Spoken Mind

A few months ago, I was reading an article on a news site and this line happened to take a rough right jab at my eye, “The susceptibility of women and children to HIV was directly linked to the high levels of sexual violence committed against them.” This, from a prominent Capetonian politician, had me mauling over the ‘this-ness of this,’ the brutal, beastly nature of unperceptive men. “The Archbishop must be flooding his bedside with incessant prayers to the Christian God,” I thought.

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2012

May

Projekt 23 – The Green Movement II (Series)

Early in 2009, while working at an Island on the West Coast, I was preparing for my graduation. I was due to get my National Diploma in Ecotourism, and because I had had to answer so many questions about what Ecotourism is about throughout my Diploma years, I felt that as a way to celebrate my graduation, I needed to educate people about this. That’s when I started Projekt 23 – The Green Movement, a community project that deals with environmental education and the planting of indigenous trees at schools and the broader community.

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2012

Apr

Pieces of Saddi Khali

Not many modern day artists are naturally-born artists like those who have always been haunted by that 3rd eye that forces them to see the world in a way most mere mortals are blind to. These rare breeds are forced to see the world as it truthfully is, as well as imagine how it could possibly be, and somewhere in between this awakening, they create art which relates their visions to the rest of the world. Saddi Khali is one such artistic gem.

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2012

Mar

Projeckt 23 – The Green Movement

What is biodiversity? In the simplest term, it is the variety of life forms within an area; that is, animals, plants, and everything else found in a natural system (genes, species etc). But what is the big deal here? Why should you care what biodiversity is?

The big deal here is that we all depend on biodiversity – natural resources- to get on with life. Take a few seconds to think about it. You woke up today, walked to the bathroom to freshen up and brush your teeth because you would not have that cup of coffee unless you had done so.

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2012

Jan

The Spoken Mind Lives

Let me take this moment to reintroduce my new found self. During my long leave of silence I have turned my face to the Son (sun), thus the shadows have fallen behind. I have embraced the spoken secrets whispered by those who have lived before me, not because those who spoke them were perfect, but because the lessons learnt from a man of fault are as candles lit to disperse the darkness

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2012

Jan

Spokenmind Speaks with Lebo Mashile

Listen to Lebo Mashile to get a grounded, sober view of life as a poet and what it takes to succeed. Like any artist of substance, Lebo talks with sincerity, her depth of insight delivered in simple words; she’s not here to impress, she’s here to do what few writers do, to open herself to her appreciative fans.

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2011

Nov

Intervarsity Spokemind Competiton 2011

Art imitates life. Depending on which school of thought you embrace, life imitates art. Whichever way you look at it, life and art come together in an aesthetic amalgamation that pleases and appeases the senses. That was the experience on Saturday, 27 August in a trendy Africafé in Sunnyside, Pretoria.

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2011

Nov

The Intervarsity Spokenmind Competition

This page, the Spoken Mind, being resident in Consciousness is somewhat symbolic to me. It conjures up visions of home, of belonging, like the stars inhabiting the night skies, familiar. It has imbued the patriot in me.

A patriot is one who not only supports with her/his passion, but also with her/his dreams and beliefs and with the very sinew of her/his life. Perhaps I should have written a piece about this passion beforehand, a year or so ago, to introduce our readers to the (at the time) faceless author of the Spoken Mind.

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2011

Aug

Conversations With Yesterday: An Evening With Don Mattera

In my mind, I had always imagined yesterday as a personified, moving allegory of the deceptive hands of time. A noun as opposed to an adverb. She would be a great speaker oozing provocative diatribes.

Adorned in fitting attire, she would be an enceinte symbol of rhetoric, lest mundane thinking beset us. Aristotle would dress her in fine linen of “logos, pathos and ethos.”

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2011

Apr

Love & Society

At the beginning of every year, we find ourselves pressed by the glorious presence of an eternal hope.

Eternal, not because it pre-dates us, but because at the core of our very existence lies a story pre written, adjudicated by deity and DNA’d in inescapable bloodlines

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2011

Feb