A few weeks ago, I wrote a piece entitled “Of racists, kaffirs and coconuts” in which I wondered out loud if such a thing as a kaffir actually existed. That was at the height of the “Khoza fingers the kaffir” row. In that piece, I promised that I would return to the subject to complete my thoughts.
I have a confession to make. I set a trap for you, my readers. In the very last sentence of that blog, I consciously made a vague allusion to DJ Fresh, the 5fm presenter. I must thank you my sheeple for falling for the trap like a fruit fly on crack for the Venus flytrap’s tricks. You came out guns blazing in condemnation of Fresh’s allegedly coconutty ways. And, to sweeten the deal, some readers even threw in Talk Radio 702′s Redi Direko. I call such moments the good times.
I guess the most important question here is: What is a coconut? I think that it is sufficient to explain the term “coconut” as a black person with white values. Fair enough? OK, if you want to be pedantic and pick at those nits, I suppose you could throw in white mannerisms, speech, behaviour and perhaps even dress sense.
The reason I am honing in on white values is simple. I think that people who use words like “coconut” do so because they lack the vocabulary to say what they really mean, which is “Eurocentric”. I have sufficient lack of faith in human intelligence to predict that someone will attempt to come up with a definition of a typical white person. Some people have the optimism of a horny Chihuahua attempting to mount a Great Dane in heat.
But let us pretend for a second that there is such a thing as a typical white person on which these self-loathing black coconuts model themselves. I am personally not aware of such a prototype of a white person. Who is more typically white: Casper de Vries or Bill Gates? David Bullard or Britney Spears? I hope the question is as absurd to you as it is to me. It makes just as much sense as asking which is better: a shoe or a banana?
However, there are pointers to what it is that people mean when they describe others as coconuts. I’m going to invite the wrath of the nitpickers by trying to summarise of the behaviours that are attributed to people such as Fresh and Redi that apparently make them coconuts:
1. Coconuts speak English most of the time and they do so with an accent that is “white”.
2. Coconuts seem to be very comfortable in white people’s company and may have many white friends.
3. Coconuts, in their sickening coconuttiness, will often express views that seem at loggerheads with African values.
I guess that if I had the time, I could write a much longer list. I could even write a 500-page thesis and get academic accolades from the funny guys in frocks at graduation ceremonies. I am frankly not interested. So let us respect my laziness and confine ourselves to these three coconutty ways.
I think that holding it against people that they speak English with this, that or another accent is the height of stupidity. That is tantamount to dispensing sanction for the ability to learn. Stay with me here. English is the language of the English. One can therefore make an argument that the best English is likely spoken by the English. Not strictly true, of course, but there are reasons why people like David Beckham speak like they have neither a hard palate nor an upper lip. Let’s choose a typical Oxbridge English professor as an archetype of the English speaker, then.
Here’s the thing; most so-called coconuts speak the way they do because they studied in previously white schools. What would personally worry me more is if someone went to Michaelhouse in the KwaZulu-Natal Midlands for five years and emerged on the other side sounding like Fikile Mbalula. You will be amazed at the number of people who will descend upon me like dung beetles on a sewer spill and accuse me of saying there’s something wrong with the way Fikile speaks English. In a word: no.
All I’m saying is that there’s nothing strange about people the acquiring speech patterns of those around them. I have a brother who lived in Rome for only three years and when he came back he could not speak without flailing his hands. Mbalula speaks English the way he does because I imagine that everybody around him spoke English that way. Redi Direko speaks English the way she does because everybody around her spoke English that way. If she spoke any other way, this would either make her fake, at best, or an impregnable fortress of stupidity, at worst. Is this seriously a point that needs to be specifically stated?
As for black people having white friends, well, take me to the Noord Street taxi rank, strip me down to my drawers (not nude in this weather, please — shrinkage) and parade me as a coconut. Guilty as charged. But I’ve always just assumed that the whole thing about a non-racial society, freedom of association and all of those goodies in the Constitution was not some kind of gag-reel material. Unless, of course, breaking bread with them pale people is seen as fraternising with the enemy, in which case you’ve got me seriously worried now. Some of them are OK, you know. Others can even resist their genetic disposition to taking a whizz in people’s food. I think we can move right along.
