scholarly journals Ubuntu as a spirituality of liberation for black theology of liberation

2021 ◽  
Vol 77 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Sandiswa L. Kobe
Keyword(s):  
Black People ◽  
Research Work ◽  
Religious Studies ◽  
Black Theology ◽  
Social Sciences And Humanities ◽  
Indigenous Philosophy ◽  
African Spirituality ◽  
Practical Reflection ◽  
Scholarly Contribution ◽  
Theology Of Liberation

This article aims to respond to Vuyani Vellem’s challenge to black theology of liberation (BTL) to ‘think beyond rethinking and repeating its tried and tested ways of responding to black pain caused by racism and colonialism’. Vellem argued that ‘BTL needs to unthink the west by focusing on and retaining African spirituality as a cognitive spirituality’ for the liberation of black people in South Africa. This article argues that Ubuntu is the spirituality of liberation that BTL needs to advance as one of its interlocutors. This research work will consult the literature emerging from African philosophy, ethics, spirituality and BTL arguing that Ubuntu is an indigenous philosophy, spirituality that continues to exist in the languages and culture of the Abantu (Bantu) speaking people. This article is dedicated to the memory of Vellem as a BTL scholar and a faithful believer of the liberative paradigms of BTL.Contribution: The scholarly contribution of this article is its focus on the systematic and practical reflection, within a paradigm in which the intersection of religious studies, social sciences and humanities generate an interdisciplinary contested discourse.

scholarly journals The idolatry of white supremacy in church and society? Some reflections on Black Theology of Liberation in present-day South Africa in memoriam of Vuyani Vellem

2020 ◽  
Vol 76 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Rothney S. Tshaka
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Black People ◽  
White Supremacy ◽  
Black Theology ◽  
Social Sciences And Humanities ◽  
Church And Society ◽  
History Of ◽  
Black Life ◽  
Scholarly Contribution ◽  
Theology Of Liberation

In remembering Vuyani Vellem, this paper delves into his scholarship, a scholarship that admittedly exudes his activism in academia, church and society. Choosing intentionally the marginalised as the primary interlocutors in discourse, Vellem demonstrates that he is situated in the arena of those who are otherwise seen as the wretched of the earth, insisting that Black Theology of Liberation must engage in a praxis that centres the lived experiences of black people and creates for itself legacies that would attest to Black Theology of Liberation as a formidable hermeneutic that recognises the sanctity of black life in a context of the prevalence of white supremacy. It notes however that a history of colonisation and subjugation has wrecked the humanity of black people, and as a result, a contract with black people becomes essential on this path towards the total emancipation of black people in South Africa and the world.Contribution: The scholarly contribution of this article is its focus on the systematic and practical reflection, within a paradigm in which the intersection of religious studies, social sciences and humanities generate an interdisciplinary contested discourse.

scholarly journals Umfazi akangeni ebuhlanti emzini … A womanist dialogue with Black Theology of Liberation in the 21st century

2016 ◽  
Vol 72 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Fundiswa Kobo
Keyword(s):  
Black Women ◽  
Black Men ◽  
21St Century ◽  
Black People ◽  
Cultural Practices ◽  
Black Theology ◽  
Complex Interplay ◽  
Men And Women ◽  
Mind Set ◽  
Theology Of Liberation

As reflected in the title, this article is premised by pervasive attitudes arising from a complex interplay of cultural practices, which have succeeded in dislocating black women from what is perceived to be black men’s sites, ebuhlanti (kraal), esuthwini (initiation school); locating them in culturally designated womanised sites eziko/egoqweni (kitchen and household), ekuzaleni nasekukhuliseni abantwana (child birth and rearing) in a patriarchal society. The crux of the article lies in its attempt to re-locate both men and women by its adoption of ‘a hard-line pro-black position’. Womanists acknowledge the interlocution of black men and thus suggest firstly, a shift in mind-set for both to view these sites as life giving and therefore to look for convergences. The article is thus a dialogue between a womanist and Black Theology of Liberation in the 21st century for the purpose of understanding liberation of black people for the liberation of humanity.

A Black Theology of Liberation

2005 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 11-31 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dwight Hopkins
Keyword(s):  
Black Theology ◽  
Theology Of Liberation

scholarly journals The black church as the womb of black liberation theology?: Why the Uniting Reformed Church in Southern Africa (URCSA) is not a genuine black church?

