Exploring ‘space’ in censorship battles: the case of popular musicians in 1980s South Africa

Abstract

ABSTRACTA part of the apartheid state's attempt to maintain hegemony in South Africa was through censorship. The terrain of popular music was no exception. This paper considers popular music censorship by means of the metaphor of space as both a real and imagined area of contest. It is argued that censorship involved contests over the use of space, and those involved in the contest sought to reposition themselves according to the most suitable strategies available to them. Influenced particularly by the work of Pierre Bourdieu, the analysis of contest posited in this paper emphasizes that agency is possible, even in contexts of severe repression. Throughout the apartheid era some musicians engaged in instances of resistance within the context of social movements to devise means of overcoming censorship and making themselves heard. Despite apartheid censorship, creative and meaningful spaces of resistance were discovered and successfully manipulated.