South Africa Essay - 1004 Words

South Africa is a nation with a wonderful and varied culture. This country has been called â€Å"The Rainbow Nation†, a name that reflects the diversity of such amazing place. The different ethnic and cultural groups of the South Africa do, however, appreciate their own beliefs and customs. Many of these traditions, besides African culture, are influenced by European and Western heritage. The complex and diverse population of the country has made a strong impact to the various cultures. There are forty-five million people; about thirty million are black, five million white, three million coloured and one million Indians. The black population has a large number of rural people living in poverty. It is among these inhabitants that cultural†¦show more content†¦Many black musicians who sang in Afrikaans and English during the apartheid period began to sing in traditional African dialects developing a singular style called Kwaito. This is a music genre that became the favorite way of representing social and economic issues. I believe that in certain way, Kwaito is a political power that shows activism in its apolitical actions. In the other hand white and coloured South African singers were strongly influenced by European music. African Indigenous Churches were the largest of the Christian groups during the apartheid period. It is argued that many of the people who claimed no relation with any religion were part of indigenous religions. This is a religion that combines Christian and indigenous influences. Many South African Muslims are described as Coloureds, especially those whose ancestors were slaves. Others are described as Indians including those whose ancestors came as traders from South Asia. Religion plays such an important fact in South Africa giving an special taste to the culture. The culture during the apartheid time is still powerful in much of South Africa countryside. For example, across the many ethnic groups, marriage traditions are different, but all the beliefs are based in a masculine deity, ancestral spirits and supernatural forces. Usually, plural marriages are permitted and a lobolo (dowry) is usually paid. Cattles play an important part in many ofShow MoreRelatedSouth Africa 1004 Words   |  5 Pages South Africa is known to be successful after the Apartheid but it really wasn’t. The South African Revolution also known as the time of the Apartheid took place during 1908-1994. It was a long struggle for the Africans, which included riots, protests, segregation and physical pain. During the period of the Apartheid, blacks were not treated with equal respect to the whites. They weren’t allowed to vote, hold office and the children couldn’t go to school with whites. It was a horrific time for blacksRead MoreSouth Africa812 Words   |  4 PagesThe history of South Africa encompasses over three million years. Ape-like hominids who migrated to South Africa around three million years ago became the first human-like inhabitants of the area now known as South Africa. Representatives of homo erectus gradually replaced them around a million years ago when they also spread across Africa and into Europe and Asia. Homo erectus gave way to homo sapiens around 100,000 years ago. The first homo sapiens formed the Bushman culture of skilled hunter-gatherersRead MoreSouth Africa3003 Words   |  13 PagesSouth Africa South African landscapes provide us with the lush greens of the jungle, the dry grass of the savanna, the majesty of the mountains, the eroded clay of the desert and the high-rise mortar of the city. A filmmaker can find there any background desired as the scenery for his motion picture, but variety is not the only true value of the African landscape. Here we find the lush, well tended greens that represent the wealth and control of the Europeans who have invaded the country; theRead MoreA better South Africa for the new South Africa Essay625 Words   |  3 PagesA better South Africa for the new South Africa The Apartheid struggle is not an anecdote about a few black people that lived under a suppressive government; it is a story about millions of black people who suffered tremendously under the oppressive classification system of the National Party. It is a story about bloodshed, suffering and tears. It is a story that serves as a painful reminder of the extent that a group of people would go to ensure that the purity of their race was conserved. The ApartheidRead MoreThe Apartheid Of South Africa Essay788 Words   |  4 PagesSouth Africa, after experiencing the apartheid, is trying their best to overcome the apartheid. Now, the country even has its own leader. He is Jacob Zuma. It is already his second term as a president.( News, B. (2016, August 5)) The country went over a lot of things, and the history of democratic political system is not very long for them. English and Dutch colonized South Africa in the seventeenth century. After South Africa got its independence from England, Afrikaner National Party became a majorityRead MoreThe Apartheid Of South Africa1750 Words   |  7 Pagesfirst black President of South Africa. Referred to as the living embodiment of black liberation, Mandela specifically fought against the government system of South Africa known as apartheid (Lacayo, Washington, Monroe, Simpson). Apartheid is an Afrikaan word meaning apartness and was a system of racial segregation for the South African people from 1948 until F.W. de Klerk became president in 1991. Although Nelson Mandela was both literally and metaphorically imprisoned by South Africa’s racist ideologiesRead MoreApartheid in South Africa711 Words   |  3 PagesRacial discrimination dominated South Africa in 1948, and this was further witnessed when the ruling party made the discriminatory apartheid policy into law, in the same year (Pfister, 2005). The Afrikaans word, which literally translates to racial discrimination ‘apartheid’, was legislated and it started with the Dutch and the British rulers. The initiators of apartheid applied it to all social nature of the South African people. For instance, the majority of the population who were Africans wasRead MoreApartheid in South Africa1154 Words   |  5 Pagesend to Apartheid in South Africa because he was a believer in basic human rights, leading both peaceful and violent protests against the white South African Government. His beliefs landed him in prison for twenty-seven years, almost three decades. In doing so, he became the face of the apartheid movement both in his country and around the world. When released from prison in 1990, he continued to honor his commitment to fight for justice and equality for all people in South Africa. In 1994, Nelson MandelaRead MoreThe Segregation Of South Africa846 Words   |  4 PagesAfrica is a country with many differe nt government parties, each having its own legislation. Although much of the country is of the non-white population, the government officials in South Africa were all white. This lack of diversity within the government led to the establishment of racial segregation, the term used for this segregation was apartheid. Many of the issues that led to the eventual establishment of segregation stemmed from the 1913 Land Act, â€Å"marked the beginning of territorial segregationRead MoreThe Apartheid Of South Africa1608 Words   |  7 PagesFrom 1948 to 1994, South Africa functioned under the policy of apartheid, a system of racial segregation and white supremacy in which nonwhite racial groups were deprived of their South African citizenship and forced to live separately from whites. Stripped of their rights and marginalized in a country where they were in fact the majority, nonwhites launched strikes and campaigns of passive resistance against the all-white South African government. One freedom fighter stood out amongst the rest: