Search

In this article, I consider a selection of photographs of a man of color from a luxury book of male nudes, Images (1982), aimed at white gay men and published in South Africa by Alternative Books (AB) in the late apartheid period. Given the exclusive association of assimilable homosexuality with whiteness in the national gay press and other homoerotic commodities available in South Africa at the same historical juncture, I propose that these photographs, which interrupted longstanding, racist homoerotic iconographies, elicited experiences of ambivalence (and thus critical reflection) amongst their historical audiences. To this end, I analyze the editorial and commercial content of the newspapers Link/Skakel and Exit for the period that AB was active (1981–1991), anticipating an overlap of readership between these papers and the publisher's titles. More precisely, I discuss the prevalence of the figure of the "good homosexual" and representations of classical (that is, white) male beauty in these papers to plot how apartheid logic was broadly reproduced (and same-sex desire disciplined according to such dictates) in mainstream South African gay movements, institutions, and print cultures during this time, but, notably, not in Images. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ubuntu has been defined as a moral quality of human beings, as a philosophy or an ethic, as African humanism, and as a worldview. This paper explores these definitions as conceptual tools for understanding the cultural, educational, and philosophical landscape of post-apartheid South Africa. Key to this understanding is the Althusserian concept of state apparatus. Louis Althusser divides the state apparatus into two forces: the repressive state apparatus (RSA); and the ideological state apparatus (ISA). RSAs curtail the working classes, predominately through direct violence or the threat of violence, whereas ISAs function primarily by ideology, including forms of organised religion, the education system, family units, legal systems, trade unions, political parties, and media. This paper discusses the link between increasing inequality in post-apartheid South Africa and education, with specific reference to Althusser's ISAs and the abuse of Ubuntu as a subterfuge for socio-economic inequality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Scholars examining racial stereotyping and prejudice in racially organised social systems have largely focused on how non-White ethnic and racial groups experience racial stereotyping in White-majority national contexts such as the US, Australia and European countries. There is only scant scholarship on experiences of ethno-racial communities in Black-majority countries such as South Africa, a country where Whites are a minority. Even though there is ample scholarly work on racial stereotyping of racial groups in South Africa such as Coloured people, much of it is focused on their experiences during colonial and Apartheid eras. Little is understood about how Coloured people experience racial stigmatisation in post-Apartheid South Africa. This paper addresses this gap. Based on interviews with fourteen Coloured participants from Westbury, Johannesburg, this study found that many interviewees claimed that Coloured South Africans were negatively racially stereotyped as people who use drugs, as aggressive and violent people, as alcoholics and as criminals. Many participants also resisted and countered the negative stereotypes by talking about Coloured people in positive ways, which shows their agency. The negative stereotyping of Coloured people which prevailed during colonial and Apartheid times is still deployed by society to describe Coloured people in post-Apartheid South Africa. To capture the continuity of negative stereotyping in South Africa about Coloured people, I developed the analytical term of 'perpetual racial stereotyping'. Many decades after the end of the Apartheid system, negative racial stereotyping of Coloured South Africans still continues in everyday life, and Coloured people are still associated with racist prejudices, narratives, discourses and stereotypes that were invented many decades ago by settler colonialism and Apartheid. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper addresses apartheid political history and ‘coloured’ identity challenges in South African society. A textual analysis of Nadine Gordimer’s My Son’s Story (MSS, 1990) adheres to understanding ‘coloured’ identity struggle as an ‘Other’ and their racial marginality during apartheid. This research deeply studies race and identity theories with Frantz Fanon’s psychological notion of racism, decolonisation and the idea of cross-racial relations are important to analyse MSS. A textual study of MSS is significant for examining the impact of apartheid on ‘coloured’ characters. This research finds that ‘coloured’ community’s struggle and their racial consciousness of being other were political and psychological challenges during apartheid time. To put in a nutshell, apartheid stories are not individual representations but these are collectively representing the ‘coloured’ community's struggle in South Africa. Racial consciousness of being other was a form of racial exclusion so, a discussion on ‘coloured’ discourse becomes important to contextualise political history. The negligence of the ‘coloured’ issues during apartheid questioned the psychological development of ‘coloured’. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper engages issues of complicated femininity and the representation of such in South African telenovela Gomora. Set in South African township Alexandra, Gomora tells the story of contemporary life in post-apartheid South Africa, where people are forced to engage issues of poverty, inequality, racism, and more. In particular, the paper engages one of the main characters in the program, Nomasonto Mildred Molefe. Mam' Sonto is the matriarch of her family who is also the head of an established hijacking syndicate. Throughout the first season of this show, audiences are able to engage with a complicated woman who is good and bad, kind and cruel. Moving away from a moral reading of the character, this paper unpacks how the character comes to be and how she asserts her own power and agency in engaging a deeply racist and sexist society in order to survive and provide for her family. Engaging works of Pumla Gqola, Sisonke Msimang, Roxanne Gay, and more, the paper presents a reading of this character that enables a clear argument for the need for such depictions of complicated womanhood as part of pushing the reified boundaries of patriarchy that women are forced to exist within. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examined the brutal tactics used by security forces in the early days of the COVID-19 lockdown in South Africa. Key questions raised relate to the philosophical (dis)connectedness of their actions. The paper posits that the way in which some police and soldiers conducted themselves in black communities is reminiscent of colonial-apartheid hermeneutics. Their conduct, devoid of Ubuntu, relegates the culprits to "mere symbols with no substance," in a deeply conditioned state of mental subjugation. Though black, the culprits remain largely unAfrikan in thought. The paper concludes that training for security forces needs to inculcate philosophies of Afrikanism. Furthermore, the paper highlights key lessons to be embraced. Recommendations made include the professionalisation of the security forces, enabling public dialogue, and bringing the culprits to book faster to restore the image of the country, the government, and the security agencies. This paper used a qualitative desktop design that applied inductive analyses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In his writings, Bernard Magubane theorizes racial capitalism but without necessarily invoking the term. Instead, he frequently refers to "the political economy of race and class" in the South African society. First, Magubane traces the roots of capitalism and racism in South Africa back to European expansionism. Second, he grapples with dispossession during the colonial period and calls it "the fact of conquest". This period was a significant prelude to apartheid capitalism and racism. Third, having analyzed these forms of domination, he argues that black people in South Africa would be liberated through the insurrection of the working people. Magubane's main contribution is his use of historical analysis to understand the next move by imperialism and its impact on the interaction of race and class and the struggle for liberation. Magubane seeks to develop a clear theoretical framework to understand the nature of the South African society. In this paper, I will attempt to illustrate Magubane's contribution to Marxist thought based on his study of South Africa's racially hierarchical political economy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Across the Jewish world religious polarization is gaining momentum. At the secular end of the spectrum people are switching away from religion while at the religious pole fertility levels are high. This trend is evident among South African Jewry; data from the 2019 Jewish Community Survey of South Africa (N = 4193) show that the community is becoming polarized, and the traditional center ground is collapsing. However, unlike many other Jewish communities today, switching toward more religious subgroups than the one in which one was raised is more common in South Africa than switching away from them. This tendency is most pronounced among people born in the 1960s and 1970s. A similar trend characterizes South African non-Jews. We argue that coming of age in a period of profound political and social instability explains the increased likelihood of switching toward religion. The effect is more marked among Jews due to distinct communal characteristics and history that provided the optimal conditions for switching towards a more religious lifestyle. This paper highlights the necessity of examining internal processes that are unique to the Jewish community alongside broader developments to improve our understanding of religious polarization among Jews. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents an ethnographic exploration of working-class commuter cyclists on Rudolf Greyling (RG) Street in Bloemfontein, Free State, South Africa. The historical significance of this street/road is that it traversed a 'buffer zone'. In apartheid town planning, buffer zones were areas that, in the absence of physical or man-made boundaries, separated mono-racial areas designated as such under the Group Areas Act (Davies 1981). Today, these old buffer zones continue to map the distances that working people, living in low-income residential locations, cover to reach economic opportunities. For 3 weeks in the month of September 2018, we spent our mornings and evenings, walking, observing, and speaking, to the cyclists who rode along RG Street. Engaging with the stories cyclists of RG Street shared with us, we discuss how physical and metaphorical buffer zones of the past shape the experiences and concerns of working-class cyclists in the present. As much as the use of a bicycle to commute helped save money, riding along the roads decidedly not designed for cyclists exposed conditions of adversity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses relations between South Africa and Southern Rhodesia from 1939 to 1948. The article begins in 1939 when the outbreak of the Second World War brought mixed fortunes for the two neighbours. For Southern Rhodesia, which relied mainly on imported manufactured goods from the United Kingdom, the war induced shortages resulting in huge domestic demand. Shortages stimulated calls for local industry to fill the vacuum. Consequently, an import substitution industrialisation (ISI) drive developed. In addition to the ISI, South Africa, which had a comparatively established secondary industry by the time the war broke out, increasingly became an essential source for Southern Rhodesian imports. This, however, was not without its challenges. Southern Rhodesia's economic interest groups often raised complaints against South Africa's economic competition and its threat to the Rhodesian economy. Nonetheless, Pretoria and Salisbury worked closely and found ways to ease the challenges. By 1948, the end date of the paper, Southern Rhodesia and South Africa's relationship had resulted in the signing of a Customs Union Agreement. Thus, the article demonstrates, thematically and chronologically, that relations between the two countries evolved through cooperation and competition during the Second World War until the onset of Apartheid in South Africa and the Customs Agreement. The paper relies on primary material from the Zimbabwean and South African archives comprised of correspondences of Customs Agreements negotiations, economic policies and relations, and Parliamentary debates. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Redressing the wrongs of the past has been a central theme in democratic South Africa. The land restitution programme was specifically intended to foster the process of redressing the loss and pain inflicted through racially motivated and violent dispossession of land. After more than two and half decades of implementing the land restitution programme, there are serious questions around how far this programme has contributed to redressing the injustices of the past. This paper, drawing from three land restitution case studies, illustrates that while many victims of colonial and apartheid land dispossession have been compensated, the land restitution process has scored limited success in redressing past injustices. The paper argues that the failure to substantively redress colonial and apartheid land dispossession is partly due to the narrow conceptualization of the restitution programme, which has emphasized procedural aspects, ignoring the need for meaningful redress of the victims of land dispossession. As a result of this, the land restitution programme has not fulfilled its transformative objectives of reconciliation, reconstruction, and reducing land inequalities in the country. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper reads contemporary South Africa through the lens of melancholia and situates the experience of loss at the heart of social entanglements in the country. It argues that the purchase of melancholia lies partly in the fact that the problem of disarticulated and disenfranchised loss is common to post-apartheid modernity in general. It suggests that post-apartheid melancholia is a resultant effect of the country's fraught engagement with loss and (be)longing. It also notes that post-apartheid melancholia is a result of structural traumas and moral anguish that have not been worked through. This paper shows how melancholia manifests in the different modes of attachments to, and identifications with victimhood; it explains why each identity group lays il/legitimate claims to victimhood in South Africa. In addition, this paper conceptualises post-apartheid melancholia along racial and generational lines. That is, it examines the ways in which personal testimonies and meditations shed light on the prospects of white, black and intergenerational melancholia in post-apartheid South Africa. In all, this paper argues that melancholia is an affective structure of the everyday life in post-apartheid South Africa which – if we are not quick to pathologise it – may help combat hurried attempts at closing the door on the past. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

