Examination of Coloureds toward a more inclusive history (original) (raw)
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Anthropology at the dawn of apartheid
Focaal, 2017
In this article, I focus on diff erent strategies of anthropological engagement with government and potential funders. I do so by considering the diverse nature of Alfred Radcliff e-Brown and Bronislaw Malinowski's encounters with South African authorities, between 1919 and 1934. I suggest that Radcliff e-Brown saw South Africa as an integrated society in which segregation was impossible, and advocated the sympathetic scientifi c understanding of cultural diff erence within this context. By contrast, Malinowski was committed to a romantic vision of holistic cultures, collaborated directly with colonial authorities, and argued for a policy of eff ective cultural and territorial segregation. Th e strategies had important longterm consequences and costs, calculable only from the privileged vantage point of history.
Focaal, 2017
In this article, I focus on different strategies of anthropological engagement with government and potential funders. I do so by considering the diverse nature of Alfred Radcliffe-Brown and Bronislaw Malinowski’s encounters with South African authorities, between 1919 and 1934. I suggest that Radcliffe-Brown saw South Africa as an integrated society in which segregation was impossible, and advocated the sympathetic scientific understanding of cultural difference within this context. By contrast, Malinowski was committed to a romantic vision of holistic cultures, collaborated directly with colonial authorities, and argued for a policy of effective cultural and territorial segregation. The strategies had important longterm consequences and costs, calculable only from the privileged vantage point of history.
Apartheid: ancient, past and present
1999
By Nisrccn Balliish and Anthony Ldwsledt (Webster University. Vienna) I. Introduction The Afrikaans term apartheid, which originally means 'apartness' or 'separateness', has become a globally used, household word for ethnic and ethnicist oppression. There is some irony in this, since South Africa's National Party, which ruled the country from 1948 until 1994, itself coined the term to veil or mask the oppressive elements of its policies and practices. The concept of separateness in itself does not imply any group being favored over any other Segregation per se of ethnic entities, after all, was supported by some South African Blacks 2 Now in common usage all over the world, apartheid has drifted away from its original lexical meaning to denote physically repressive, economically exploitative and ideologically racist or ethnicist segregation. This paper focuses on three apartheid societies, Graeco-Roman Egypt, South Africa and Israel, and offers conceptual reflections on possible frameworks for future Truth and Reconciliation Commissions, especially with regard to present day Israel Apartheid in comparative focus Throughout this century, the unique developments in South Africa have often confounded political theorists by proving to be exceptions from otherwise global trends. For instance, whilst race in apartheid South Africa became more decisive than economic class, Marxism's central tenet of class struggle was suspended. Ever since the repeal of the apartheid laws in this decade, however, Marxism could be said to have been vindicated "in the last resort" From that perspective, the highly artificially racist society of South Africa is now being replaced by a "conventionally" capitalist class society ' The same Marxist analysis in this regard could be applied to the USA from I86S (abolition of slavery) and 1964 (legislation against segregation), respectively. The US laws of segregation between Blacks and Whites, the non-violent struggle against them and the violent White backlash and reaction to that struggle in themselves manifest strong parallels to South African developments, especially as many formative events in this regard took place around the same time, in the 1950's and the 1960's. Albert Luthuli could indeed be compared to Martin Luther King whilst Robert Sobukwe and Nelson Mandela could be likened with Malcolm X (the latter two at least with regard to strategies of resistance). Blacks in the USA and in the preceding North American colonies, however, were always a minority, as opposed to South Africa. ' We arc indebted to the Austrian Ministry or Science and Traffic (Oslcrreichisches Bundcsniinislerium fur Wisscnschaft und Verkchr) and to VOEST-ALPINE Induslrieanlagcnbau GmbH., Litiz. Tor grants sponsoring the presentation or this paper at the conference. "The TRC Commissioning the Past", jointly organized by the History Workshop at the University of the Wilwalcrsnind and the Centre for the Study of Violence and Reconciliation, in Johannesburg. June 11-14. 1999. 2 Lester. Alan: From Colonization to Democracy: A new historical geography of South Africa. London & New York: Tauris Academic Studies. 