Africa Is a Country

Not Julius Malema's Youth League

Africa Is a Country Podcast
African Five-a-Side Podcast

Not Julius Malema's Youth League

By
Sean Jacobs

[slideshow]
I’ve blogged before (at my old blog address) about the Johannesburg fashion movement, The Smarteez. (More exclusive than the mass outlet Amakipkip.)

Now Dazed Magazine have discovered them. For its June special “South Africa” issue (Africans still get “special issue” status everywhere), the magazine’s editors sent a writer and photographer to profile the designers.

The piece is not online, but a slideshow and a video. On the Dazed blog, writer Rod Stanley has a quote from one of the designers explaining how he feels his generation differs from their older cousins and neighbors: ‘… Too young to really remember the struggle for apartheid, they’re less politicised and claim that their “struggle” is now one against blandness and conformity – to them, it’s all about partying, self-expression and challenging stereotypes.’  I don’t think they care for Julius Malema.

Photographer Chris Saunders, who has been documenting the Smarteez for a while now, took the pictures.

There’s also a short film about the Smarteez on the Dazed website.

— Sean Jacobs

Via Style Bubble. [h/t Nerina Penzhorn]

Further Reading

The cost of care

In Africa’s migration economy, women’s labor fuels households abroad while their own needs are sidelined at home. What does freedom look like when care itself becomes a form of exile?

The memory keepers

A new documentary follows two women’s mission to decolonize Nairobi’s libraries, revealing how good intentions collide with bureaucracy, donor politics, and the ghosts of colonialism.

Making films against amnesia

The director of the Oscar-nominated film ‘Soundtrack to a Coup d’Etat’ reflects on imperial violence, corporate warfare, and how cinema can disrupt the official record—and help us remember differently.

From Nkrumah to neoliberalism

On the podcast, we explore: How did Ghana go from Nkrumah’s radical vision to neoliberal entrenchment? Gyekye Tanoh unpacks the forces behind its political stability, deepening inequality, and the fractures shaping its future.

The Visa farce

The South African government’s rush to clear visa applications has led to mass rejections, bureaucratic chaos, and an overloaded appeals system—leaving thousands in limbo.