Summer
Show
2022
Show
2022
24
November
18:00 SAST
November
18:00 SAST
Passage
to Rites
Defining Womanhood esiXhoseni to Escape Identity Purgatory
Siphokazi William
BArch Hons 2022
Supervisors:
Unit Leader: Tuliza Sindi
Unit Assistant: Tshwanelo Kubayi
Unit Assistant: Miliswa Ndziba
UNIT 19
Unsettling Ground: Beyond the Terra Nullius
“Understanding where the western world (through
information) has left a void, African customs fill that void” – Gray, 2005
Experiencing the world as a western-world-born woman I struggle to find my place in traditional Xhosa spaces. The body of work attempts to define whether or not I am a woman in these spaces but above all looks for a way to understand how me being sure of my place in Xhosa ritual spaces I can find a passage through to the rites of being a woman and how the rituals themselves begin to override built architecture and give programme to the spaces through Xhosa rituals. This is explored through rituals, materials, memories and concepts of tabulation. This is the way in which I personally navigate the Ciskei - where my mother and her mother learnt Xhosa rituals - to define my womanhood but ultimately my place in this space. The work becomes a guide for an individual who is not familiar with the space to navigate it far beyond the Ciskei.
Experiencing the world as a western-world-born woman I struggle to find my place in traditional Xhosa spaces. The body of work attempts to define whether or not I am a woman in these spaces but above all looks for a way to understand how me being sure of my place in Xhosa ritual spaces I can find a passage through to the rites of being a woman and how the rituals themselves begin to override built architecture and give programme to the spaces through Xhosa rituals. This is explored through rituals, materials, memories and concepts of tabulation. This is the way in which I personally navigate the Ciskei - where my mother and her mother learnt Xhosa rituals - to define my womanhood but ultimately my place in this space. The work becomes a guide for an individual who is not familiar with the space to navigate it far beyond the Ciskei.
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