1996: 87ff. Without segregation, many South African Blacks may indeed not have been able to keep so many of their cultural traditions-including language-and proud resistant attitudes in defiance of Whiles and their cultures. Of course, this was not part of the Whites' plan. The indigenous culture was supposed to just fade away, due merely to being in the proximity of superior' While culture. Cf, for instance. Jaspers. Karl: Voin Ursprung und Ziel der Geschichte. Zurich, 1949: 69, 88. Similarly, the physical separation of races was favored by a Black US emancipationist like Malcolm X. and it still is today by Louis Farrakhan. ' Lester 1996: 2ff Along with Australia and New Zealand, South Africa also stands out as a prominent exception to the "North-South Divide" of rich and poor countries, respectively. It is, for example, an often forgotten fact that the electric power station in Johannesburg in 1914 was the largest and most modern one in the world. Ever since the industrialization of South Africa, it has been one of the richest and technologically most advanced countries in the world. The first ever open heart surgery on a human patient was performed there in 1967 Only a few years later, the NP government procured the country's first nuclear weapons, less than 30 years after the USA. Other comparative attempts to make sense of South African political developments have included comparisons with Nazi Germany, on the one hand, and the Soviet Union, on the other. The National Party (NP) had close ties with the Nazis and openly supported them, but the former were not yet in power when the World War II broke out. The slightly less racist Union Party formed the government at the time, and South Africa joined the war on the allied side. After the war, however, the NP unexpectedly won the 1948 (ail-White) elections-they were to stay in government until 1994. Already in their first few years in power, the NP rehabilitated South African Nazi supporters and introduced racist laws and covert operations reminiscent of Hitler's "master race" policies. 5 Ideology was also similar in these cases: The centuries-old Afrikaner idea of being "God's Chosen People" 6 (which of course goes back to the millennia-old Jewish idea) was mirrored in the Nazi notion of Aryans or Germans being "Nature's Chosen People", the be-all and end-all of natural selection. Especially anthropology and biology were misused to a great extent in order for Whites in Germany and South Africa to attempt to prove these ideas. The parallel with the Soviet Union could also be argued convincingly. Both apartheid South Africa and the Soviet Union created a giant state apparatus and undertook massive social engineering programs, including large, forced removals of millions of people, whole segments of the population. These costly adventures-in financial as well as human termswere made possible only by industrialization, the advent of which nearly coincided in the two countries at the beginning of this century. Yet, both states, it has been argued, were rendered obsolete by further industrialization. The further development of globalized capitalism demanded a state with less expenditure and less market intervention and control. 7 Indeed, only half a year lies between the demise of the apartheid state and the end of the Soviet Union The two countries are at present also facing similar restructuring problems manifesting themselves primarily as high unemployment and high crime-rates. Apartheid in an historically wide sense In this paper, we will compare the South African apartheid system as well as the oppressive structures which preceded and influenced it, with Egypt under Greek and Roman rule, from 332 BC continuously until AD 642, on the one hand, and with modern Palestine under Israeli rule since 1948, on the other. Both of these societies have repeatedly been compared to apartheid South Africa in sweeping terms. What we wish to do here is to provide an analysis to match those generalizations, without shying away from the differences. What the parallels of Graeco-Roman Egypt and modern Israel 8 (until the late 1970's, when the Jews
Historical Scholarship and the Legitimatization of Apartheid Policy in South Africa, 1948 – 1994
Apartheid was a system of racial segregation in South Africa enforced through legislation by the National Party (NP) governments, the ruling party from 1948 to 1994, under which the rights, associations, and movements of the majority black inhabitants were curtailed and Afrikaner minority rule was maintained. Legislation classified inhabitants into four racial groups-'black', 'white', 'colored', and Indian'. The article examined the way that the different racial groups in South Africa in most historical texts were presented. Attention was focused on the nature and extent of ethnic stereotyping in most of the publications and the endorsement of particular social and political attitudes relevant to the particular circumstances in the apartheid South Africa. The overall object of this study was to assess how far and in what way these texts formed part of the legitimatization process of the apartheid regime. Texts books as medium of instruction are capable of reflecting and transmitting dominant social values and the study of history is a particularly potent means of doing so especially when the interpretation of past events is used to give meaning to the present..Obviously, there may be many interpretations of history which ought not to be thought of as a body of permanent truth. Nonetheless, history can be used throughout the world to justify particular forms of social structure and government. Therefore, the central thesis of this paper is that historical scholarship was used to justify the system of racial segregation in South Africa.
2021
The historical system of racial segregation in Africa has been evolutional. With countries like South Africa and Sudan in every spotlight, it is no wonder why they still struggle with civil wars and homophobia, two phenomena of which I dare say are direct consequences of the apartheid struggle, even though such has left the scene decades ago. Here, we deep dive into apartheid proper, setting our scope to Africa and dissecting through the struggles and stories of native black South Africans and Sudanese against racial and religious apartheid. Notable events, figures, dates, practices, current and future effects on the economy, as well as contemporary relevance. This way, the researcher aims to give the audience a different yet better perspective of the apartheid struggle, with Africa at a glance.
