To be woke again

Lately, I have been missing “woke”, the term popularised by the delightfully offbeat singer/songwriter Georgia Anne Muldrow on the mystic doula sorceress Erykah Badu’s “Master Teacher Medley”, a track off the seminal New Amerykah Part 1.

While its invention is credited to author William Melvin Kelley, in a 1962 New York Times essay, the term was thrust into the early 2010s as a proxy for political and social consciousness, with the quip “stay woke” emerging as a knowing nod to keeping your social justice eye on the prize, to be suspicious of the powers that be — whether they be obnoxious governments, or a untouchable private sector elites committed only to profitable ends, via several exploitative detours. In the intervening years however, woke’s meaning has been eroded and has now come to represent something entirely unwelcome.

Thanks to some adroit right-wing scheming in the US, it has been successfully chipped away at by conservatives and bible belt fascists; while in SA, it remains a regular target of an illiberal and myopic leadership in the official opposition. “Woke” has become a swear word, a term of derision smeared on anything that vaguely resembles progress. It is the kind of energy that obliterated abortion rights, affirmative action and any mention of the US’s foundation of enslavement. In a similar way that neo-liberalism has co-opted, diluted and turned nonracialism or “colour blindness” into the very thing it’s always sought to eradicate, the idea of wokeness is now easily dismissible. And it couldn’t have happened at a worse time.        

The last few months have seen the disruption of a global mass slumber, especially among a generation too young have a geopolitical context for much of what we now grapple with. There are those in the age range that straddles young millennials and Gen Z who — shocked by the indiscriminate bombardment and man-made famine sweeping through Gaza and broadcast on their Tik Tok feeds — are only now learning about 1948. They are only now digesting the darkness that befell Rwanda 30 years ago; the horrors of Auschwitz decades earlier; the greed fuelling the current human emergencies in Haiti, Sudan, the DRC; and the decimation of the Herero and Nama at the turn of the 20th century.

The more news of heatwaves, fires, earthquakes, disappearing coastlines, melting glaciers and storms flood their “always on” world, the more they realise that while they genuflect at the mere mention of Greta Thunberg’s name, are steadfast in lowering their personal carbon footprint and encourage their friends to thrift rather than fund the Shein/Temu war, the people most guilty of accelerating our planet’s deterioration couldn’t care less about a transition, let alone a just one.      

Recently, the information contained in the lawsuits filed against Sean ‘Puffy, Puff, (P.) Diddy, Love’ Combs and the meticulous — and entertaining — YouTube sleuths that continue to unearth often long-buried tales of sexual and physical assault, blackmail, blackballing, drug dealing, human trafficking and attempted murder, would have awoken the very same demographic to the deep and dark flaws of this mythical world that populates their Spotify playlists.   

The myths flogged by the fashion industry haven’t escaped unscathed. As studies keep finding microplastics in just about everything we consume or adorn, greenwashing gets ever more sophisticated. Revered houses that decried the murder of George Floyd, posted black squares on Instagram and vowed to “diversify” their hiring practices have reverted to their old ways – white male appointments are once again all the rage in the land of couture. In this climate, it was almost inevitable that Loro Piana – that bellwether for “old money style” or, with apologies, the “quiet luxury” trend – would be outed in a Peruvian slave pay scandal.         

At this moment then, when the veil of secrecy that often governs the world and our movements in it, is falling away; when healers, seers and truth seekers from around the world are in agreement about an age of awareness when young people, especially — the ones history instructs us, time and again, are the ones necessary to topple dangerous ideas —Adios  are awake to the world’s ways  and bravely making counter narratives trend through digital activism and in some cases, literally putting their bodies on the line in defence of ideas on the right side of history, it would be so fitting to call them woke, in the way it was always designed.

It would give my Gen X sensibilities satisfaction to give them a fist bump (yes, I know, I know) and assure them that their activism is valid, essential and appreciated. Stay woke kids, we need you more than you know.  

• Lately is an occasional column by Wanted editor-in-chief Siphiwe Mpye.