2015 ◽  
Vol 71 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Rothney S. Tshaka
Keyword(s):  
Southern Africa ◽  
Black Church ◽  
Black People ◽  
Black Theology ◽  
Dutch Reformed ◽  
Black Liberation ◽  
Black Liberation Theology ◽  
Reformed Church ◽  
Critical Theology ◽  
Dutch Reformed Church

This article sets forth a controversial thesis which suggests that the Uniting Reformed Church in Southern Africa, although considered a black church, is in fact not a black church in the sense in which a radical black church is traditionally understood. A black church, it is argued, is perceived to be one that is a self-determined church which supports initiatives of ameliorating the depressive situations in which black people find themselves. References are made to black theology as a critical theology which was never accepted in the black church due to the dependency syndrome which was brought about by the white benevolence of the Dutch Reformed Church. This, it is argued, had become innate in the Uniting Reformed Church in Southern Africa which still considers itself as a so-called daughter church of the white Dutch Reformed Church.

scholarly journals Ebuhlanti Amandla ngawethu: Womanism and black theology of liberation, in memory of Vuyani Shadrack Vellem

2020 ◽  
Vol 76 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Fundiswa A. Kobo
Keyword(s):  
Black Women ◽  
Lived Experiences ◽  
Black Theology ◽  
Black Consciousness ◽  
The West ◽  
Women’S Experiences ◽  
Women's Experiences ◽  
Heuristic Device ◽  
A Site ◽  
Theology Of Liberation

The liberation of black humanity has been an area of scholarly reflection by black theologians and the black consciousness communities. The constructs of oppression such as race, class and sexism amongst others have been critiqued in the quest for liberation of a fragmented black humanity. In this article, this quest for liberation happens within ubuhlanti [kraal], a site for which Vuyani Vellem is ‘like a hermeneutical circle, where the mediations of the bonds of spheres and the instantiation of their life take place’. By looking at a fragmented black humanity and black women’s experiences, we posit that no western framework could ever be representative of those bodies, ubuhlanti becomes our solution as a heuristic device and symbol of a communication of the efficacy of integrated life. From a womanist perspective, ubuhlanti decentres the West. Ebuhlanti Amandla ngawethu [power belongs to us], as black women and men dialogue issues that affect black humanity. The whole proposition of this dialogue ebuhlanti is animated by our lived experiences, which already offer alternatives for us to decentre.Contribution: Premised by the lived experiences of black humanity in their quest for liberation, this paper contributes in the dewesternising discourse by presenting alternative epistemologies and spiritualities. A womanist dialogue with black theology of liberation ebuhlanti, a decolonising and decentring praxis for the liberation of black humanity is our solution as blacks.

scholarly journals The colonial matrix of power: Image ontology and the question of blackness

2021 ◽  
Vol 77 (4) ◽  
Author(s):  
Itumeleng D. Mothoagae
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
South Africa ◽  
United States Of America ◽  
Black People ◽  
World Order ◽  
The United States ◽  
Global South ◽  
Black Theology ◽  
The Social ◽  
The World

The question of blackness has always featured the intersectionality of race, gender, sexuality and class. Blackness as an ontological speciality has been engaged from both the social and epistemic locations of the damnés (in Fanonian terms). It has thus sought to respond to the performance of power within the world order that is structured within the colonial matrix of power, which has ontologically, epistemologically, spatially and existentially rendered blackness accessible to whiteness, while whiteness remains inaccessible to blackness. The article locates the question of blackness from the perspective of the Global South in the context of South Africa. Though there are elements of progress in terms of the conditions of certain Black people, it would be short-sighted to argue that such conditions in themselves indicate that the struggles of blackness are over. The essay seeks to address a critique by Anderson (1995) against Black theology in the context of the United States of America (US). The argument is that the question of blackness cannot and should not be provincialised. To understand how the colonial matrix of power is performed, it should start with the local and be linked with the global to engage critically the colonial matrix of power that is performed within a system of coloniality. Decoloniality is employed in this article as an analytical tool.Contribution: The article contributes to the discourse on blackness within Black theology scholarship. It aims to contribute to the continual debates on the excavating and levelling of the epistemological voices that have been suppressed through colonial epistemological universalisation of knowledge from the perspective of the damnés.

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