scholarly journals History, memory and reconciliation: Njabulo Ndebele’s The cry of Winnie Mandela and Pumla Gobodo-Madikizela’s A human being died that night

Literator ◽  
2006 ◽  
Vol 27 (2) ◽  
pp. 1-20
Author(s):  
R. Goodman
Keyword(s):  
South African ◽  
Human Being ◽  
African History ◽  
African Society ◽  
South African Society ◽  
The Past ◽  
Public Figures ◽  
Ethical Complexity ◽  
Narrative Techniques

This article deals with two texts written during the process of transition in South Africa, using them to explore the cultural and ethical complexity of that process. Both Njabulo Ndebele’s “The cry of Winnie Mandela” and Pumla Gobodo-Madikizela’s “A human being died that night” deal with controversial public figures, Winnie Mandela and Eugene de Kock respectively, whose role in South African history has made them part of the national iconography. Ndebele and Gobodo-Madikizela employ narrative techniques that expose and exploit faultlines in the popular representations of these figures. The two texts offer radical ways of understanding the communal and individual suffering caused by apartheid, challenging readers to respond to the past in ways that will promote healing rather than perpetuate a spirit of revenge. The part played by official histories is implicitly questioned and the role of individual stories is shown to be crucial. Forgiveness and reconciliation are seen as dependent on an awareness of the complex circumstances and the humanity of those who are labelled as offenders. This requirement applies especially to the case of “A human being died that night”, a text that insists that the overt acknowledgement of the humanity of people like Eugene de Kock is an important way of healing South African society.

scholarly journals What makes theological education "theological"? A South African story on the integrity of theological education

1996 ◽  
Vol 17 (2) ◽  
pp. 405-419 ◽  
Author(s):  
P.J. Robinson ◽  
D.J. Smit
Keyword(s):  
South African ◽  
Theological Education ◽  
Historical Consciousness ◽  
Sociological Imagination ◽  
Social Changes ◽  
African Society ◽  
South African Society ◽  
The Past ◽  
Public Responsibility

What  makes  theological  education  "theological"?  A  South  Mrican story on the iniegrity of  theological education David  Tracy  claims  that  the  contemporary  emergence  of a  sociological imagination  is  as  crucial for  theological  self-consciousness  as  the  earlier rise of  historical consciousness among  theologians.  The  authors are of  the opinion  that  the  rapid  and fundamental  social  changes  in  South  African society  over  the  past few  years  have  accelerated  this  "emergence  of a sociological  imagination"  amongst  Sout~  African  theologians.  In  three sections,  they  point  to  three  clusters  of questions  that  have  therefore become  increasingly  important,  namely  questions  related  to  the  growing awareness  of the  crucial  role  of social  location  or  context,  questions arising  from  a  growing  acknowledgement  of public  responsibility,  and questions concerning  the  integrity of  theological education,  i e the question on what makes theological education  "theological".

scholarly journals What makes theological education "theological"? A South African story on the -integrity of theological education

1996 ◽  
Vol 17 (2) ◽  
pp. 405-419
Author(s):  
P.J. Robinson ◽  
D.J. Smit
Keyword(s):  
South African ◽  
Theological Education ◽  
Historical Consciousness ◽  
Sociological Imagination ◽  
Social Changes ◽  
African Society ◽  
South African Society ◽  
The Past ◽  
Public Responsibility

What makes theological education "theological"? A South Arican story on the iniegrity of theological educationDavid Tracy claims that the contemporary emergence of a sociological imagination is as crucial for theological self-consciousness as the earlierrise of historical consciousness among theologians. The authors are of the opinion that the rapid and fundamental social changes in South African society over the past few years have accelerated this "emergence of a sociological imagination" amongst South African theologians. In three sections, they point to three clusters of questions that have therefore become increasingly important, namely questions related to the growing awareness of the crucial role of social location or context, questions arising from a growing acknowledgement of public responsibility, andquestions concerning the integrity of theological education, i.e. the question on what makes theological education "theological".