But the bit about this whole coconut business that I find fascinating is the third attribute of coconuts: that is, black people who depart from African norms and values. First off, African values are, in themselves, a deep mystery wrapped up in a riddle to me. They are as much of a mystery as “white values”, as alluded to earlier (he hastens to add, lest the pan-Africanists descend upon him like fireflies on a fluorescent condom in the dark).
Much brighter people than I have grappled with the whole notion of culture, values and norms. All I’ve ever taken out of these wise people is that there are many questions to be answered about the dynamic nature of any particular culture and its traditions. The more astute have probably picked up the fact that I’m all over the dartboard like a drunk in a pub on Saturday night with the usage of terms such as “culture”, “tradition”, “norms” and “values”. That’s because they reside in the same box in my brain, which is neatly labelled “culture and shit like that”. What I know about the subject matter is dangerously little, but I have established a rich tradition of proudly displaying my ignorance. So here goes nothing.
I think that culture/tradition/values/norms are dynamic and subject to external influences. The external forces in these parts of the world were introduced to us by a bunch of guys in tight pants who appeared from the sea in a cruise liner called the Dromedaris. They were later joined by another bunch of okes from a tiny island who went about dispensing their own brand of culture that involved minimal baths and speaking through their noses.
I guess one could argue correctly that the brutality of the methods employed to dispense these values was disgusting. You would get no resistance from me. I’d toyi-toyi right next to you and chant anti-imperialist slogans. Of course I’d run away shrieking like a little girl when the first rubber bullet was discharged and call it “a strategic retreat” afterwards. Not everybody has the stomach to be a revolutionary, you know. The only role some of us can play is to wander this wasteland called South Africa like Kwai Chang Caine from Kung Fu, muttering pseudo-intellectual mumbo-jumbo.
I guess that the disgust that some people exhibit towards those they call “coconuts” is understandable. I imagine that if one holds dear these African values, the perception that some black people seem to be turning their backs on them must be pretty disgusting. I’m personally not one such person. I have always just operated from a “live and let live” standpoint. And if you’re going to cast the first stone at people because they don’t satisfy your “African enough” criteria, then you have a responsibility to share your criteria.
My (hopefully) obvious point here is that Africanness is relative. A few years ago I was having just this debate with someone and I was sufficiently moved to put together this graph:
I hope the graph illustrates my simple point. Even as we castigate those whom we think have embraced Eurocentric norms, in the eyes of many others we are guilty of exactly the same thing. If my granddad saw me now, he’d shake his head and call me a &^*%ing coconut. And from where he’d be standing, he’d be right too.
Is JZ a coconut? Well, it depends, doesn’t it? His mates from his goat-herding days who never left Nkandla probably think he’s a freaking coconut, what with all his suave city ways, complicated English and snazzy suits from Casanova. I could be wrong of course.
Because this is Thought Leader, there has to be a point somewhere in this maze of circular logic. I guess my point is that I see no value in these pointless finger-pointing exercises in which we engage. I personally think that DJ Fresh is an articulate, smart brother who has done well for himself. He is clean-living, does not do drugs (or is smart enough to snort in private), is a family man and doesn’t engage in stupid behaviour in public. I think there’s a name for this, but it escapes me. Ah, yes: a great role model.
Is the best description for Fresh a “coconut”? This is a man whose heart is so much in the right place that he has started the DJ Fresh Foundation, which has raised millions of rands for needy kids (often known as ubuntu) to go to school, for the record. I personally don’t care whether he pronounces the word “matter” or “mutter”, like the president. I think this is a man worthy of emulating. If that makes him a coconut, you can call me a coconut too.
As a matter of fact, I’ll say it for you, granddad. I’m a coconut and I’m proud of it.
silwanekanjila@gmail.com
Thank you, thank you!
Now I wish that every coconut-bashing person could have a copy of this … it would just make things so much easier for “coconuts” like myself coz I’d just refer them to this post.
Thank you!
Ndumiso,your article sounds more like you registered PhD, and need some help on the topic, that’s an interesting one indeed.
This is no pap en vleis issue,you need to realize that. This will require a whole social re-engineering program in order to reverse the indoctrinations of the past. I am talking here not only about BBBEE’s,EE’s and AA’s; we really need to instill in our minds a sense of self worth, now you get a clue; that paradigm shift will not happen overnight.
Evolution that is based on natural selection according to Darwin is currently taking care of itself. People cannot be indefinitely enslaved; as that does not follow the laws of natural consequence. I believe, what we call English today might converge to a universal language that borrows from every language in the world, something that’s on the pipeline already (e.g. what is the English word for lobola?). We cannot cry for spilled milk, but we can only learn from the mistakes of the past, I am saying this because I can’t see how one can use Sotho for instance, to trade with the Japanese.
The harsh reality is that, everyone is living in a global village by now, and we need to exchange. I just think cultural preservation is soon going to belong to the museum (perhaps a reason why people laugh if one cannot pronounce a word in so called “English”) as all of us mingle together with cross cultural marriages in the forefront of it all. In any case culture should be dynamic, I concur.
So I see nothing wrong with how people think now, one may think it’s westernisation as your linear extrapolated, unrealistic graph points out; but rather a transition period where people happen to be victims of circumstances (it happens in any war situation,there will always be casualties). This is not rhetoric at all, we need time to heal whilst in the process our minds are freed from the negativity, we really have to stop stupid name callings by understanding our backgrounds; it takes time.
What a discourse discourse.
I only discovered your column a few days ago, Ndumiso. Great writing and great sense of humour. (I’m perplexed at your support of Mbeki’s quiet diplomacy, though.)
At the end of the day, despite the fact that we are all South African – yes South Africans with different languages, cultures & traditions, we are also part of a global world – a global world that communicates to a large degree in English, hence the speaking of “good” English is maybe wanting to be more worldly & not necessarily more “white”. (Just a thought!)
I also think the term “Eurocentric” is used a bit too loosely because Europe is made up of non English speaking countries, so is a “coconut” really “Eurocentric”?
If we nitpick, geographically speaking, England is not part of Europe & I don’t think many Brits would happily consider themselves “European” either!
So instead of using the word “Eurocentric” maybe it should be substituted for “Anglophile”.
Australians, Canadians and Americans also speak English, and the constitution of India is written in English (which is one of India’s official languages).
English is an international language – and the world’s main computer language.
I am black female married to an Africa-American with Africa- American kids-raised with a mixture of South African and African-American and Christian values, I still have my African accent speak my mother-toungue occasionally, and English is predominant in my household, does that make me a coconut?
To answer my question: If Iam a coconut.. I am proud for my babies’ and my husband’s sake, my black, English speaking friends, in-laws, church family… and white sisters in Christ. Dang, I am so proud.. And they do not judge how I articulate but appreciate what’s on the inside- which MATTERS THE MOST. And i cannot help the insecurities of those who hear me speak in a mixed accent.
Ndumiso,
I have just re-read your article/blog above. In my opinion, if I were to grade it, it would get a DISMAL. I am so sorry, it is so uninformed and ignorant. First of all, you have no clue what white values are. And the three points you made above are not representtive of a larger population of those you call coconuts. You have no clue of what you’re talking about. I a have made my conclusion right there in the middle of your article before I read further that you do not have substantial evidence to back up your argument. SO BIASED AND UNINFORMED. It would have been even more professional if you cited some form of academic or journalistic research on this topic. Any Joe on the street could write this junk and make their own uneducated and prejudiced comments.
-First of all you have NO CLUE as to white values are and I am included in the bracket. Could it be that what you are trying explain is ‘POP CULTURE’ of which some may feel offended by freedoms that many so-called coconuts enjoy, or should I say they harbor some inferior complexity, which, in my opnion is ridiculously silly.
Let me ask you a question, South Africa is a diverse nation with so many nationalities and languages, with English being the most official/universal. How come you do not criticize Indians or Coloreds who speak with English and Afrikaner accents, when all of them are dark skinned and half white. They have their own culture and values, but choose to adopt or embrace Western and Eurocentric culture as well. We live in global village. SO get over it.
I do not believe, not for one minute, that you wer setting a trap by writing this article or any other article related to this. You know wxactly what you were doing an dof course you were anticipating a repsonse. Now quit insulting our intelligence. At least you have to be intuitive enough to know that some if not most of your readers are critics as well, and can read between the lines.
I have no qulams with Black people with western or Eurocentric accent. If they choose to abandon their culture or values , it their problem. What matters to me t he most is what one can do for their brother or sister-(i.e. make a difference in your own community or society).
Petty stuff like judging people for how they look or speak is way too shallow in my book and it does not contribute in anyway to our well-being. It’s like gossiping, which is mostly fuelled by people who are not happy with themselves or have too much time in their hands, spreads like wild-fire and the next hing you know you have all this judging and character bashing comments above(including mine)..
And my next question wold be, how on earth could you write this article when our very people are so critical or should embarrased of their own who speak fluent Zulu or Xhosa with what we call a ‘country accent’. When I was growing up young people used to call them ooBaru, just because they grew up ezilalini and are clueless when it comes to eKasi Taal or just popular culture, period.
we live in the 21st century, and what does speech have to do with African values? Values are not only extrinsic.. You cannot make conclusions about people by what you see or hear. We’re so wrapped up in technology advancement and trying to grab the latest gadgets and toys, forgetting all of us definitely have some coconut fabric in ourselves.
South African educational institutions and workplaces are integrated because we fought for those privileges. Many have made friends with White people, and now you have a problem about it?
How are we supposed to produce competent youth if they;re not influennt in the most universal language(English). So what is a parent supposed to do when English teachers, teach English in Xhosa, if you raising a child with dreams of excelling in college/university. I know my argument maybe somewhat out of context, but I often look at the bigger picture.
There is definitely nothing wrong with Blackness or having an African accent- infact I am proud of my African accent, but they way I choose to speak a foreign language should not reduce my entire personality or the real me to being labelled a coconut. In my book, that is a complete shallow view of ones whole-being and values. Hey, if a black person speaks like Oprah Winfrey, but has a big heart and in love and at peace with his or her neighbor- it’s enough for me. And if one is offended by how one speaks- that is some form of prejudice in my opinion. It’s funny how we slam people for speaking a certain way, but we always applaud other ethnic groups(esp. whites) for incorrectly pronouncing Zulu or Xhosa dialects- when they speak in our accents. And when they speak our languages fluently with African Accents nobody complains.
Have you ever been in a foreign country where you had to repeat yourself because they do not understand a word you are saying, even when you speak in their own langauage?
I am not saying one should completely abandon their instrinsic blackness. Being accomodative to other cultures is who we are. And for those who forsake their blackness- they hve some deep-seated issues i don;t even care to entertian. And when your own people bad mouth you about speaking differently or choose to have white friends, is a double-standard to me, when we wear, drive and use brands of products mae by whites and other ethnicities that are not African. Our culture is so diluted- and I find it unjust to judge people based on those facts you pointed about.
In sumary, I am not impressed – not this time.
Yoh! I’ve never read so much truth in just a few paragraphs. You’ve definately hit the nail on the head! I’m coconut (well, wateva that is!) and not exactly proud of it. How do you begin to explain to yourself let aloone to your zulu parents that you don’t agree with their traditions, belioefs etc. My parents being who they really don’t see the issue in beating up their 17 year old son if he dared to speak up about all these issues! I really enjoyed reading your articles adn looking forward to more!
Hold on! This has nothing to do with culture or values. It simply refers to black people who imitate white people, particularly black people who have ‘lost’ their languages as a result of being schooled in the multi-racial schools of SA.
mr ngcobo
i officially love you. i’m 17 and throughout my short life i’ve been persecuted for the way i speak and how i express myself. i’m seen as a stuck-up, rude and obnoxious teenager. i love my accent and i feel i don’t need to apologise for it. it’s not my fault i acquired the accent but at the same time i love it. i love me. i question culture because i feel it holds no place for me. women, no matter how many men try to dispute it and console us,have no significance in african culture. we are slaves and statues of obedience compared to men and it makes me feel so small. your article made my day and it just might of made my life. thank you sir.i’m a proud coconut baby! love tebogo
i think the fact that our parents gave us non-Zulufied names like “princess” ; “ambulance” etc was the beginning of coconut-ism…:)
what is the key of becoming someone successful is to first now who you are and make every second count then you reach your goals