Sikelelwa Anita Mashiyi

Fellow: Anthropology Department, PhD

Sikelelwa Anita Mashiyi is a PhD candidate in Social Anthropology at The University of the Western Cape under the supervision of Dr. Annachiara Jung Ran Forte. She holds fellowships in the following centres Mellon Mays, Centre for humanities research, Social Science research council and Anthropology Southern Africa Association; she is also a recipient of the golden key award (2014). She has done various volunteer work, peer mentors University and High School students as well as tutors in her Anthropology department. She strives to challenge silence through her research contributes by addressing the lacuna in African hip-hop discourse. Her focus, specifically being on ‘Spaza hip-hop’ not only as a musical genre but also explores intersectionality of its consumption and production in South Africa. Her PhD research pushes this narrative forward and centres women’s experiences in township life and their life stories through their music. Seeking to explore how gender and sexuality are contested, redefined and produced in creative spaces. Born and bred Masiphumelele, Fish Hoek where dreams for most black bodies are just that, dreams, she has had the privilege through her academic pursuits to engage, travel and present her work in different Universities such as Emory University, University of New Mexico and Columbia University. Her future prospects are to produce journals from her work and attempt to create new pedagogies of popular culture in Anthropology.