“Rocking the rock”: A conversation on the slogan “Wathinta abafazi, wathint’ imbokodo!”, intergenerational feminisms and the implications for womxn’s leadership

This perspective captures the fault lines of a conversation between three Black feminists in their 40s and 50s, that was sparked by a critical moment during the #Total Shutdown intersectional womxn’s march against gender-based violence in August 2018, when, in response to the call “Wathinta imbokodo”, a group of young womxn chanted back “We are not rocks! We are not rocks!” The subsequent conversation revolved around intergenerational feminisms and the convergences and tensions within and between historical and contemporary womxn’s movements. It also included reflections on the discourse of the South African feminist struggle slogan of imbokodo, lessons from the student-led Fallist movement and the implications for African feminist womxn’s leadership and activism moving into the 2020s.