TEN YEARS - DISA

democratic perspective on culture and its important relationship to the resurgence
of the national democratic movement.
The magazine has interacted with all the significant political and historical
developments of the past ten years. This interaction is reflected in a diverse
range of artistic and literary modes: popular history, performance poetry, social
realist fiction, popular music, committed art, documentary photography,
and generic hybrids (like the 'proemdra') of a scope, depth and radical orientation
not to be found in any other cultural magazine in circulation during the
same period.
Staffrider has exerted pressure on the institutionalised notions of writing as
well as the rigid demarcations between genres and modes. In so doing it has
stimulated debate around questions of the relationship between fiction and
documentary reportage, between literature and the other arts, between poetry
and politics. It has displayed a willingness to subject itself and its contributors
to criticism and to reshape itself according to the demands of the times.
Concerning the magazine's relationship to ideology, the received view has
been that the historical circumstances that prevailed at the time of Staffrider's
appearance ensured that the ideological perspective of Black Consciousness
permeated the editorial policy and therefore the contents of the magazine. This
mechanistic view regarded Staffrider as a magazine 'by blacks for blacks'.
However, while the initial self-editing policy certainly derived from the selfreliance
advocated by Black Consciousness, the diversity of contributors during
the same period cuts across the entire spectrum of the South African population
and unsettles simplistic notions. This flexibility has ensured that the work
of previously unpublished writers has appeared alongside that of almost every
South African writer of note - Lionel Abrahams, Achmat Dangor, Ahmed
Essop, Nadine Gordimer, Douglas Livingstone, Es'kia Mphahlele, Mtutuzeli
Matshoba, Njabulo Ndebele, Mongane Serote, Miriam Tlali and Rose Zwi,
to name but a few.
During the self-editing phase the magazine acted as an outlet for the many
cultural groups which sprang up all over the country during the late seventies.
Gradually this emphasis was replaced by a more rigorous selection process,
coupled with criticism and workshop discussion to improve the overall quality
of the work. The magazine also strove to recover and re-insert the writings
of earlier generations, and this went a considerable way towards restoring a
suppressed tradition of resistance literature in South Africa.
The editors would like to acknowledge the contributions of Paul Weinberg,
Omar Badsha and Jeff Lok to this compilation. Weinberg and Badsha, both
staunch supporters of the magazine over the years, have played an important