Paper short abstract:

Migrant labor and rural 'homelands' formed the backbone of the South Africa apartheid economy. Rural women maintained traditions that became icons of ethnic divisions and pride. A new generation of Zulu ceramists are capitalizing on rural/urban nostalgias and creating a national design culture.

Paper long abstract:

Migrant labor, and required return migration of workers to rural 'homelands,' formed the backbone of the South Africa apartheid economy. 'Homelands' and the apartheid system were justified by the reification and accentuation of ethnic divisions. In the rural areas, the Bantu Education system encouraged the maintenance of traditions of art and craft as icons of ethnic divisions, as well as cultural pride.

This paper focuses on a new migration to the greater Johannesburg metropolitan area by contemporary women, and sometimes men, who are capitalizing on rural/urban nostalgias and turning icons of rural identity into objects of national design culture. Cape Town is often seen as South Africa's art and design center by international audiences, with events such as the International Design Indaba and the new Cape Town Art Fair, but Johannesburg - Joburg or eGoli - is the more edgy meeting ground for young Zulu-speaking talent. Migratory paths to Joburg's mines drew in Zulu men of the apartheid era. Today the 'urban Zulu'-speaking eGoli is more approachable than the largely English speaking Cape Town, particularly for rural women from KwaZulu-Natal province, where more traditional Zulu is still spoken.

With the rise of international theoretical inquiry into and financial investment in design and 'new craft', ceramic artists are finding new ways to maintain and improvise upon notions of Zulu ceramic creativity. However, the limits of innovation on ceramic forms by rural women hearkens back to the containment of apartheid era cultural divisions. This paper points illuminates the finer points of this constraint.