The Truth and Reconciliation Commission, commenced in order for South Africans to be able to talk about their experiences during apartheid as well as testimonies to the public ("For all voices, for all victims" by Antjie Krog, 2013). The main aim of The Truth and Reconciliation Commission were the hearings, which acted as an indication to democracy and transition. In her poem, “For all voices, for all victims,” Antjie Krog, made use of this poem as a response the occurrences of the apartheid era and the struggles that those who had been oppressed in those years. Furthermore this poem reminds the readers, not only of the struggles that were experienced during apartheid, it continues to talk of the human rights that had been violated to the oppressed groups of South Africa and covers the multiple changes which had to take place for the rise of democracy to take place effectively.
Evidence of Antjie Krog using “For all voices, for all victims” as a response to apartheid:
In her poem, “For all voices, for all victims,” Antjie Krog utilizes the first stanza as support to the argument that, “For all voices, for all victims,” was in fact written in response to the struggles experienced during apartheid before the commencement of The Truth and Reconciliation Commission. This evidence is brought to life in the very first line, “because of you,” (Krog, in Carolin, 2014: l.1) in her poem, “For all voices, for all victims,” where Antjie Krog is addressing someone: because of you this country no longer lies between us but within
The persons that are being addressed are those that were oppressed and victimized in the height of the apartheid era. In this stanza the structure of address provides room for the reader to reason that both, reconc...
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...ll of her people, can also be considered as a nation where all races come together as one, which is ultimately what the new South Africa stands for, ("For all voices, for all victims" by Antjie Krog, 2013).
This paper henceforth draws closed the argument that The Truth and Reconciliation Commission was in fact an opportunity for those who were done in during the apartheid era to take from the past and build on it in order to locate their place in the post-apartheid South Africa which became a country for citizens to feel they belong.
Works Cited
Krog, Antjie. “For All Voices, For All Victims." Eng 2A – South African Poetry. Selected Poems. Ed. Andrew Carolin, 2014, p. 6.
"For all voices, for all victims" by Antjie Krog. (2013, October 19). Retrieved April 28, 2014, from Slideshare: http://www.slideshare.net/denae7/antjie-krog-for-all-victims-for-all-voices
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