Chapter 10 SOUTH AFRICA : The Legacy of Apartheid : Racial Inequalities in the New South Africa
2005
The legacy of 350 years of apartheid practice and 50 years of concerted apartheid policy has been to create racial differences in socioeconomic position larger than in any other nation in the world. Whites, who constitute 11 percent of the population, enjoy levels of education, occupational status, and income similar to and in many respects superior to those of the industrially-developed nations of Europe and the British diaspora. Within the White population, however, there is a sharp distinction between the one-third of English origin and the two-thirds of Afrikaner origin. Despite apartheid policies explicitly designed to improve the lot of Afrikaners at the expense of non-Whites, the historical difference between the two groups continues to be seen in socioeconomic differences at the end of the 20 th century. Still, the disadvantages of Afrikaners are modest compared to those of non-Whites, particularly Coloureds and Blacks, who bear the brunt of apartheid policies. Ethnic penalties are especially large for people with lower levels of education. For those with less than a tertiary education, there appears to be an occupational floor under Whites and an occupational ceiling over non-Whites. For the small minority of Blacks and Coloureds with tertiary education, the likelihood of being employed and the kinds of jobs available differ relatively little from the opportunities of Asians and White; but for the vast majority lacking tertiary education the ethnic penalty is very large, particularly for Blacks. Most are unable even to find work, with about 40 percent of Black men and more than half of Black women unemployed; and those who are employed are relegated largely to semiand unskilled jobs. Although tertiary education minimizes racial differences in occupational opportunities, it has little effect on racial differences in income, which are large even among the well educated and even among those working in similar occupations. inequalities left as a legacy of the apartheid system of racial domination in place from 1948 through 1994. South Africa's four official racial groups ('Whites', 11 percent of the population in 1996; 'Asians', 3 percent; 'Coloureds', 9 percent; and 'Blacks', 77 percent) 1 differ substantially in their income and other socioeconomic attributes. In 1996, non-White men, who together constituted 81 percent of the male labour force, on average earned 23 percent of what White men earned, up from 19 percent in 1991 and 15 percent in 1980 (Treiman, McKeever, and Fodor 1996:112). 2 Thus, at the dawn of the new South African dispensation, racial differences in South Africa were far larger than in other multi-ethnic countries. For example, in the U.S., Black males in 2000 earned, on average, about 67 percent of what non-Hispanic White males earned (U.S. Bureau of the Census 2001). In Israel, Arabs in 1983 earned 63 percent of what Jews earned (Semyonov 1988). This paper extends previous work analyzing racial differences in occupational status and income in South Africa in 1980 and 1991 (Treiman et al. 1996), using data from the most recent South African census available for scholarly use-that conducted in 1996. 3 Before describing these data, I briefly review the history and social structure of South Africa. A (VERY BRIEF) INTRODUCTION TO THE SOCIAL DEMOGRAPHY OF SOUTH AFRICA 4 The earliest known residents of what is now South Africa were hunters and herders known as the Khoi, who are genetically related to the present day San people ('Bushmen') of the Kalihari desert of Botswana. The influx of Bantu-speaking herders from Central Africa, starting in the 4th Century A.D., had driven the Khoi into a relatively small area near present-day Capetown, which is where employees of the Dutch East India Company found them when they established a refuelling station in 1652. Unions between Dutch men and Khoi women resulted in what is now known as the 'Coloured' population, genetically enriched by later unions with slaves imported from elsewhere in Africa and from the Dutch East Indies, particularly Malaysia and Indonesia, and with people from the Indian subcontinent who arrived in the late 19 th Century. Over the 200 years subsequent to first contact, the Dutch settlers, supplemented by French Huguenots and Germans, gradually spread East and then North, subsisting as semi-migratory cattle herders (trekboers in Afrikaans, literally 'wandering farmers') in much the same manner as the Bantu-speaking people who already occupied the areas into which the Afrikaners, as the 1 Computations from the 1996 census. Although there are many ethnic distinctions within racial categories, almost all statistical tables published by the South African Central Statistical Service (now known as Statistics South Africa) are divided on the basis of race, using these four categories, a usage that has held from at least the 1904 census continuously through the 2001 census. For convenience, I refer to these groups without quotation marks.
The Racialisation of Social Scientific Research on South Africa (1998) (with MARK ORKIN)
The study of South African societies has been framed within the logic of the "factual " existence of "race" and "ethnicity". A brief historical account of the context of studies shows a range of unresolved questions in mainstream research on South Africa society. It has not been shown exactly why and how "race" and "ethnicity" are sociologically useful categories for analysis and has not actually been made clear how "race" and "ethnicity" help "explain" South African society. The mainstream research has been marked by the empirical-analytical approach which guides to the paradigm of divided society. How has mainstream work sought to establish a critically distant position from apartheid thinking, and has it been able to move substantively beyond the "official" "racial" and "ethnic" classifications of apartheid ideology? -are two main problems discussed in this paper.