The racial politics of Afropolitanism and Zukiswa Wanner’s London, Cape Town, Joburg

Abstract

While scholars have long taken Afropolitanism to task for its classism, its racial politics have largely been praised. Pushing against this (un)critical consensus, this article offers the first sustained analysis of the racial politics informing Achille Mbembe’s theory of Afropolitanism alongside Zukiswa Wanner’s novel London, Cape Town, Joburg (2014). Making visible how institutional racism continues to define the post-apartheid present, it shows that both authors differentially single out race for scrutiny and collude in mystifying white dominance in South Africa. Just as Mbembe’s works on Afropolitanism are preoccupied with race but obfuscate racism, Wanner’s novel uses racialized drama as an important plot device yet stigmatizes the denunciation of white supremacy, while sharply critiquing homophobia, sexism, and xenophobia. In invoking race as central while relieving white people of responsibility for the racist status quo, these works display paradoxes that reveal an investment in silencing racism, paradoxes which this article lays bare.