Learning Zulu

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark Sanders
Keyword(s):  
Language Learning ◽  
Cultural History ◽  
South African ◽  
Press Coverage ◽  
African History ◽  
African Culture ◽  
The Past ◽  
Correct Form ◽  
Linguistic Purism

When this book's author began studying Zulu, he was often questioned why he was learning it. This book places the author's endeavors within a wider context to uncover how, in the past 150 years of South African history, Zulu became a battleground for issues of property, possession, and deprivation. The book combines elements of analysis and memoir to explore a complex cultural history. Perceiving that colonial learners of Zulu saw themselves as repairing harm done to Africans by Europeans, the book reveals deeper motives at work in the development of Zulu-language learning—from the emergence of the pidgin Fanagalo among missionaries and traders in the nineteenth century to widespread efforts, in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, to teach a correct form of Zulu. The book looks at the white appropriation of Zulu language, music, and dance in South African culture, and at the association of Zulu with a martial masculinity. In exploring how Zulu has come to represent what is most properly and powerfully African, the book examines differences in English- and Zulu-language press coverage of an important trial, as well as the role of linguistic purism in xenophobic violence in South Africa. Through one person's efforts to learn the Zulu language, the book explores how a language's history and politics influence all individuals in a multilingual society.

scholarly journals Between separation and celebration: Perspectives on the ethical-political preaching of Desmond Tutu

2015 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 41 ◽  
Author(s):  
Johan Cilliers
Keyword(s):  
South African ◽  
African Society ◽  
South African Society ◽  
The Past ◽  
African Film ◽  
Desmond Tutu

Recognising the complexity of a pluralistic South African society, this article attempts to identify four ethical movements in preaching in the past, as well as the present. These movements are from silence to struggle, from eparation to celebration, from lamenting to longing, and from shaming to playing. In this regard, cognisance is taken in particular of the sermons, speeches, and letters of Archbishop Desmond Tutu. The paper concludes with a discussion of a classic South African film from 1976, entitled <em>e’Lollipop</em>.

Afrikaanse gereformeerde kerke in die sleurgang van die tydgees

2021 ◽  
Vol 6 (3) ◽  
pp. 49-78
Author(s):  
Pieter Kruger
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
South African ◽  
Religious Beliefs ◽  
The Political ◽  
African Society ◽  
Pluralistic Society ◽  
Beliefs And Practices ◽  
South African Society ◽  
The Past ◽  
History Of

During the past nearly 30 years the epochs of democratisation and globalisation became intertwined with the South African society, determining its spirit of the age. The democratisation of South African since 1994 has its own history of radical rather than evolutionary transformative measures which brought about constructive changes to the political and social fibre of a secularised South Africa. In conjunction, globalisation as dominant worldview became evident in the transposition of South Africa into a secular, liberal, capitalistic, pluralistic society. Over this period the Afrikaans-speaking churches of reformed tradition were not immune to these influences, channelled via their members’ experiences of and responses to their changing social and economic setup. These churches have since also changed. Their influence on society and social matters has dwindled. The contexts of their congregations changed. Their traditional collective forms of institutionalised religion are changing due to the influence of a plurality of different personal, religious beliefs and practices. These developments challenge these churches to rethink their denominational identities and consider the way in which they approach society and what they can contribute to the ecumenical church.

The ‘Transformation’ of the South African Military

1996 ◽  
Vol 34 (3) ◽  
pp. 441-457 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gary Kynoch
Keyword(s):  
South African ◽  
Regional Policy ◽  
African Society ◽  
The South ◽  
South African Society ◽  
State Security ◽  
Regional Conflict ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
The Military

SouthernAfrica has been at war since the 1960s. Following the capitulation of Ian Smith's Rhodesian Front and the acceptance of majority rule in Zimbabwe in 1980, the widely acknowledged root of most of the regional conflict has been South Africa. In defendingapartheid, the régime in Pretoria engaged in a systematic campaign of destabilisation designed to bring its neighbours to heel. Military invasions, raids, sabotage, support of dissident groups, and assassinations were all part of the National Party (NP) Government's ‘total strategy’ that employed violence as a key element in its regional policy to achieve economic, military, and political hegemony. P. W. Botha during his tenure as Prime Minister and President, 1978–89, ‘politically modified the role’ of the South African Defence Force (SADF), as explained by Herbert Howe, and ‘created the military-dominated State Security Council, which effectively replaced the Cabinet and became the centre of national decision-making and official power in the 1980s’.1The result was the militarisation of South African society and a swath of destruction across the southern part of the continent.

Remembering in times of misery: can older people in South Africa ‘get through’?

