I can see echoes of African landscapes in this polished stone from Riverton…
Copper sun sinking low
Scatterlings and fugitives
Hooded eyes and weary brows
Seek refuge in the night
They are the scatterlings of Africa
Each uprooted one
On the road to Phelamanga
Where the world began
I love the scatterlings of Africa
Each and every one
In their hearts a burning hunger
Beneath the copper sun
Ancient bones from Olduvai
Echoes of the very first cry
“Who made me, here and why?
Beneath the copper sun”
African ideas, African ideas
Make the future clear, make the future clear
And we are scatterlings of Africa
Both you and I
We run the road to Phelamanga
Beneath the copper skies
And we are scatterlings of Africa
On a journey to the stars
Far below we leave forever
Dreams of what we were
“Scatterlings of Africa” by Johnny Clegg and Juluka
As an adolescent in Johannesburg’s northern suburbs, Johnny Clegg encountered the music and dances of the city’s Zulu migrant workers. He learned the Zulu language, the maskandi guitar and the dance styles of the migrants. Clegg’s involvement with black musicians often led to arrests for trespassing on government property and for contravening the Group Areas Act. He was first arrested at the age of 15 for violating apartheid-era laws in South Africa banning people of different races from congregating together after curfew hours. He went on to record and perform with his bands Juluka and Savuka. Once, Savuka drew such a large crowd for a concert in Lyon, France, that Michael Jackson cancelled a concert there, complaining that Clegg and his group had stolen all his fans. “Scatterlings of Africa” was Clegg’s most popular international hit. I used to show the video of it in a lecture to raise questions for New Zealand about the difficulty of understanding an African setting and the meaning of an African dance, and the type of research methods needed to overcome those difficulties.
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