyanka Nayer was done with her incredible, heartfelt, sincere speech, few in the hall were untouched, many shedding a tear and choking up. In a little more than five minutes, she showed what a tangible sense of purpose can do to ignite a young child’s sense of purpose. More importantly, she demonstrated just how much a mission of doing good can do to develop children into responsible citizens.
Some Joburgers suffer from what those on the social circuit call event fatigue and I can understand this because many of these events have the same jaded guests listening to meandering speeches that sound as if they were approved by a committee. What a breath of fresh air to attend events at which there were no expensive bouquets, no pretentious decor and no overbearing ushers.
When outgoing mini mayor Cassidy Gordon took to the podium, it was clear for all the parents gathered in the room that she had had the kind of experience that has a lasting effect on a young child. Her speech focused not just on the life-changing experiences the council had had, but the difference they had made to less privileged school children, the ill and to the abused. It is telling that these events are happening right at the beginning of the year, when there is still the time for children to learn and implement the values of their schools and their institutions. So often things are left till the last minute and then a kind of heroism of achieving at the last minute is celebrated.
by Victor Dlamini on Sep 16th, 2011
Some of those who try to promote a culture of reading do more bad than good.
They make reading seem like something mysterious, which is accessible to only a few. Worse still, they make the terrible mistake of asking kids to choose between reading and television.
This past week has been National Book Awareness Week and everywhere you turn there are messages that encourage reading.
Instead of focusing on the negatives, their campaign would probably be more successful if it emphasised the pleasures of reading and showed lots of kids and adults actually reading.
We have become a nation of slick campaigns, many of them put up at great expense.
Sometimes you wonder if, over time, these campaigns don’t obscure the original goals.
In many ways, National Book Awareness Week reminds me of National Car Free Day. Both events are promoted with great fanfare and afterwards it’s business as usual until the next campaign.
Sadly, many of the campaign messages around reading inadvertently subvert their own aims by suggesting that reading is accessible only to a few.
There is a history of looking down at ordinary reading material and a glorification of so-called “classic texts”.
The idea of “high culture” has done much to discourage reading because many of the texts available in libraries are wholly alien to the lives of the children asked, or even forced, to read them.
South Africa has succeeded in creating a vibrant publishing industry and many new books written by South Africans are being launched each month.
The success of the Daily Sun and similar tabloids in South Africa has shown that readers will emerge when the appropriate material is made available.
Similarly, Isolezwe and Ilanga continue to draw in readers who would otherwise remain outside of the reading public in South Africa.
In the same way, book publishers need to ask themselves if they are producing the kinds of books that would interest a new segment of the population.
There is no point in force-feeding people a literary diet they have no taste for.
Reading, like commuting, is a matter of everyday habit and it is really what happens during the ordinary period that affects enthusiasm for reading.
In those households where the habit of reading is nurtured early, books become a part of everyday life.In much the same way that we have road-safety signs, there should be a plethora of messages that promote and celebrate reading.
This is where a great deal of our attention should be paid. The public broadcaster could run announcements that promote reading throughout the year.
Of course, books are powerful and reading them expands the horizons of any child or adult. Children who grow up reading books are more likely to do better than those who don’t.
It is not just pleasure that readers derive from books but also significant knowledge. But reading is not accessible only through old-fashioned books.
Today’s kids are growing up reading and writing on mobile pages and online. Like many things in life, there are many ways of arriving at literacy and “the book”.
The literary purists may dismiss reading on the internet but the success of the Kindle and tablets like the iPad show that technology can make reading even more accessible.
The conversations about books and reading on Facebook and Twitter show that the internet is already replacing the traditional classroom.
People who want to promote reading in South Africa must not fall into the trap of glorifying “old-fashioned” reading but accept that even books themselves were once a mysterious technology when they first appeared.
by Victor Dlamini on Aug 26th, 2011
by Victor Dlamini on Aug 10th, 2011
by Victor Dlamini on Jul 11th, 2011
by Victor Dlamini on Jun 28th, 2011
There is a danger that many of today’s youngsters will end up believing that the only way they can get ahead in life is through the intervention of some powerful institution, or the wholesale change of laws.
But Michelle Obama’s speech in Soweto this week suggests that there are other ways for young people to find meaning and purpose in their lives.
At the core of her message, Obama suggested that some of the most remarkable social achievements are brought about by strong, actionable, individual belief.
This is a very necessary and timely perspective because it reimagines the sources of success away from grandiose projects to smaller, personal ones.
It is appropriate that Obama’s message was one that centred so strongly on the power of personal belief because South Africa’s own struggle for freedom leveraged the power of belief to inspire young and old to bring down a rotten but powerful regime.
Sadly, today all one hears about are “resources, resources, resources” and it leads people to throw their hands up in despair, feeling that there is not much they can achieve without a big institution or huge infrastructure.
As Obama spoke of her own modest upbringing and how she had followed her heart, not her career, it was clear that she wanted to remind the youth that their own choices still mattered.
Of course, Obama did not come to Regina Mundi to preach; she came to speak to young African women leaders. But by the time she’d finished her rousing speech, it was clear that even though she had not come to preach, she had delivered a secular sermon for a new age.
Hers is a most important message because its power lies in the depth of her personal beliefs that the greatest change comes not from changing laws, but changing people.
It was truly remarkable to listen to the wife of the most powerful president in the world using not the language of institutional power, but that of personal power.
When Obama took to the podium, her speech was filled with the diction of one who is familiar with the power of the places of worship that also double up as the places of resistance and rejuvenation.
She placed this solidly built church in Soweto within the axis of those places that earn the right to be called “sacred”.
For those of us who forget or are urged to forget our own history, it was deeply moving to hear the US First Lady remind us that Regina Mundi is more than a church, but one of our most important sanctuaries.
She regaled us with the historic events of June 16 1976 with an enthusiasm that spoke of her own grasp of the rejuvenating powers of fresh memory.
But it was her ability to connect the struggles of her own country some 50 years ago to those in South Africa 35 years ago that uplifted so many in the audience.
In an era in which the mantra of the economy can often be deafening, drowning out all other impulses, especially those towards social justice, Obama revalidated the right of the young to fight for their own causes.
She was correct to point out that many of the victories that are available to today’s young leaders may not get their names emblazoned across the pages of history, but this does not make them any less valid.
by Victor Dlamini on Jun 7th, 2011
I had the pleasure of attending this year’s Venice Biennale, here’s a video I recorded with one of the artists in attendance there, Mary Sibande:
by Victor Dlamini on May 6th, 2011
…the corner of, that is.
by Victor Dlamini on Apr 29th, 2011
The late Lewis Nkosi, photographed wearing his “Mandela’s Ego” shirt.
by Victor Dlamini on Apr 21st, 2011
Please enjoy this selection of photographs from my archives…
…along with this new portrait of an editor we know and love:
Brought to you by yours truly:
