Thank you for your application to join the newly formed intellectual esprit de corps, The Native Club. As expected there has been an overwhelming response to the formation of this provocative new cerebral delegation. In announcing The Native Club, our honourable President, Thabo Mbeki, said it should be an association of the very cream of African intellectuals. In order to ensure this, we have to ask all applicants to complete the following questionnaire.
1) Basic Intellectual Capacity: To calculate this capacity first measure the space in millimetres between your ears, multiply this by the square root of your odontoid process, add 27 times the day of the week and divide by a factor four-point-two Xolela Mangcus. If done correctly you should end up with a figure between one and eleven. If this figure is lower than three you are kindly requested not to complete the rest of this questionnaire.
2) References: Who among the following recommended that you apply for membership of The Native Club? (a) Judge John Hlophe (b) South Africa’s best-known theatrical agent, Pieter Toerien (c) Dr Manto Tshabalala-Msimang’s Herbal and Vitamin Adviser; (d) Ronald Suresh Roberts; (e) Sangomas Without Borders; (f) The Faculty of Advanced Political Correctness at The University of Cape Town; (g) Someone you met at your last reed dance.
3) Appearance: In order to signify that you are a true native intellectual, what sort of clothes ought you to wear: (a) The shabby old slippers, ill-fitting cardigans, dull grey berets, dribble-stained corduroy trousers, thick coatings of pipe ash and gamy underclothes traditionally associated with Western intellectuals; (b) Leopard-skin sashes, necklaces made out of crocodile teeth, bright green Y-Fronts and Nikes; (c) Exquisitely tailored Italian suitings, silken Dujon shirts with shoes hand-crafted by Swedish master-cobblers; (d) Cross-weave Angoran-wool djbellas; (d) A T-shirt imprinted with a picture of a Wally Serote at sunset?
4) Status: Are you intellectually (a) Affluent; (b) Effluent; (c) Flatulent; (d) None of the above?
5) Income Per Annum: (Remember: size counts!) (a) Between R100-thousand and R200 000; (b) Between R200 000 and R300 000; (c) Between R300 000 and R400 000; (d) More than R1- million; (e) More than R2-million rand; (f) More than even the CEO of Eskom.
6) Mental Health: Have you ever been: (a) A member of the Inkatha Freedom Party; (b) Forced to do community service because of unpaid Travelgate fines; (c) Admitted to a registered psychiatric institution for emergency electro-convulsive therapy; (d) Suicidal after watching Bafana-Bafana lose 27 matches on the trot; (e) Summoned to appear before the Human Rights Commission for crimes against the Gautrain; (f) Injected with a whale tranquiliser after having unprotected political intercourse with Tony Leon?
7) Education: Where were you educated and to what level: (a) At an apartheid-style school to matric level; (b) At an apartheid-style registered university to bachelor’s degree level; (c) At an apartheid-style Marxist Collegium to Purblind Apparatchik level; (d) In the bitter college of life to a deeply pessimistic level; (e) At the Texas ‘Only $25-an-Instant-Degree University” to doctorate level?
8) Perceptions: If asked by a fellow native intellectual to describe Jacob Zuma, which of the following phrases might spring to your mind: (a) A homesick Venusian praise-singer; (b) Someone who has supplied a grateful African National Congress presidency with a tantalising new strain of HIV/Aids denial; (c) Someone of inestimable help to the honourable Ronnie Kasrils in the updating of his memoirs in order to rectify bad impressions about him flowing from one of South Africa’s leading rape trials; (d) Someone who takes all the weary repetition and strain out of being a honkey racist?
9) Historical Penalty: After careful evaluation of your circumstances would you describe yourself as: (a) Intellectually Disadvantaged; (b) Intellectually previously disadvantaged; (c) In imminent danger of becoming previously intellectually disadvantaged; (d) Couldn’t give a shit?
10) Anti-Eurocentric Cultural Acumen: How good are you at sui generis Southern Sotho basketwork: (a) Excellent; (b) Fair to middling; (c) Cannot understand what possible cultural enhancements sui generis Southern Sotho basketwork might bring to the intrinsicalisation of post-colonial issue-dominated sub-closures of educational systemics in Limpopo; (d) Never heard of it?
11) Historical Positioning: Your independent intellectual research will have led you to believe that two of the following were actually built by Africans long before the Egyptians, Greeks, Romans, Huns or Jerry Builders PLC arrived. Which two are they: (a) The Pyramids; (b) The Acropolis; (c) The Parthenon; (d) The Brandenburg Gate; (d) Tony Blair’s secret adultery pad at 21 Underthatch Crescent, Hillside Housing Estate, Bognor Regis?
NB: This application must be accompanied by a full colour recent photograph of yourself, certified as a true and accurate likeness by a policeman of rank higher than inspector; a bank guaranteed cheque for R2 000 to cover supply of your robes, native intellectual authentication certificate and SABC Canteen Discount Card; a written release from your parents or guardians if you are under 45 years of age.
FOR OFFICE USE ONLY:
ACCEPTED UNCONDITIONALLY
REJECTED UNCONDITIONALLY
ACCEPTED ON 6 MONTH ANC YOUTH LEAGUE TRIAL BASIS
ACCEPTED SUBJECT TO DOCUMENTARY PROOF OF QUESTIONS 6(f) and 7(d)