Fat in a time of slim: The reinscription of race in the framing of fat desirability in post-apartheid South Africa

Sexualities ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 19 (8) ◽  
pp. 914-925 ◽  
Author(s):  
Louise Vincent

This article critically examines the way in which the reported sexual desire of black African men for fat women is contained and managed in South African media representations of fat. While sexual desire for fat women represents a potential challenge to the dominant framing of fat as diseased/dysfunctional/disgusting, the article shows how the reduction of this desire to one of two (racialized) ‘explanations’ – either evidence of racial primitivism or a (black male) strategy to avoid infection with HIV – emasculates the potentially powerful oppositional framing of fat as sexy. It is a mark of the dominant frame’s influence that it is capable of co-opting oppositional frames and recasting them in its own image. From the point of view of critiques of the fat-as-disease orthodoxy, the claim to the existence of an alternative norm of fat as sexually desirable in ‘black culture’ emerges as a problematic oppositional frame – saturated with raced assumptions in the way in which it is reported. The counter framing of the (black) fat body as sexually desirable is given column space to be derided and dismissed as an instance of deviant black sexuality, as a mistaken belief in need of ‘correction’, or it is subsumed under a medicalized frame as a strategy for the avoidance of disease rather than an expression of genuine sexual desire.

Author(s):  
Ernest Muchu Toh

This paper brings to understanding the effects of class and racism which are manifested in xenophobic attacks against foreign blacks in South Africa. Xenophobic attacks have been persistent in the country for over the last two decade. It has amongst other things slowed the economy, particularly affected the country’s relations with the African continent and tainted the image of South Africa to the entire world. These attacks turn the livelihood of Africans immigrants into a daily struggle to adapt, survive, integrate themselves and contributes to the development of the country. The article seeks to unveil the reasons South African blacks behave the way they do against their fellow Black African counterparts despite the call for African unity and solidarity also known as ‘Ubuntu’. From the findings, it demonstrates that the act of xenophobia is a manifestation of effect of mindset influenced by the apartheid policy, which was based on hatred, class, race, and violence.


Author(s):  
Maria Paola Guarducci

Aim of this article is to explore some paths of meaning in the lyrics of the South African poet Ingrid de Kok. I will analyse her relationship with the history of her country in various collections and the difficult balance between collective and personal ethos, trying to highlight her linguistic search for ethical spaces not colonized by the widespread and still racially loaded ideologies of her country. One of the main features in de Kok’s poetry, I think, is her capacity to allow opposing realities to coexhist. My article will deal with the notion of juxtaposition the way it comes across in some of her poems, both from a linguistic point of view and in terms of its imagery.


Author(s):  
Diana Sfetlana Stoica

This chapter is an invitation to look over some creative products of media representations and communication, especially present in African country commercials, and analyze them from a potential BRICS ideology's dissemination point of view. The aim of this research is to finally conclude that there are very few differences between the North and the South, speaking about creativity, along with realizing a frame of paradigms on the global character of this concept. However, perceptions are subdued to the translation of creativity movements and the summing up of images created by these perceptions are paving the way to the conceptualization of Othered creativity. The Othered creativity is a concept proposed to frame the representations of an Otherness, subject to images that have been displaced from one cultural environment and re-proposed in another one.


2020 ◽  
Vol 17 (3) ◽  
pp. 433-444
Author(s):  
Amanuel Isak Tewolde

Many scholars and South African politicians characterize the widespread anti-foreigner sentiment and violence in South Africa as dislike against migrants and refugees of African origin which they named ‘Afro-phobia’. Drawing on online newspaper reports and academic sources, this paper rejects the Afro-phobia thesis and argues that other non-African migrants such as Asians (Pakistanis, Indians, Bangladeshis and Chinese) are also on the receiving end of xenophobia in post-apartheid South Africa. I contend that any ‘outsider’ (White, Asian or Black African) who lives and trades in South African townships and informal settlements is scapegoated and attacked. I term this phenomenon ‘colour-blind xenophobia’. By proposing this analytical framework and integrating two theoretical perspectives — proximity-based ‘Realistic Conflict Theory (RCT)’ and Neocosmos’ exclusivist citizenship model — I contend that xenophobia in South Africa targets those who are in close proximity to disadvantaged Black South Africans and who are deemed outsiders (e.g., Asian, African even White residents and traders) and reject arguments that describe xenophobia in South Africa as targeting Black African refugees and migrants.


