In his autobiography, Kaffir Boy, Mark Mathabane demonstrates the hardships of growing up in the black ghetto of Alexandra in South Africa during the 1960s and 1970s. Throughout this book, we examine their daily struggles to survive under South Africa's system of apartheid. Despite the frequent police raids, arrests, and scavenging for food, Mathabane shows us his determination and strength to excel in his education and to have a better life.
The word kaffir comes from Arabic origin and means "infidel". Used by most whites to refer to blacks, it is the equivalent of the term nigger. Members of the African Bantu-speaking peoples were often called "kaffirs". .
In writing his autobiography, Mathabane's goal was to give the audience a real life encounter of his experiences, and paint a picture for readers that would make them understand just how much suffering blacks went through during apartheid. He also shows us how one can be successful and survive if they stand up for what they believe and have the confidence in them to accomplish something in their lives.
From the beginning to the end of his story, Mathabane discusses and depicts the terrible toll of apartheid on the lives of individuals. Apartheid developed from an economic (oscillating) and political system. Advancing what the British had already established in South Africa, it worked by segregating the blacks from the whites. It put the blacks at the lowest level possible while raising the white standard of living (188). The government gave Afrikaners influence in all areas. One man, Hendrik Frensch Verwoerd, caused apartheid to become the most notorious form of racial domination that the postwar world has known (189). .
Mathabane noticed right away how apartheid used tribalism as a form of oppression against Africans. When he recognized his father's commitment to the "double apartheid and tribalism" (207), he decided that African "superstition" and tribal cultures were not for him.
Kaffir boy was an extremely honest tale of what life was like during apartheid. Apartheid was a system designed by Holland settlers to separate the native Africans from their settlers. They conformed them into small ghettos or tribal reserves which where unpractical and unsanitary. Although man...
"Struggle For Education" In "Kaffir Boy", Mark "Johannes" Mathabane's mother strives to send him to school. She does not let anything get in the way of her ambition. Even though her husband disapproves, she will not let anything get in her way, but now her desires for her son to be educated are stro...
Throughout his book, Kaffir Boy, Mark Mathabane describes in intricate detail how the white South Africans controlled South Africa in the 1960's and 1970's. ... As a boy, Mark would help the people who could not read get the documents they needed to keep their books in order. ...
Experience is Not Always Better The novel The Power on One written by Bryce Courtenay tells a story of the experiences and the hardships that a boy named Peekay must face. ... It was only a kaffir, a dirty stinking yellow man, why you hitting a white man over a kaffir?" ... Peekay helps the "kaffirs". ...
Frikkie is a white boy who has a Dutch descent while Tengo is a native black African boy. ... On the farm, he used to play with a white boy named Frikkie at his age. The white boy was the farm owner's nephew. ... At the same time, the madam came in and told Frikkie's sister in a sharp voice, "you should never let a kaffir boy into your room again!" Afterward, Tengo felt extremely angry and then he realized that there was a line between him and the white boy that must not be crossed. ...
During the unfair treatment a young boy endured, he had to decide if the value of friendship can overcome extreme tensions risen by a unfavorable system. ... Tengo was a black boy who laborer on the farm of Frikkie's uncle. ... He was accustomed to privileges, such as freedom and schooling, and did not have to encounter the poverty and afflictions of Kaffirs (the black boys). ...
In a way, "Kaffir-town- could represent an African scheme, and this realization is not lost on Roy when John's arrest means a return trip to Edinburgh: "Edinburgh to me represented serfdom. I realized that it was exactly the same situation as Johannesburg; the only difference was that the Kaffirs were white and called schemies or draftpaks- (Welsh 80). ... His assault of the boy seems to be South Africa/Uncle Gordon's influence in all of this. ...
They take away books that they feel Nyasha should not be reading, forces their daughter to eat when she says that she is not hungry, and even uses violence to reprimand her for staying out too late with a boy. ... Nyasha pretends to be a settler and insults her father by calling him a "good boy, a good munt. A bloody good kaffir" (Dangarembga 200). The use of the term "boy", which implies the bottom of social hierarchy, shows that black African men are perceived to be inferior and forced to be obedient to the white settlers. ...
