Urban folklore—the political song

Abstract

The political song is seen as an emergent form that originated in an urban context as a product of South African politics Yet the political song avails itself of traditional structures, and these are explored in the article according to a number of parameters of the performance approach. Then the emergent nature, especially content, of these songs are illustrated in a number of examples. In conclusion the political song as an example of urban folklore is typified as an entity with relatively fixed structures of orality but with an open content matrix. The article must be seen as an exploratory one on the concept of urban folklore.