Water in the Anthropocene: Perspectives on Poetry by South African Women

Abstract

Cape Town’s drought (2015-2017) focused attention on humans’ dependency on water and the irreversibility of environmental degradation in South Africa in the Anthropocene. Water is symbolically linked to femininity as fluid, connected to the moon and tides, generative and sustaining. This article explores South African women poets’ diverse responses to water, focusing on Allison Claire Hoskins, Toni Stuart, Koleka Putuma, Wilma Stockenstrom and Gabeba Baderoon. Feminist psychoanalysis, feminist new materialism and decolonial theory are brought to bear in the analysis. The audio-visual poems by Hoskins and Stuart feature water as an irresistible force of change and retribution. Similarly, Putuma’s celebrated poem ‘Water’ accuses colonisers of using water to facilitate their agenda. She pleads for water to be restored as a site of memory for black people. Stockenstrom’s (2007) The Wisdom of Water draws on traditional nature poetry. She represents water as filled with life, giving life, and deeply connected to women. Gabeba Baderoon is the only poet to write about the environmental degradation brought about by climate change. The article concludes that the poets’ diverse strategies in their representation of water intersect in their portrayal of it as symbol and medium of connection.