Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-dzt6s Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-22T20:01:26.137Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

FORGETTING APARTHEID: HISTORY, CULTURE AND THE BODY OF A NUN

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 July 2016

Leslie J. Bank  and
Benedict Carton
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

In 1952, the African National Congress (ANC) initiated its Defiance Campaign, opposing apartheid laws through organized civil disobedience and African nationalism. On Sunday 9 November, the city of East London became a site of political mobilization when 1,500 Xhosa-speaking ANC sympathizers peacefully protested in Bantu Square, the hub of a township named Duncan Village. Police arrived and fired on the crowd, igniting ‘spontaneous riots’. An Afrikaner salesman and an Irish nun were killed in the ensuing unrest. Rumours circulated that a mob ate the white woman; troop reinforcements then fanned into the township to wage a retaliatory war, shooting and bayoneting their victims. Upwards of 200 Africans may have died but only nine fatalities were recorded. If the revised toll is credible, the bloodshed exceeds that of Sharpeville, the worst one-day massacre in apartheid South Africa. Oral sources explain why the slaughter in Duncan Village is not widely known. Township residents secretly carted the dead to rural graves, fearing to report their losses as people mourned the tragic slaying of the nun named Sister Aidan. Today, ANC rulers of East London seem content to silence the memory of a mass killing reputedly spawned by chaos and cannibalism. At the centre of this incident is Sr Aidan's mutilation for the purpose of making muthi, a shocking incident that dominates the story of violence on Black Sunday. Using archival documents and oral histories, and incorporating the methodologies of Jennifer Cole, Donald Donham and Veena Das, this article reconstructs a narrative of ‘critical events’ surrounding the nun's muthi murder. The scrutinized witness testimonies relay how township residents framed their fierce encounters with a symbolic (white person) and ubiquitous (militarized police) enemy. Oral sources reject the notion that an aimless ‘riot’ occurred on 9 November. Instead, they reflect on cultural enactments of purposeful violence through scripted assaults and muthi ritual. Ultimately, they view the fatal attack on Sr Aidan as an evolving customary act of defensive retribution and symbolic warning, submerging truths in apartheid and hindering reconciliations in democracy.

Résumé

En 1952, l'ANC (African National Congress) lançait sa campagne de défiance (Defiance Campaign) contre les lois d'apartheid à travers un mouvement de désobéissance civile organisée et de nationalisme africain. Le dimanche 9 novembre, la ville d'East London devint un lieu de mobilisation politique lorsque 1 500 sympathisants de l'ANC, de langue xhosa, organisèrent une manifestation pacifique à Bantu Square, au cœur de la township Duncan Village. Arrivée sur les lieux, la police a tiré sur la foule, déclenchant des « émeutes spontanées ». Un vendeur afrikaner et une religieuse irlandaise furent tués lors des troubles qui suivirent. Des rumeurs ont alors circulé selon lesquelles la femme blanche avait été mangée par des émeutiers ; des renforts de troupes déployés sur toute la township se livrèrent à des opérations de représailles, faisant des victimes à coup de fusil et de baïonnette. Jusqu'à 200 Africains ont pu avoir péri, mais seuls neuf décès furent officiellement enregistrés. Si l'on s'en tient au bilan révisé, ce massacre excède celui de Sharpeville, le pire qu'ait connu en une journée l'Afrique du Sud sous l'apartheid. Des sources orales expliquent pourquoi le carnage de Duncan Village n'est pas bien connu. Les résidents de cette township ont enterré les morts dans le secret à l'extérieur de la ville, craignant de déclarer leurs défunts alors que l'on pleurait la mort de Sœur Aidan, la religieuse tragiquement assassinée. Aujourd'hui, les membres de l'ANC qui dirigent East London semblent se contenter de garder le silence sur la mémoire d'un massacre que l'on dit engendré par le chaos et le cannibalisme. Cet incident a pour élément central la mutilation de Sœur Aidan aux fins de pratiquer le muthi, un incident choquant qui domine l'histoire de la violence du Black Sunday. Cet article, en se servant de documents d'archives et d'histoires orales, et en intégrant les méthodologies de Jennifer Cole, Donald Donham et Veena Das, reconstruit un récit d'« événements critiques » qui ont entouré le meurtre muthi de la religieuse. L'examen minutieux des témoignages révèle comment les résidents de la township expriment leurs ardents démêlés avec un ennemi symbolique (personne blanche) et omniprésent (police armée). Des sources orales rejettent la notion d'une « émeute » sans but ce 9 novembre. Elles songent au contraire à des expressions culturelles d'une violence intentionnelle à travers des attaques scénarisées et le rituel du muthi. En définitive, elles considèrent l'attaque mortelle contre Sœur Aidan comme un acte coutumier évolutif de châtiment défensif et d'avertissement symbolique, immergeant la vérité dans les profondeurs de l'apartheid et entravant la réconciliation en démocratie.