At the onset of the apartheid era, Jewish women across South Africa began to publish community cookbooks to raise money for Jewish schools, synagogues, and other organizations. Through their combination of recipes, titles, advertisements, prefaces, and guidelines, community cookbooks narrated the economic, social, and cultural successes of the women who compiled them. In the postwar period, South African Jewish women sought a place for themselves in Jewish communal life, and in the white middle class of the country’s new apartheid order. By producing and consuming community cookbooks, these women armed themselves with the organizational platform and the cultural capital that would help them claim that place. In order to be able to step into the public sphere while meeting their domestic obligations, they came to rely on the invisibilized labor of the black women who worked in their homes and kitchens. The paper uses cookbooks to think critically about the position of South African Jews in the apartheid system, analyzing how Jewish women benefited from the privileges of whiteness in the intimate arena of their homes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Given the recent oppressive histories of apartheid and colonialism, the legacies of slavery in South Africa are often overlooked in thinking about aspects of post-apartheid democracy's discursive formulation of race, nation, and reconciliation. This paper analyses how two examples in Cape Town – the permanent exhibition Representing Slavery at the Slave Lodge Museum and the Memorial to the Enslaved in Church Square – represent the historic event of slavery in South Africa. The paper argues that the museum exhibition and the memorial site are instances of memorialisation and simultaneously function as political processes that offer insight into discourses of race and reconciliation in South Africa during the early stages of democracy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyzes how the white Belgian population in the former Belgian Congo (now the Democratic Republic of the Congo) obtained refuge in South Africa during the Congo Crisis. It tries to understand the ways in which whiteness and the European citizenship were decisive for such reception, considering that South Africa was under the colonial regime that was based on the racial segregation, the Apartheid. This article is based on a bibliographic review. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Bantustans were created during the apartheid period of South Africa's history and represented one of the key pillars of planning for 'grand apartheid'. A major challenge was the promotion of economic development in these territories in order to give them a facade of economic legitimacy. Four of the ten Bantustan ethno-states eventually acceded to the grant of 'independence' which created a changed environment for territorial economic development. The article explores a transition in economic development planning by the apartheid state from Bantustan industrialization to a focus on tourism and casino resort developments as a potential driver of Bantustan economic progress. In terms of methods and sources the paper applies an historical approach that blends secondary sources with primary documentary material. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Territorial administrative restructuring and the redrawing of municipal boundaries was undertaken in South Africa to address the apartheid legacy of major social, economic and spatial inequalities. A significant consequence of territorial administrative restructuring was that the boundaries of certain South African metropolitan areas were expanded such that they incorporate vast rural geographies. These spaces pose particular challenges for metropolitan planning. The aim in this paper is to examine the resultant planning challenges which confront South Africa's extended metropolitan spaces. Among several consequences was the imperative for metropolitan authorities to build new competences in order to plan and manage these added rural spaces as well as the peri-urban spaces. The analysis is contextualised within an international literature on planning in extended metropolitan spaces and of peri-urban spaces. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Conservation and political ideology were closely interlinked in apartheid South Africa: forced removals in areas considered important for conservation was a common practice. Post-Apartheid reforms sought to address the injustices of the past, and at the level of policy, the Land Restitution Act of 1994 recognizes the injustices suffered by specific groups during Apartheid providing a framework to address their claims. However, the land claims process is still marked by various injustices. Drawing on life history interviews conducted with 31 members of the Likhayalethu Community, South Africa, as a case study this paper presents an analytical discussion of how the Land Restitution policy framework in South Africa attempts to address the epistemic injustices in the case of claims in protected areas. The paper raises concerns about the capacity of this policy framework to prevent epistemic injustices from continuing to occur through the current land restitution process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the career of the prominent intellectual and activist Zachariah Keodirelang Matthews and his efforts to promote higher education for black South Africans during the mid-twentieth century. Popular narratives of South African history often tend to downplay or discredit the moderation, pragmatism and cultural diversity of Matthews and his generation and instead emphasize the growth of black solidarity and militancy, but study of Matthews’ writings reveals the important role of old liberal ideas in African nationalism, including an enduring faith in the power of knowledge and an expectation that justice would eventually prevail. The life and work of Z.K. Matthews demonstrates how an African teacher and scholar could steadfastly resist European domination while simultaneously maintaining belief in the essential oneness of humanity and hope for the future of South Africa. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Scholars studying race and racial classification in post-apartheid South Africa have paid little attention to how African refugees navigate the South African racial classification scheme and how they self-identity in the face of their everyday encounters with imposed racial classification in South Africa. This paper addresses this research gap by exploring how first-generation Eritrean refugees self-identify in the context of an imposed South African racial classification system. The result reported here forms part of a broader research study that explored how Eritrean refugees in South Africa self-defined in the face of racialization. The broader study identified various themes but this paper only reports on those who defined their race as Habesha in the face of their experiences with racial classification. I argue that by defining their race as Habesha, participants re-defined race as a pan-ethnic identity dissociating racial identity from physical appearance and skin colour. Some refugees who never self-identified in terms of phenotype-based racial categories are nuancing traditional definitions of racial identity in post-apartheid South Africa. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Through land restitution, a component of land reform, the state seeks to restore the dignity of black communities who lost their land during colonial and apartheid times. Land restitution seeks to return the land that was unfairly grabbed from black people or to offer alternative land or cash compensation. Much public discourse and research on South African land reform has been on the failure of land reform projects and on land acquisition debates. Little research has been published foregrounding the voices of beneficiaries. By capturing their lived experiences after land transfer, this paper examines whether these beneficiaries have been "restituted." My study in the Macleantown and Salem restitution cases shows that access to land has restored the dignity of beneficiaries and produced nostalgia because of the return of ancestors' land, although the livelihoods of beneficiaries have not improved and these projects have failed to function. I argue that these land compensated beneficiaries have not been properly 'restituted,' because the programme has failed to improve their livelihoods or to produce modern solutions for the restitution programme. Land restitution in these areas has largely not led to land justice because beneficiaries are living in poverty. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The New African poet, playwright, and intellectual H.I.E. Dhlomo is often cited as one of twentieth-century South Africa's most important cultural figures. In contrast to his celebrated theoretical writings, however, Dhlomo's actual literary work tends to receive mixed reviews from scholars. This paper seeks to reassess Dhlomo's much-maligned use of Romantic and Gothic tropes by focusing on two of his lesser-known plays: Men and Women and The Expert. These plays, which date from towards the end of Dhlomo's playwriting career, have never been published, yet reveal a great deal about both the nature of his literary project and the conditions of Black cultural production in segregation-era South Africa. Indeed, I argue that these plays engage in some of the most radical social critiques found anywhere in pre-apartheid South African drama, and, furthermore that the melodramatic and incongruous elements of these works are essential to their intended impact. Having experienced segregation-era South African society as an unfolding nightmare, for H.I.E. Dhlomo laughter and horror were intimately related. Ultimately, I contend that Dhlomo's linkage of laughter to the supernatural and the Gothic marks an important moment in South African history, illustrating powerfully the dashed hopes and aspirations of the New African generation within the context of tightening white philanthropic control. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

What do cinema houses have to tell us about the experience of collective leisure in early twentieth-century South Africa? This article considers how the cinema house points to unprecedented social conditions that allowed the emergence of new publics. Drawing on scholarship on the development of cinema in South Africa, the article considers how the historical transformations through which the cinema has passed since the 1910s suggest attempts to domesticate the space of projection of the cinema as well as the formation of new cinema audiences. Diverging from readings of the cinema in South Africa that focus on film, the article considers how the cinema house is inscribed in this scholarship as an evocative cipher of incipient publics and as a metaphor for the containment of a new public sphere during the periods of segregation and Apartheid. While today the cinema house no longer occupies the place it once did, the paper concludes with a reflection on recent recreations of the space of the cinema in two South African art installations. The restaging of these cinemas offers a way into the making of a collective space and the kinds of distinct publics they forged. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper traces the evolution and periodization of shifting ideas about the critical issues shaping city planning in South Africa, looking both at the relative and variable importance ascribed to health and other factors such as labour, economic reconstruction and housing. While the evolution of the South African city cannot be read without an understanding of the role of public health, changing ideas about cities and public health necessitate careful historical unravelling before any causal relationships can be identified. Any urban reconstruction, including post-COVID-19 reform, will demand deep knowledge of how the health/planning nexus has evolved, alongside expert advice on how to maximize urban health. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Based on insights gained from two decades of research on South African heritage and monuments, this paper critically reflects on the status quo of heritage transformation in South Africa 25 years after the end of apartheid. It assesses new directions in national heritage policy and government strategy in relation to recent developments around post-apartheid heritage and the popular demand for a removal of 'colonial statues', which gained impetus from the #Rhodes Must Fall campaign. It is argued that the government's approach to heritage transformation and most notably its treatment of white minority heritage, dominated by the 'juxtaposition model', has had limited success. The paper illustrates how heritage and the memory of the past are entangled with socio-political and economic realities in the present, which in turn is overshadowed by the long-term effects of apartheid and impacted by global or transnational considerations, such as foreign investment and tourism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores strategies deployed by a sample of white, British-born South Africans to account for their positions during apartheid and post-apartheid. Whereas literature on white racism identifies denial as a key strategy towards racial discrimination and the maintenance of privilege, the historical and political 10 context of South Africa makes this tactic implausible. The paper contributes to understandings of pluralism within white identifications through investigation of diverse discursive strategies used to frame the overtly racist, apartheid regime and the present post-apartheid, supposedly, 'post-race' state. A range of positions attempting to minimise individual implication are identified. 15 A common feature however is to reimagine the structure of social relations in order to diminish responsibility for the sins of the past or the success of the future; suggesting profound difficulties in adjusting to the new social reality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is often stated that art reflects reality. Therefore, it should not be a surprise that in times of extreme conflict and oppression, theatre practitioners explore themes such as violence, legacy and emancipation during and after such situations. As with any verbatim theatre production, the play is based on real stories and events. Within the South African context, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission has enabled a large number of enlightening narratives to enter local, national and international discourses. This has also provided many opportunities for the further exploration of both the individual stories, and themes arising, through the medium of verbatim theatre. This paper reflects on a number of different examples of verbatim theatre productions in a post-apartheid South Africa, including productions such as Ubu and the Truth Commission (1997), He Left Quietly (2002) and Truth in Translation (2006). While these theatre productions utilize real stories to explore topical and contentious themes, each production explores the different narratives by employing a variety of dramaturgical techniques. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The end of apartheids, integration into SADC region and reconnection to global economic world resulted in the increase of migration to South Africa. The aim was to identify the qualifications and economic profile of the migrants in relation to entrepreneurial skills that enhance the quality of life and sustainable livelihood of the migrants. The study was qualitative in nature and employed descriptive research design. These methods helped the researchers to understand the experiences and perceptions of migrants on sustainable livelihood and quality of life. The study used a snowball sampling technique, and individual interviews were used to gather information from study participants. Interviewing technique (face-to-face individual interviews) was used within the context of descriptive design. The paper revealed that migrants' entrepreneurial skills play vital role and contributed immensely to the country's economy and improved the quality of life and sustainable livelihoods of migrants. The study revealed that some migrants' small businesses were established through the support and network with their fellow countrymen. It was further found that these businesses generate income and uplift their livelihood through the flow of remittances to their home countries, they are experiencing robberies and other related crimes. Lastly, it also revealed that there is no link between the qualification and kind of business operated by the migrants. Findings from this study will form part of the policy briefs to relevant stakeholders and the funders (National Institute for Humanities and Social Sciences - NIHSS. Southern Africa and South Africa is experiencing high volumes of migrants for various reasons. The study contributes into the body of knowledge by closing a gap on the link between the educational qualifications and economic profile that enhance sustainable livelihood of migrants. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study shows that occupations in South Africa are segregated and stratified by gender. While some women (mostly Black and "Coloured") overwhelmingly fill low-paying jobs, others (mostly White and Indian/Asian, but also Coloured) tend to fill higher-paying professional positions. This paper finds evidence of a long-term reduction in gender segregation and stratification, with women and men entering occupations previously dominated by the other gender, although this trend is sensitive to several data considerations. Most recent evidence, however, points to stagnation in this process. Distinct worker characteristics by gender – including education, location, or age – cannot explain the existing segregation or women's overrepresentation in low-paying jobs, compared with men's representation. They do partially explain the overrepresentation of women in some higher-paying positions and the declining stratification of the labor market by gender. Education is the primary driver for upward mobility for women and gender equality in the South African labor market. Note: This study follows the current South African government's usage of the racial category "Coloured," with the caveat that the term is not in acceptable use outside South Africa. HIGHLIGHTS Gendered occupations and pay gaps in South Africa have not been adequately studied. Black women suffer double labor segregation in South Africa, by gender and by race. Post-apartheid progress in reducing labor segregation has been faster by gender than by race. Improved education offers women a route to better-paid professional occupations Although women now access better jobs, managerial positions remain disproportionately male. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Performing excess is a trope of comedy that dates back to the earliest times – with jokers and clowns being the most popular example of how comedy allows individuals to abandon restrictions of decorum and social graces. In a society where increasing democratic freedom allows for expressions of identity to be performed more openly, it is interesting to note how excess has been linked to the consumption of material goods, wealth and the caricatured performance of culture. Comedy, true to its nature, allows for these expressions of excessive consumption to appear even more pronounced than they do in other cultural products. In the South African Indian community, excess is used in an attempt to emphasize belonging in a market-driven capitalist economy and is also used to lampoon stereotypes of the rapacious Indian. Two main issues arise from depictions in South African Indian comedy. First, the South African Indian community has been associated with the stereotype of greed and rapaciousness, and the comedians (most prominently Karou Charou and Peru and Bala) are often criticized for allowing the use of stereotypical tropes to capitalize on the lampooning of the South African Indian community. Second, the exaggerated stereotypes reflect the state of comedy in post-Apartheid South Africa, with a heavy reliance on stereotypes and excessive displays of conspicuous consumption. The comedy in post-Apartheid South Africa, particularly from minority communities, has often been 'low brow', with an emphasis on excess, exaggeration of stereotypes and self-deprecatory humour. This excessiveness is prevalent in some South African Indian comedy, which relies heavily on stereotypes, such as that of bling township culture and excessive alcohol consumption, to provoke humour. This paper explores excess as an expression of consumption: how is consumption linked to comedy and how does this reflect the identity of South African Indians? [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Non-racialism is a deep-rooted ideal in the history of resistance in South Africa. It is not only the basis of the post-apartheid legal order, but also crucial to the form of capitalism. This paper reinterprets non-racialism and inequality in post-1994 South Africa by revisiting conventional understandings of the nature of the state and the rule of law. It shows that racial inequality is inscribed in the non-racial form of the state. The non-racial democratic shell correlates with the commodity form. Scholars have neglected the shift in the form of the state after 1994, partly because they focus on policy and see the state as an external structure in a racial society. