"How can we sing when we're in a strange land?": practical theology as performance and improvisation in a post-colonial context
In this article I want to explore some of the key shaping factors for an ethnographic study of a new expression of church in the South African context at St Peter’s Anglican church in Mowbray, Cape Town. Following Swinton and Mowat,2 I suggest a metaphor of musical performance especially around impr...
| Main Author: | |
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| Format: | Print Article |
| Language: | English |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Interlibrary Loan: | Interlibrary Loan for the Fachinformationsdienste (Specialized Information Services in Germany) |
| Published: |
[2019]
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| In: |
Journal of theology for Southern Africa
Year: 2019, Volume: 165, Pages: 24-49 |
| IxTheo Classification: | CD Christianity and Culture FD Contextual theology KBN Sub-Saharan Africa KDE Anglican Church NCC Social ethics |
| Summary: | In this article I want to explore some of the key shaping factors for an ethnographic study of a new expression of church in the South African context at St Peter’s Anglican church in Mowbray, Cape Town. Following Swinton and Mowat,2 I suggest a metaphor of musical performance especially around improvisation that might help us construct new strategies for overcoming colonial narratives.3 Following work by Lartey,4 Sugirtharajah,5 and drawing on Biko,6 I seek to build an approach to postcoloniality which acts as a counter narrative to colonial hegemony and, also, uncovers the suppressed voices that were brutalized and subjugated under apartheid’s twisted form of internal colonialism. Singing, scatting and howling a way out of hegemony can be an important device for the oppressed. My central research questions is: How can authentic shapes of church in South Africa, through the Fresh Expressions church planting movement, allow previously subjugated people a home and a place to sing out? |
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| ISSN: | 0047-2867 |
| Contains: | Enthalten in: Journal of theology for Southern Africa
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