Philippi Township, Cape Flats, SA, one of
the Assitej 2017 Cultural Hubs, was a good location to consider how indigenous
knowledge can remap an understanding of the world. Sandra Laronde from the Canadian company Red
Sky Performance gave a gentle but intriguing invitation to consider indigenous
cartography, language and map-making.
During a break in proceedings, a young local
theology student filled me on information about the local area. We were in an area some 20 km outside
Capetown, which he told me has another indigenous name meaning ‘where the
clouds gather’.
We were in the district of Nyanga (Xhosa
word meaning Moon) and in the township of Philippi (named after the Greek city where
the apostle Paul preached for the first time on European soil). We wondered why
it was called Philippi. Was it the influence of the Lutheran farmers that
arrived in Philippi in the 19th century? Likely, but neither of us
could confirm facts. It was conversation in which I, as a visitor, made an
incomplete map in my head based listening to the knowledge and memory of a
local resident.
Some more of the contemporary, human stories of the young men
in the townships were shared later in a powerful piece of theatre Phefumla
(Xhosa word meaning breathe). The piece began with the set, pieces of
corrugated steel, undulating with the breath of the actors inside, to create
the sense of the life inside the township.
Shortly after I visited the District Six
Museum that told the story of the forced removal of more than 60000 people from
central Cape Town to Cape Flats.
“Gone
Buried
Covered
by the dust of defeat –
Or so
the conquerors believed
But
there is nothing that can
Be
hidden from the mind
Nothing
that memory cannot
Reach
or touch or call back”
Don Mattera, 1987
District Six Museum
Together these experiences gave a small
insight into recent South African history, but also an insight into the role of
theatre, and in this case, theatre for young people, to tell the stories and
name the places that are not named on the official maps. And reminded me of a quote from Milan
Kundera, “the struggle of man against
power is the struggle of memory against forgetting.”
