Abstract
This article examines the rearticulation of meanings appropriated out of the South African anti-Apartheid struggle, specifically with regards to race (non-racialism) and Black Consciousness. It discusses examples of democrats in contexts radically different from South Africa, deploying ‘South African-made’ meaning into discursive and political economic contexts for which they had not been designed. The example of Steve Biko’s life, and ideas of non-racialism and Black Conciousness, as articulated in the films Cry Freedom and Biko: Breaking the Silence is the main discussion of the article. It will examine, within the context of the competing visions for South Africa in the 1980s, meanings appropriated and rearticulated by liberals in Britain and America – producing narratives that may have been a surprise to Biko himself.