Basotho accordion music’s influence on Seema’s life: Capturing Africana woman’s strength

Abstract

This study is propelled by the observation that although Basotho accordion music artists have contributed much to the Basotho’s lives through their music, it seems little has been done to focus on individual artists to unpack each and every artist’s music. Our conviction is that artists are individuals who have their own style, diction, themes and prowess. Therefore, this study intends to focus on Puseletso Seema’s selected songs to find out how the Basotho receive and utilise them and how her music impacts on their lives. This study is framed within Africana womanism and indigenous knowledge system to highlight the framework’s attributes through Puseletso Seema’s accordion music. It is a qualitative study and uses secondary data. It analyses four purposely selected songs that merit the notion of interest in this study to reveal specific features of Africana womanism. The study’s findings reveal that Puseletso Seema manages to encourage, motivate and show strategies that can be used to empower Basotho women through her songs. The songs further help to preserve Basotho culture and empower Basotho women to navigate through patriarchal culture and social structures. Contribution: This article confirms that Basotho accordion musicians contribute positively to the Basotho’s lives. Therefore, it is imperative that each artist’s music be recognised as expressions of individual creativity by unpacking it to find out how it contributes to the promotion of a desired society considering that music is one of the important factors that influence the society’s life. The high unemployment rate among the Basotho justifies the need to find more strategies that can be used to encourage citizens to empower themselves.

Keywords

• africana womanism
• women empowerment
• basotho women identity
• famo music
• folklore
• women’s songs.