Type
Writing and Forgetting History
Information
Africa , Volume 86 , Issue 3 , August 2016 , pp. 472 - 503
Copyright
Copyright © International African Institute 2016 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Anderson, D. (2005) Histories of the Hanged: the dirty war in Kenya and the end of empire. New York NY: W. W. Norton.Google Scholar
Ashforth, A. (2002) ‘Epidemic of witchcraft? The implications of AIDS for the post-apartheid state’, African Studies 61 (1): 121–43.Google Scholar
Bank, L. (2011) Home Spaces, Street Styles: contesting power and identity in a South African city. Cambridge: Polity.Google Scholar
Bank, L. and Bank, A. (2013) ‘Untangling the lion's tale: violent masculinity and the ethics of biography in the “curious” case of the apartheid-era policeman Donald Card’, Journal of Southern African Studies 39 (10): 7–30.Google Scholar
Beinart, W. (1992) ‘Political and collective violence in South African historiography’, Journal of Southern African Studies 18 (3): 455–86.Google Scholar
Beinart, W. and Bundy, C. (1987) Hidden Struggles in Rural South Africa: politics and popular movements in the Transkei and Eastern Cape, 1890–1930. Johannesburg: Ravan Press.Google Scholar
Bernault, F. (2006) ‘Body, power and sacrifice in Equatorial Africa’, Journal of African History 47 (3): 207–39.Google Scholar
Blok, A. (2000) Honour and Violence. Cambridge: Polity.Google Scholar
Bonner, P. and Ndima, V. (2008) ‘The roots of violence and martial Zuluness on the East Rand’ in B. Carton, J. Laband and J. Sithole (eds) Zulu Identities: being Zulu, past and present. New York NY: Columbia University Press.Google Scholar
Bourgeois, P. (2004) ‘US inner-city apartheid: the contours of structural and interpersonal violence’ in Scheper-Hughes, N. and Bourgeois, P. (eds) Violence in War and Peace: an anthology. Oxford: Blackwell.Google Scholar
Bozzoli, B. (2004) Theatres of Struggle and the End of Apartheid. Athens OH: Ohio University Press.Google Scholar
Bradford, H. (1988) A Taste of Freedom: the ICU in rural South Africa, 1924–1930. Johannesburg: Ravan Press.Google Scholar
Breier, M. (2015) ‘The death that dare(d) not speak its names: the killing of Sister Aidan Quinlan in the East London riots of 1952’, Journal of Southern African Studies 41 (6): 1151–65.Google Scholar
Burgess, T. and Burton, A. (2010) ‘Introduction’ in Burton, A. and Charton Bigot, H. (eds) Generations Past: youth in East African history. Athens OH: Ohio University Press.Google Scholar
Carton, B. (2000) Blood from Your Children: the colonial origins of generational conflict in South Africa. Charlottesville VA: University of Virginia Press.Google Scholar
Carton, B. and Morrell, R. (2014) ‘Competitive combat, warrior bodies, and Zulu sport: the gender relations of stick fighting in South Africa, 1800–1930’ in Nauright, J., Cobley, A. and Wiggins, D. (eds) Beyond C. L. R. James: shifting boundaries of race and ethnicity in sport. Fayetteville AR: University of Arkansas Press.Google Scholar
Cole, J. (2001) Forget Colonialism? Sacrifice and the art of memory in Madagascar. Berkeley CA: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Crais, C. (2003) ‘Chiefs and bureaucrats in the making of empire: a drama from the Transkei, South Africa, October 1880’, American Historical Review 108 (4): 1034–56.Google Scholar
Das, V. (1995) Critical Events: an anthropological perspective on contemporary India. Delhi: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Das, V. and Nandy, A. (1986) ‘Violence, victimhood and the language of silence’ in Das, V. (ed.) The Word and the World: fantasy, symbol and record. Delhi: Sage Publications.Google Scholar
Delius, P. (1996) A Lion Amongst Cattle: reconstruction and resistance in the Northern Transvaal. Portsmouth NH: Heinemann.Google Scholar
