Welcome to the OC 154 podcast In this episode 2 of the podcast, we discuss a seminar I attended the day before the recording of this episode, in which Dj Sbu had invited Gareth Cliff to his radio academy, and how the academy felt more like déjà-vu of all the hustles that Dj Sbu has pursued in the past, rather than a credible academic institution that is aimed at imparting skills and knowledge into the aspiring radio jocks, that he claims for it to be. This gets me thinking about whether he is taking advantage of the desperate young people who are trying to get into radio, and whether it would be fair to call him a charlatan. This is nothing close to a one sided conversation, I can promise you that much, because H, like many South Africans, consider Dj Sbu to be a really great hustler, they regard him as some kind of an iconoclastic figure, you know, they see him as this brave black brother who always challenges the status quo and swimming against the tide at all times, others even see his entrepreneurial spirit as some kind of a threat to the big, established corporations, as he himself also likes to preach. And, to a certain extent, I do agree with these sentiments, I mean, Dj Sbu is a street-smart guy. This then opens a broader conversation about how the way the socio-economic structures are set up, creates a breeding ground, if you like, for the Dj-Sbu like characters and some of the shenanigans we see in the bazalwane churches in the country with their dodgy pastors. I really like this episode of the podcast, it is what I had envisioned the format and the content of this podcast to become, and I am glad to see that our conversations are fast taking that shape so early on. H and I have no media or broadcasting experience, you see, so we do expect there to be some teething problems in these early days, but we also hope that this rawness and sincerity of our conversations, is what can get you to connect with us better, our style was not contaminated by any main stream media training, like you see with many prominent podcasts in the country today, so I hope this can be a platform for some alternative views. With that being said, though, this is not to say H and I see the world the same, in fact, the opposite is true. Individually, H and I engage with very differing content, we are inspired by a vast variety of thinkers, and we have had very different lives as you heard in our first episode, and these have obviously moulded our world views accordingly. But what we don’t see enough of today, not just in South Africa, but the world over, is having our world views challenged and questioned often, we live in our own little echo chambers; we only follow the people who already affirm our world views on social media, we are friends with people who agree with us, and we often feel the pressure to take on the dominant and popular views of the communities we live in, both in real life and online. So for me, it is quite a privilege to be able to have a conversation with someone I don’t agree with on most things, but whom I greatly respect, who also happens to be my friend. I get my views to be pressure tested against some strong opposing views, and sometimes, my mind even changed about things. I deliberately refer to this as a privilege because I know that this is not something that many of you have access to out there, when you share a different view with someone, you are most likely to get insulted and dismissed as stupid, a bigot and all the horrible things under sun, or the best case scenario, being told that you don’t like hearing the truth just because you disagree with them ,while they think they have exclusive access to the truth because of the information they consume. My ultimate dream for this podcast is to see a community of thinkers with diverse views come together and have healthy conversations and debates, and engage in intellectually honest critical thinking, that is not polluted by ideologies.

Welcome to the OC 154 podcast In this first episode of the podcast, H and I are having a look at the indigenous South African languages. So, during the month of June, Motsweding and Lesedi Fm celebrated their birthdays, and we thought, this would be such perfect time to reflect on the state of African languages, and to also interrogate the role that the vernacular media plays in growing and advancing these languages. As you will hear, the conversation quickly morphs into a debate about how the pedantry that surrounds the use of these languages, hinders their day to day use, and arguably their growth too, you know.  In this brief argument, you really get to hear how our respective life experiences and upbringings really shaped our attitudes towards our mothers’ tongue.  So, I grew up in a Tswana speaking town in the Free State, and I went to the township schools from the beginning all the way to my matric year, and H on the other hand, comes from a Venda speaking family, but spent a greater part of schooling years in Gauteng, and went to a former Model-C school. I spoke my mother tongue for the most part of my schooling years and H had an almost opposite experience. And you can really hear how these opposing experiences filter through to our conversation and the views we take in this. This is truly a South African conversation more than anything, I am sure many can relate to these kind of dynamics. At some point in the podcast, we also have a look at the vernacular radio stations, where we shine a spotlight on the state of these radio stations at the current moment, and whether they are living up to the expectation we have of them, and whether they will survive these technological times where the internet is overtaking everything. At the beginning of the podcast, we reflect on our failed attempts of getting into radio, which I promise will make you feel good about yourself, lol. This is a subject matter that is really close to our hearts, so I really hope you enjoy the podcast.