2005 ◽  
Vol 25 (4) ◽  
pp. 525-541 ◽  
Author(s):  
ELS VAN DONGEN
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Older People ◽  
Collective Memory ◽  
South African ◽  
Social History ◽  
Opposite Effect ◽  
African Society ◽  
South African Society ◽  
The Past ◽  
History Of

This paper reports a study of the situations of disadvantaged older people in contemporary South African townships. It draws from their own accounts that were collected through ethnographic research in day centres and care homes. Most of the informants had experienced a succession of serious material, psychological, social and cultural losses. Their lives had been characterised by violence, inequality, disruption and poverty. A dominant theme in their accounts is that they can hardly ‘get through’ their lives. Their thankless, even alienated, situations are not only a function of personal losses but also have much to do with the recent political and social history of South Africa. The colonial and Apartheid eras have by and large been excluded from the country's collective memory, with the result that older people's experiences of those times are not valued as affirmational reminiscence or for shaping a kin group's common identity. Expressed recollections have acquired a different function, of being a means of articulating moral judgements on the present. The result is that memories, rather than bringing the generations together, have the opposite effect and widen the gap in understanding between the older and younger generations. This in turn has serious effects on older people's wellbeing. The silencing of memories reflects the society's radical break with the past, which has made it difficult for younger people to mourn or sympathise with older people's losses. While far from helpless victims, many of the older township residents lack meaningful frames by which to locate themselves in contemporary South African society.

scholarly journals Canine agents in two South African short stories

2018 ◽  
Vol 55 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Mathilda Slabbert
Keyword(s):  
Short Stories ◽  
South African ◽  
African Society ◽  
South African Society ◽  
Human Animal ◽  
Human Emotions ◽  
Animal Agency

This article explores the role of the figure of the dog in two contemporary South African short stories. It considers the metaphorical-cum-allegorical significance of the textual animal in these texts, asking how the writers use dogs as imaginative devices to draw attention to issues of gender, human emotions or psychoses, and the avowal or disavowal of (human and animal) agency. The aim is to engage with the writers’ evident wish both to comment on human-animal relationships and encounters in contemporary South African society, and to emphasise how these become effective, affective means of commenting on the continued inequities of post-apartheid society.

scholarly journals The role of the school in inculcating citizenship values in South Africa: Theoretical and international comparative perspectives

2020 ◽  
Vol 40 (Supplement 2) ◽  
pp. S1-S11
Author(s):  
Charl Wolhuter ◽  
Jan Germen Janmaat ◽  
Johannes (Hannes) L van der Walt ◽  
Ferdinand J Potgieter
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
South African ◽  
African Society ◽  
South African Society ◽  
Unequal Treatment ◽  
Post Conflict ◽  
Role Players ◽  
South African Education ◽  
International Comparative

In view of the serious moral decay in South African society, this article reports on our research regarding the role of the school in the inculcation of citizenship values (as part of the brief of South African education). We regard a set of citizenship values consonant with a democratic dispensation to be a core component of a moral order essential for South Africa. Using a combination of interpretive-constructivist and comparative approaches, we examine and evaluate the experiences of other post-conflict societies in using education to inculcate citizenship values. We conclude that schools can be successful with respect to the inculcation of citizenship values, provided that the curriculum itself does not discriminate against any group or category of people. Desegregation can only be beneficial in the absence of negative depiction (including criminalisation) or the unequal treatment of any particular societal grouping. Our research suggests that active citizenship education is needed in schools. For this reason, we contend that teacher education has to form an integral part of a moral revival project. Lastly, we highlight the importance of finding democratically agreed-upon ways to continually engage with parents, legal caregivers and other stakeholders and role-players before and during the execution of any such project.

scholarly journals The leadership role of emeritus Archbishop Desmond Tutu in the social development of the South African society

2020 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 263-297
Author(s):  
KJ Pali
Keyword(s):  
Social Development ◽  
South African ◽  
Social Issues ◽  
Leadership Role ◽  
African Society ◽  
The South ◽  
South African Society ◽  
The Social ◽  
Desmond Tutu

Leadership of the ministers of the Word is often restricted to within church boundaries, on the pretext that ministers should be religious and not too involved in the “world”. On the other hand, ministers are involved in social issues mostly to address immediate needs, often at the expense of  transforming the unjust system that perpetuates social injustices. Emeritus Archbishop Desmond Tutu practised his leadership ministry within and beyond the church boundaries. In the South African society, his leadership ministry contributed towards social development and transformation. This article aims to analyse the contribution of the leadership role of emeritus Archbishop Desmond Tutu in the social development of the South African society. The main research question is to what extent is or was the leadership of emeritus Archbishop Desmond Tutu involved in the social development of the South African society?

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