Born a Crime is a memoir written by Trevor Noah, a south African comedian and host of The Daily Show. In this book, Noah focuses on the living conditions in South Africa during the Apartheid government. Trevor explains that the government separated people into three groups based on their color: white, black, and colored. Since Noah’s mom (Patricia) is a black Xhosa woman and his father (Robert) is a white male, causing Trevor’s birth a violation of apartheid laws preventing interracial sex. Noah was brought up by his mother, under harsh conditions due to widespread poverty among the non-white community. Noah explains that the apartheid government was abusing the differences between the ethnic groups in order to provoke fights between the groups to give the government more control over the country. He also mentions about the living conditions in the ghetto where the government forced native Africans to live. Since he was of mixed race, Noah states that he was able to see instances of injustices and inequalities against people of color. Soon after the release and election of South African President Nelson Mandela, democracy was existent in the society. However, Noah states that even though there was democracy, the government’s corruption was deeply ingrained. He highlights that even though the apartheid government has fallen, he saw many effects of its existence as colored people were restricted from basic rights such as education and healthcare, colored people were still living in poverty. Without education, colored people were not able to run their businesses and soon white businesses were still dominating the economy and had health insurances. Whereas Noah’s family were in debt and had no health insurance to cover the medical costs when his mother was shot in her head. The main point Noah tries to make is that even though a democratic government took over South Africa, the oppressed people were still facing the effects for many years. Throughout this book, we can observe many instances of systemic injustices against people of color. An instance of the theory mentioned in “Can the Subaltern Speak” can be observed, the apartheid government was abusing the cultural differences among people to control them and suppress the voices of ethnic groups. We can also observe the idea of Othering. In this case, the apartheid government is “The One” and the people of ethnic groups would be considered as “The Other”. The government was oppressing, and controlling the people of ethnic groups by segregating them, suppressing their voices and using deadly force against them.