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper interrogates the legacy of apartheid as a socio-economic and political system on the emerging democracy and citizenship in post-apartheid South Africa. Following the arrival of Europeans in the 17th century, South Africa was subjected to the Dutch and the British political administrations. The political conquest of South Africa by these nations left the indigenous peoples stripped of their dignity, land and political rights. As well as being deprived of their human right to exist, the indigenous people experienced brutal wars, social exclusion and economic marginalization. This paper argues that apartheid and the democratic system of governance both created binaries based on inclusion and exclusion, race and class, gender and ethnicity. The failure of the democratic government to address the structural and institutional challenges not only reinforced these binaries but also perpetuated democratic inequalities, pushing poverty and unemployment to high levels. This paper traces the legacy of apartheid's social implications on a nation branded on the concept of the rainbow nation. Economically, the adoption of neo-liberal policies has failed to yield the economic growth needed for South Africa to tackle poverty, unemployment, inequality and other social issues. Although democracy has been institutionalized through the Constitution of 1996 and other relevant legislation, the South African democracy is unable to address the socio-economic and political challenges. The data for this paper was elicited from discourse analysis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the range of functions undertaken by the University of Fort Hare (UFH) over its 100-year history and in what ways it has carried these out. Drawing on the framework developed by Castells on the functions performed by universities, the paper shows that UFH’s role in three of these functions - namely, in the production of values for individuals and social legitimation for the state, in the formation of the dominant elite, and in the training of the labour force - has shifted and changed along with the different imperatives and conditions of the colonial, apartheid and post-1994 democratic eras in South Africa. By contrast, UFH’s role in the production of scientific knowledge is a relatively recent development, but one which has strengthened rapidly. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article re-examines existing interpretations of the ANC's economic and social policy choices during the negotiations that led to South Africa's democracy. The divergence but also convergence crucially in economic policy thinking of key policy actors within the ANC and the National Party (NP) led apartheid regime is contrasted. The National Party's economic policy agenda is discussed with attention to its key 'technocratic' policy actors and how they influentially negotiated neo-liberal policy positions with the ANC. The economic and social policies of the ANC must be seen in contrast as part of a series of attempts historically at advocating social democratic oriented policies. The ANC leadership however marginalised and abandoned these ideas and policies in a social democratic vein in the consensus seeking transition era. The paper tries to explain these shifts and to come to grips with the complexity of the actors, history and politics of ANC policy thinking in the transition era. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Africa is rapidly urbanising and urban food systems are being transformed. Some have argued that this transformation is driven by a supermarket revolution akin to that in North America, Europe and Latin America. Others suggest that the supermarket revolution model oversimplifies complex African realities and that urban food systems are experiencing uneven supermarket penetration in the face of resilient informal food sectors. This paper focuses on Windhoek, Namibia, showing that the city's food system is dominated by South African and local supermarket chains. Since the end of apartheid, South African supermarket chains have expanded their operations into Namibia. Supermarket domination of Windhoek's urban food system is a function of proximity of South Africa and integration into South African supply chains. In other African countries, supermarket penetration has been much slower and is even being reversed. Explanations for uneven penetration in different countries require greater contextualisation and more case study research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores debates and politics over the place of regulatory democracy in contemporary South African constitutionalism. Twenty-five years after the formal legal transition from apartheid, regulatory institutions – by and large not the focus of negotiations in the early 1990s – have increasingly assumed prominence within the South African state. Such organisations and their functions do not fit easily within one 'branch' of the classic legal theory of the separation of powers into three parts, namely the judiciary, the legislature, and the executive. A typology of regulatory institutions in the South African polity includes at least four distinct types. The work of these regulatory organisations in formulating and implementing law in post-apartheid South Africa has become significant in politics, especially over the past decade. While the existence and operation of regulatory institutions does not itself comprise the whole of regulatory politics, such organisations do constitute a crucial component of and locus for such politics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Focusing on education policy and politics in Israel, this essay examines how ethnic segregation is established and sheds light on the latest curricular developments that place a heavy emphasis on Jewish identity. The first part of the paper underscores the rising influence of the radical right in Israel and it’s political theology. The second part presents the Apartheid education in South Africa. In doing so, this part underscores the roles of segregation and religion in establishing a justificatory system that legitimises racial superiority and presents Apartheid education as ‘civilising’ and ‘modernising’. In the third part, the paper discusses how segregation and religious-ethnonationalism make up an apartheid-like reality in Israel, focusing on recent curricular policies. The final part presents concluding thoughts on racism and colonialism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Czechoslovak 'people's democracy' supplied a model for the development of a South African notion of a 'national democratic' revolution as well as providing key skills and resources. Czechoslovak support for this project in the 1960s and 1970s was both a source of confidence and fragility for South African Communists, boosting morale but confirming their subordinate status in their partnership with African nationalism. Drawing upon Czech archival materials as well as memoirs and interviews, this paper explores encounters and connections between South African Communists and the Czechs against the backdrop of the broader strategic concerns that shaped Soviet and Eastern European support for South African liberatory politics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

South Africa has a long-established independent left, outside the big traditions of nationalism and Marxism-Leninism. Post-apartheid its fortunes have varied considerably, as space opened up for movements to the left of the African National Congress and the South African Communist Party, but opportunities declined as the state increased its legitimacy, penetration of civil society, and systems of patronage. This paper looks at cooperation, competition and convergence on the independent left, with particular reference to independent Marxists (mainly the well-established Trotskyist tradition) and revolutionary anarchists and syndicalists (a movement that revived in the 1990s). These intersections have taken place in study groups, popular education, student struggles, and post-apartheid social movements and unions, and indicate the vitality and fragility of the independent left, and the ongoing importance of cooperation and overlaps, as well as of long-standing divisions over theory and strategy. Particular attention is paid to Keep Left, the Socialist Group, the Democratic Socialist Movement, and the Zabalaza Anarchist Communist Front. