Reading with empathy
Sindiwe Magona's Mother to Mother
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 4367376 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Angus Whitehead (0000-0002-8392-2988, Newcastle University, corresponding author), Anne Whitehead (Newcastle University) |
| Year | 2012 |
| Volume | 13 |
| Issue | 2 |
| Pages | 181-195 |
| Publication date | 2012-08-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Feminist Theory (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 1464-7001 • E-ISSN: 1741-2773 |
| Publisher | SAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.1177/1464700112442645 |
| OpenAlex | W2138581087 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 7 |
| References cited | 14 |
Through a reading of Sindiwe Magona's Mother to Mother (1998), this article assesses claims for the empathetic potential of reading fiction, as a means of promoting cross-racial understanding. Drawing on feminist theorists Ann Cvetkovich, Clare Hemmings, and Sara Ahmed, I uncover the modes of political critique that can reside in resisting affective identification, and position Magona's rejection of empathetic cross-racial connection as a critique of the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC). I focus particularly on Magona's representation of black motherhood, and argue that Mother to Mother seeks to inscribe the systematic violation of the maternal relation under apartheid - a form of violence that was not registered by the TRC - and also to position the black mother's affective experience outside of the empathetic reach of the white mother, precisely because it is embedded in a long history of social, political, and material dispossession
Art · Close reading · Empathy · Literature · Narrative · Political science · Politics · Psychoanalysis · Sociology · African studies and sociopolitical issues · Gender Studies · Law · Postcolonial and Cultural Literary Studies · Psychology · Social Psychology · South African History and Culture
After the TRC
Why Stories Matter
The Cultural Politics of Emotion
The Politics of Truth and Reconciliation in South Africa
Writing South Africa
Why Are You Carrying Books? Don't You Have Children?’ Revisiting Motherhood in Sindiwe Magona's Autobiographies
Oprah's Book Club and the politics of cross-racial empathy
Depression is ordinary
Affective (self-) transformations
The Xhosa Cattle-Killing and Post-Apartheid South Africa
| Unique citing works | 7 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 0,5 |
| Citation span | 2012 - 2024 (13) |
| Citation velocity | recent |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 7 |