2018 ◽  
pp. 145
Author(s):  
Juan Pablo Beca

ResumenEl trabajo analiza el curso Ética Profesional en la carrera de Derecho en la Universidad Católica de Temuco. Examina la forma como se abordaba la ética profesional antes de la creación del curso, y lo que ha ocurrido con él a través de sucesivos cambios curriculares y la introducción del modelo por competencias. El curso aporta al sello identitario, mediante un enfoque multidisciplinario. El curso ha vinculado teoría y práctica, desde que comenzó a implementarse, hasta llegar actualmente a comprenderlo en la lógica de competencias. Esta mirada implica formar a los estudiantes para resolver dilemas éticos, lo que se hace mediante la metodología del ver–juzgar–actuar. Esta metodología de discernimiento es propia de la tradicióncatólica, pero se usa en este contexto sin un cariz religioso. El método en cuestión permite ir educando la autonomía a fn de tomar decisiones. Se analiza la importancia de contextualizar la enseñanza ética y la forma como esto se ha hecho en el curso. Finalmente se aborda la relevancia de formar la conciencia ética de los estudiantes.Palabras clave: Experiencia de enseñanza – Ética profesional –Método de discernimient.ResumoO artigo analisa o curso de Ética Profssional na Escola de Direito na Universidade Católica de Temuco. Examina a forma de como abordar a ética profssional antes da criação do curso, e o que tem acontecido com ele através de sucessivas mudanças curriculares e a introdução do modelo de competências. O curso aporta ao selo de identidade, através de uma abordagem multidisciplinar. O curso tem ligado teoria e prática, desde que começou a se programar até chegar atualmente a compreendê-lo na lógica de competência. Este olhar implica formar aos estudantes para resolver dilemas éticos, o que é feito pela metodologia do ver-julgar-agir. Este método de discernimento é próprio da tradição Católica, mas é usado neste contexto, sem um aspecto religioso. O método em questão permite ir educando na autonomia com a fnalidade de tomar decisões. Analisa-se a importância de contextualizar o ensino da ética e a forma como isso tem sido feito no curso. Finalmente se aborda a relevância de formar consciência ética dos estudantes.Palavras-chave: Experiência de ensino - Ética Profssional - Método de discernimento.AbstractThis paper analyses the Professional Ethics course at the School of Law of Universidad Católica de Temuco. It reviews the way in which ethics was addressed before the course was created, and what has happened with it through the subsequent curricular changes and the implementation of a competency based model. The course contributes to the seal of identity through a multidisciplinary approach. Theory and practice have been progressively bound together since the course was introduced, to reach a point, nowadays, in which the course is understood within the logic of competencies. This point of view implies educating students for solving ethical dilemmas, which is done through the see–judge–act methodology. This discernment methodology belongs to the Roman Catholic tradition, but is used in this context without its religious complexion. This method allows educating autonomy in order to make decisions. It also analyses the importance of contextualizing ethics education and the way in which this has been done in the course. Finally, it addresses the relevance ofcreating an ethical consciousness of the students.Keywords: Teaching experience – Professional Ethics – Discernment method


2004 ◽  
Vol 60 (4) ◽  
Author(s):  
P.G.J. Meiring

The author who served on the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC), focuses on the Hindu experience in South Africa during the apartheid years. At a special TRC Hearing for Faith Communities (East London, 17-19 November 1997) two submissions by local Hindu leaders were tabled. Taking his cues from those submissions, the author discusses four issues: the way the Hindu community suffered during these years, the way in which some members of the Hindu community supported the system of apartheid, the role of Hindus in the struggle against apartheid, and finally the contribution of the Hindu community towards reconciliation in South Africa. In conclusion some notes on how Hindus and Christians may work together in th


Human Studies ◽  
2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jenny Slatman

AbstractThis paper aims to mobilize the way we think and write about fat bodies while drawing on Jean-Luc Nancy’s philosophy of the body. I introduce Nancy’s approach to the body as an addition to contemporary new materialism. His philosophy, so I argue, offers a form of materialism that allows for a phenomenological exploration of the body. As such, it can help us to understand the lived experiences of fat embodiment. Additionally, Nancy’s idea of the body in terms of a “corpus”—a collection of pieces without a unity—together with his idea of corpus-writing—fragmentary writing, without head and tail—can help us to mobilize fixed meanings of fat. To apply Nancy’s conceptual frame to a concrete manifestation of fat embodiment, I provide a reading of Roxane Gay’s memoir Hunger (2017). In my analysis, I identify how the materiality of fat engenders the meaning of embodiment, and how it shapes how a fat body can and cannot be a body. Moreover, I propose that Gay’s writing style—hesitating and circling – involves an example of corpus-writing. The corpus of corpulence that Gay has created gives voice to the precariousness of a fat body's materialization.


1980 ◽  
Vol 10 (4) ◽  
pp. 405-420 ◽  
Author(s):  
Olav Irgens-Jensen ◽  
Mons George Rud

In order to provide information on the way in which use of drugs - and of alcohol and tobacco -among young people changes over a period of time, the Norwegian National Institute for Alcohol Research has each spring, since 1968, conducted a survey of the youth of Oslo to determine their use of these drugs. The results are of significance not only from a scientific point of view but also from the point of view of practical policy-making. For instance, since 1974 there does not seem to have been any increase in alcohol consumption among the youth of Oslo, a fact which may reflect the measures which were introduced at that time in order to curb alcohol consumption among young people in Norway.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document