The "New South African Woman" in Angela Makholwa's crime fiction in a transnational feminist context

Title: The "New South African Woman" in Angela Makholwa's crime fiction in a transnational feminist context
Source document: Brno studies in English. 2021, vol. 47, iss. 2, pp. 139-152
Extent
139-152
  • ISSN
    0524-6881 (print)
    1805-0867 (online)
Type: Article
Language
 

Notice: These citations are automatically created and might not follow citation rules properly.

Abstract(s)
The article reads two crime fiction novels by Angela Makholwa, the bestselling South African novelist, as radical feminist novels that respond to an extremely high rate of violence against women in contemporary South Africa. It is argued that Makholwa's articulations of female desire rewrite South African post-apartheid discourses about the nation from a black female perspective. The trope of the New South African Woman in these texts is analyzed as an expression of 21st-century African feminism that rejects the culture of violent masculinity as well as traditional discourses about women. In comparing it with 1st-wave feminism's New Woman ideology as it was manifested in American and European fin-de-siècle contexts, it is seen as a transnational feminist phenomenon that responds to nationalism's exclusion of women from the nation.
References
[1] Arndt, Susan (2002) The Dynamics of African Feminism: Defining and Classifying African Feminist Literatures. Trans. Isabel Cole. Trenton, NJ: Africa World Press.

[2] Bhekisisa Team (2021) "#SayHerName: The faces of South Africa's femicide epidemic." Mail & Guardian South Africa, 14 April 2021. Available online at https://mg.co.za/health/2021-04-14-sayhername-the-faces-of-south-africas-femicide-epidemic/ Accessed on 11 Sept 2021.

[3] Boehmer, Elleke (2005) Stories of Women: Gender and Narrative in the Postcolonial Nation. Manchester: Manchester University Press.

[4] Crabtree, Justina (2020) "South Africa's other pandemic: Femicide rate spikes as coronavirus lockdown lifts." CGT News, 17 July 2020. Available online at https://news.cgtn.com/news/2020-06-20/South-Africa-s-femicide-rate-spikes-as-coronavirus-lockdown-lifts-RskMmKKcus/index.html. Accessed on 5 June 2021.

[5] Cviková, Jana and Jana Juráňová (2008). "Slovenka pri krbe a knihe." In: Cviková, Jana and Jana Juráňová (eds.) Hana Gregorová: Slovenka pri knihe. Bratislava: Aspekt, 226–231.

[6] Felski, Rita (1995) The Gender of Modernity. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.

[7] Göllnerová, Alžbeta and Jarmila Zikmundová (eds.) (1938) Žena novej doby. Kniha pre výchovu demokratickej ženy. Bratislava: Tatra.

[8] Gqola, Pumla Dineo (2015) Rape: A South African Nightmare. Auckland Park: MFBooks Joburg.

[9] Gqola, Pumla Dineo (2016) "A peculiar place for a feminist? The New South African Woman, True Love magazine and Lebo(gang) Mashile." Safundi 17 (2), 119–136. | DOI 10.1080/17533171.2016.1178470

[10] Grand, Sarah. 1894. "The new aspect of the woman question." The North American Review 158 (448), 270–276.

[11] Gregorová, Hana (1929) Slovenka pri krbe a knihe. Prague: Mazáčova slovenská knižnica.

[12] Gregorová, Hana (1979) Spomienky, ed. Dagmar Gregorová-Prášilová. Bratislava: Tatran.

[13] Jordan, Ellen (1983) "The christening of the New Woman: May 1894." Victorian Newsletter 63, 19–21.

[14] Jusová, Iveta (2005) The New Woman and Empire. Columbus: Ohio State University Press.

[15] Knight, Stephen (2004) Crime Fiction 1800–2000: Detection, Death, Diversity. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

[16] Lewis, Desiree (2009) "Discursive challenges for African feminisms." In Ampofo, Akosua Adomako and Signe Arnfred (eds.) African Feminist Politics of Knowledge: Tensions, Challenges, Possibilities. Uppsala: Nordic African Institute, 205–221.

[17] Makholwa, Angela (2007) Red Ink. Johannesburg: Pan Macmillan SA.

[18] Makholwa, Angela (2013) Black Widow Society. Johannesburg: Pan Macmillan SA.

[19] Makholwa, Angela. 2014. "The Interview – Angela Makholwa: Death becomes her." News 24, 24 March 2014. Available online at https://www.news24.com/news24/archives/city-press/the-interview-angela-makholwa-death-becomes-her-20150429. Accessed on 20 May 2019.

[20] Mashigo, Mohale (2016) "From Sweet Valley High to The Yearning." In: Mashigo, Mohale (ed.) The Yearning. Johannesburg: Pan Macmillan SA, vii–x.

[21] Matlwa, Kopano (2009) "Interview with Kopano Matlwa: author of Coconut." Literary Tourism, 5 November 2009. Available online at http://www.literarytourism.co.za/in-dex.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=291:interview-with-kopano-matlwa-author-of-coconut&catid=26&Itemid=100053. Accessed on 20 July 2020.

[22] Mitchley, Alex (2021) "IN NUMBERS | Murder and rape on the rise: SA's quarterly crime statistics." News 24, 20 August 2021. Available online at https://www.news24.com/news24/southafrica/news/in-numbers-murder-and-rape-on-the-rise-sas-quarterly-crime-statistics-20210820 Accessed on 11 Sept. 2021.

[23] Mongu, Blanka (2011) "Obraz modernej ženy v nemeckom a českom fejtóne v medzivojnovom období." In: Dudeková, Gabriela et al. (eds.) Na ceste k modernej žene. Bratislava: Veda, 117-126.

[24] Murray, Jessica (2016) "Constructions of gender in contemporary South African crime fiction: a feminist literary analysis of the novels of Angela Makholwa." English Studies in Africa 59 (2): 14–26. | DOI 10.1080/00138398.2016.1239415

[25] Myambo, Melissa Thandiwe (2020) "The spatial politics of chick lit in Africa and Asia: sidestepping tradition and fem-washing global capitalism?" Feminist Theory 21 (1), 111–129.

[26] Patterson, Amanda (2007) "The Writers Write interview with Angela Makholwa." Writers Write, 24 May 2007. Available online at https://www.writerswrite.co.za/the-writers-write-interview-angela-makholwa/. Accessed on 20 July 2020.

[27] Ramphele, Mamphela (1996) Across Boundaries: The Journey of a South African Woman Leader. New York: Feminist Press.

[28] Ruthner, Clemens (2018) Habsburgs "Dark Continent": postkoloniale Lektüren der österreichischen Literatur und Kultur im langen 19. Jahrhundert. Tübingen: Narr Francke Attempto Verlag.

[29] Spencer, Lynda Gichanda (2018) "'Having it all'?: (Re)examining conspicuous consumption and masculinities in South African chick-lit." English in Africa 45(3), 79–97. | DOI 10.4314/eia.v45i3.4

[30] Woolf, Virginia (1938) Three Guineas. London: Hogarth Press.