The Smithian

The litany of sociological woes bedevilling townships, there for all to see the second you step foot in Soweto or the Flats, crime and poverty, the stuff that the ANC keeps shovelling under the carpet, is a reality the crews communicate in every gesture. This is what animates their astonishing shapes. What makes dance here so intense. It drives them all. It is the real shit left momentarily behind in the liberating transcendence of dance.

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Mamphela Ramphele, a respected veteran of the struggle against apartheid, announced on Monday that she had formed a new political party to challenge the governing African National Congress, calling on South Africans to “join me on a journey to build the country of our dreams.” The party will be called Agang, meaning “build,” said Dr. Ramphele, a physician who became an anti-apartheid activist…The new party is the latest in a string of challengers to the dominance of the A.N.C., which has won every national election since apartheid ended in 1994 but has come under increasing scrutiny over charges of corruption and poor governance. In addition, inequality has grown in South Africa since the end of apartheid…

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For…part of a new generation of politically aware young people, the ANC is not the untouchable political zenith, not just the liberators of South Africa, no, now they are a government failing…The film…takes the new government of 1994 as its point of departure and…asks: what were the promises made to a new generation of South Africans when the new ANC took over? Have they been delivered?

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