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The townships of South Africa are peri-urban neighbourhoods defined by racial segregation, economic disparity, and geographic isolation. A product of the racist policies of apartheid, these spaces exist as exclusively black or 'coloured' neighbourhoods that present limited opportunities for mobility for residents. Since the end of apartheid, townships have increasingly come up under the tourists' gaze as sites/sights of resistance, difference, and, urban adventure. While much of tourism scholarship on liminality to date has focused on tourism landscapes creating liminal opportunities for tourists, this paper details how tourism encounters may also become liminal opportunities for tourism hosts under certain conditions. While the tourism encounters take place in the familiar landscape that is home, they become liminal occasions in which to come face-to-face with the previously inaccessible Other and transform one's relationship with them, with themselves, and with their home space. In conducting a critical discourse analysis with the texts of interviews with 16 township residents, a number of liminal moments were identified in participants' descriptions of tourism encounters. Themes identified in this research include: (1) Pertaining to a change in social standing, economic state, relationships to/with the other; (2) Desire for engagement, transformation through encounter; (3) Transformation of one's understanding of the physical landscape, and; (4) Transformation of one's understanding of self. These themes are elucidated through the use of creative analytic practice (CAP) and demonstrate that while tourism encounters in the spaces of home do not involve a physical relocation, they can have a transformative effect in people for whom such encounters with the Other were previously forbidden. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper is based on participant observation of begging strategies employed by placard-bearing able-bodied black and white adults at traffic lights in Johannesburg. My main concern is how ideas of ‘race’ shape the performances of begging and patterns of giving. In spite of strong sentiments held by both black and white donors that whites are illegitimate beggars, on average, white beggars earned more than did black ones. This occurred in spite of the stylistics of white beggars that suggested they were performing ‘superiority’ or ‘respectability’ in begging. Black beggars tended to adopt active strategies that ‘added value’ to the streets whereas whites were passive. Both black and white donors, in general, seemed to be troubled or fascinated by the upsetting of an enduring racial hierarchy that previously privileged whites during apartheid. The paper reflects on white privilege, begging and non-racialism. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Any analysis of South African gendered performances, identities and inequalities confront past and present experiences of and struggles with race, colonialism, post-colonial development and sexuality. These tensions shape gendered geographical work, highlighting the importance of histories of race, class, and sexuality, as well as the ways in which gender itself can be approached as an analytical category and epistemic framing in South Africa. In this paper we focus on two avenues that have engaged scholars since the end of apartheid, namely: gender and development; and gender and geographies of sexualities. The former articulates the particular ways that the historical spatially exclusionary trajectory of the country has impacted especially on women and their ability to engage with state and national building projects post-apartheid. The latter explores how South African geographies (despite the country's progressive post-apartheid constitution with regard to LGBT rights) continue to reflect and (at times) enable spatial segregation and inequalities related to gender. A key strength of research in South African gender scholarship is that it complicates and challenges how we might approach gender and gender-based inequalities, and the diverse ways in which gender categories and framings can be imagined, deployed and troubled in post-colonial states and cities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While the use of non-violent activism in faith-based organisations (FBOs) is a much-researched topic, a systematic analysis of how such elements are influenced by the interactions of different internal dynamics within such FBOs remains under-explored. This article investigates this less-researched element in relation to the development of non-violent activism in FBOs. It does this through an analysis of both the socio-political realities surrounding the evolution of a South African FBO, the South African Council of Churches and the internal group dynamics during the early years of the organisation in South Africa (1968-1980). Relying heavily on data from semi-structured interviews of key actors within the FBO and on archival documents about activities of the organisation, the article explains how these dynamics influenced the decision for the development of the different forms of non-violent activism that evolved in the organisation. The paper applies the social movement theory, drawing on its political process model to demonstrate that such kinds of activism do not evolve in a vacuum, nor as a result of only religious ideological imperatives as a large number previous studies have posited. They are rather a result of the interaction of elements around the FBO. Once developed, such strategies become contested and escalate in accordance with the resources and opportunities available to the group. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article will begin with a discussion of the distinctive ways in which the notion of Christian perfection is understood in Southern African Methodism by reflecting on how Methodists in Southern Africa have understood, perhaps even misunderstood, the emphasis on "social holiness" as a Christian response to the oppression of colonialism and apartheid on the African continent. It is contended that this understanding could be classified as a form of African Christian humanism. In order to show this, the article will highlight aspects of Christian humanism and the African worldview that correlate with Southern African appropriations of Methodist and Wesleyan theology. Reference is made to Nelson Mandela's faith, which was formed within this theological framework. He developed his own faith in response to significant Black South African Methodists (such as the founders of the African National Congress, the founder of the Pan African Congress, and the founders of the Black Methodist Consultation) and Methodist communities (such as Churches, schools and chaplaincies). The paper argues that humanism, which has its roots in Christian theological and social ethics, became distinctively African through the work and witness of Southern African Methodists. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, I wish to explore the life in the mid-19th to 20th century in the Durban-based Indian Casbah and its enduring legacy. In exploring the Casbah life in Durban, I wish to pay special attention to the narratives of the people who either were associated with it and had living memories of it, or remember the many stories passed on to them by their families.1 The central question that I explore in analysing these narratives is: does Casbah in the diaspora enable the diasporic community to reconnect with their Indian origins or does it orient them away from the romantic attachment to the places of their origin in India? In other words, is Casbah a symbol of a new settlement in which the diasporic community finds lasting meaning and legacy, or does it evoke memories and myths about their origins in India? [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Social relations, institutional arrangements and cultures bequeathed by South Africa's system of apartheid continue be felt in the present despite the country's formal transition to democracy 25 years ago. Race, class and gender inequities continue to structure South African society in ways that have proven intransigent to change, leading to growing frustration and widespread public dissatisfaction expressed in multiple arenas including worker strikes, service delivery and university student protests. While it is clear that social structures inherited from the past are difficult to change, it is also the case that change does happen. In this paper, we discuss the findings of a hermeneutic phenomenological study with 10 academics at one historically White university in South Africa, who have been agents of change within their particular context. We show how participants engaged in struggles to counter resistance to their efforts. In doing so they demonstrate what we call 'strategic competence' - the ability to act in ways that not only draw on personal resources but recognise the resources, contradictions and opportunities offered within the existing limitations of the social structure. Strategic competence thus emerges as a central feature of agency, enabling individuals to stretch the boundaries of what is possible. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In late colonial Basutoland and early independence Lesotho, the issue of who could access citizenship rights and passports became increasingly important. Political refugees fleeing apartheid South Africa took up passports on offer in the territory to further their political work. Basotho residents also took up passports in increasing numbers as a way of safeguarding their economic, social and political rights on both sides of the border. The lure of a Citizens of the United Kingdom and Colonies (CUKC) passport drew refugees to Basutoland in the early 1960s, but it was South Africa’s decision to leave the Commonwealth in 1961 that spurred many in Lesotho to formalise their imperial citizenship as well, even as independence for Lesotho became increasingly likely. The stories of those taking up papers illuminate how citizenship became a space for contestation between individuals and governments. The stories also show how the concept of the transfer of power does not accurately reflect the ways in which the sovereignty of newly independent African states, apartheid South Africa and the United Kingdom were all limited by a series of decisions made in the late colonial period. Tracing these stories helps us better understand the limitations of the term ‘decolonisation’ for reflecting the understandings and complications of citizenship in 1960s and 1970s southern Africa. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Globally and across the African continent, the past decade has seen an increase in the commitment to reducing adult illiteracy, inspired among other things by the Education for All (EFA) drive to halve the incidence of illiteracy among adults and youth by 2015. While literacy campaigns were less common during the 1990s, the last decade saw a new impetus for mass adult literacy campaigns as a way of improving national literacy levels. This paper examines the South African endeavour to meet its EFA target through the implementation of the South African Kha Ri Gude Mass Literacy Campaign, which was launched by the South African government in 2008 with the aim of enliterating 4,7 million adults who had little or no education as a result of the apartheid legacy. The Campaign was deemed successful receiving a number of South African awards for best practice and its work in rural and impoverished communities including the international UNESCO Confucius Prize for Literacy (UNESCO 2016). This article focuses on how the campaign utilised action-oriented processes, specifically the methods of participatory action research (PAR), to enhance the achievement of its goals. The methods of PAR were embedded in the campaign structure, comprising clusters of communities of practice (COPs) which provided fora for educators to voice and address challenges. Moreover, since the Campaign was implemented in post-apartheid South Africa, the article shows how the Campaign operations were guided by the ethos of ubuntu as necessary for redress and empowerment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose -- The purpose of this paper is to argue that information is an important effect of documentation. It is in this way that documentation studies distinguishes between concepts of and practices with "information" and "document": that is, documentation studies helps illuminate how information is created, stabilized, and materialized such that it can emerge and, in turn, how it can then be controlled, deployed, enforced, entrenched, managed, and used in many different ways, in various settings, and for diverse purposes. Design/methodology/approach -- This paper presents a conceptual framework on documentation, drawing upon the work of Bernd Frohmann , Michel Foucault, Bruno Latour, Hannah Arendt, @@and Ian Hacking, and applied to a case study of Apartheid South Africa. Findings -- Apartheid's documentation helped achieve apartness at the macro and micro levels of society: on the macro level, the creation and subsequent separation of different racial and ethnic identities were drafted, adopted, and turned into law through legislative documents; on the micro level, these identities were reinforced through routines with personal documents and public signs. This documentation functioned as a documentary apparatus, providing a tangible link between individuals and their official racial and ethnic categories by creating a seamless movement of documents through various institutions; further it helped transform these racial and ethnic identities into lived facts that disciplined and controlled life. Originality/value -- By examining documentation, one can present a fresh and unique perspective to understanding the construction of various things, such as the construction of identities. This conceptual framework contributes to Library and Information Science (LIS) by illuminating the central role of documentation in the creation, stabilization, materialization, and emergence of information. By using Apartheid South Africa as a case study, this paper demonstrates how this framework can be applied to shed new light on different kinds of phenomena in diverse contexts; consequently, it not only contributes to and extends parts of the scholarship on documentation studies within LIS, but also presents new directions for other academic disciplines and multidisciplinary analyses and research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Internal labour migration from rural areas to urban centres has been and remains one of the dominant patterns of migration in South Africa. Based on data from ethnographic field research, this paper explores the mobility patterns and translocal relations of miners in the Northern Cape province of South Africa. By considering the tension between mobility and locality in a historical and political perspective, the concept of translocality helps to explain why miners try to expand their action space and, at the same time, why they are embedded in certain places. Thus, a translocal perspective enhances the interpretation of the spatio-temporal transformations in South Africa’s mining communities and beyond, as it sheds light on the agency of mine workers, superseding merely structuralist explanations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]