Denis, P. (2008) ‘Introduction’ in Denis, P. and Ntsimane, R. (eds) Oral History in a Wounded Country: interactive interviewing in South Africa. Pietermaritzburg: University of KwaZulu-Natal Press.Google Scholar
Donham, D. (2006) ‘Staring at suffering: violence as a subject’ in Bay, E. and Donham, D. (eds) States of Violence: politics, youth, and memory in contemporary Africa. Charlottesville VA: University of Virginia Press.Google Scholar
Dubb, A. (1976) Community of the Saved: an African Revivalist church in the East Cape. Johannesburg: Witwatersrand University Press.Google Scholar
Edgar, R. and Msumza, L. (eds) (1996) Freedom in our Lifetime: the collected writings of Anton Muziwakhe Lembede. Athens OH: Ohio University Press.Google Scholar
Fontein, J. (2011) ‘Graves, ruins and belonging: towards an anthropology of proximity’, Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute 17 (4): 706–27.Google Scholar
Gerhart, G. (1978) Black Power in South Africa: the evolution of an ideology. Berkeley CA: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Geschiere, P. (2006) ‘Witchcraft and the limits of the law: Cameroon and South Africa’ in Comaroff, J. and Comaroff, J. L. (eds) Law and Disorder in the Postcolony. Chicago IL: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Glassman, J. (2011) War of Words, War of Stones: racial thought and violence in colonial Zanzibar. Bloomington IN: Indiana University Press.Google Scholar
Hofmeyr, I. (1994) ‘We Spend Our Years as a Tale That is Told’: oral historical narrative in a South African chiefdom. Portsmouth NH: Heinemann.Google Scholar
Kanogo, T. (1987) Squatters and the Roots of Mau Mau. Athens OH: Ohio University Press.Google Scholar
Kathrada, A. (2004) No Bread for Mandela: memoirs of Ahmed Kathrada, prisoner no. 468/64. Lexington KY: University of Kentucky Press.Google Scholar
Kuper, L. (1957) Passive Resistance in South Africa. New Haven CT: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Kuper, L. (1965) An African Bourgeoisie: race, class, and politics in South Africa. New Haven CT: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Lodge, T. (1983) Black Politics in South Africa since 1945. New York NY: Longman.Google Scholar
Mager, A. (1998) ‘Youth organisations and the construction of masculine identities in the Ciskei and Transkei, 1945–1960’, Journal of Southern African Studies 24 (4): 653–67.Google Scholar
Mager, A. and Minkley, G. (1993) ‘Reaping the whirlwind: the East London riots of 1952’ in Bonner, P., Delius, P. and Posel, D. (eds) Apartheid's Genesis, 1935–1962. Johannesburg: Witwatersrand University Press.Google Scholar
Maloba, W. (1998) Mau Mau and Kenya: an analysis of a peasant revolt. Bloomington IN: Indiana University Press.Google Scholar
Marks, S. (1970) Reluctant Rebellion: the 1906–8 disturbances in Natal. Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
Mayer, P. and Mayer, I. (1971) Townsmen or Tribesmen. London: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
McFall, J. (1963) Trust Betrayed: the murder of Sister Mary Aidan. Pretoria: Nasionale Boekhandel.Google Scholar
Mchunu, M. (2015) ‘The continuation of ritual killing: the use of muthi and war doctoring in Zululand’. Unpublished conference paper, University of Cape Town.Google Scholar
Mda, Z. (2016) Little Suns. Johannesburg: Umuzi and Penguin Random House South Africa.Google Scholar
Murray, C. and Sanders, P. (2005) Medicine Murder in Colonial Lesotho: the anatomy of a moral crisis. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.Google Scholar
Ndebele, N. (2013) ‘Love and politics: Sister Quinlan and the future we have desired’ <http://archive-za.com/za/n/njabulondebele.co.za/2013-08-11_2601848_2/Publications_and_Speeches_ndash_Njabulo_S_Ndebele/>, accessed 21 April 2015.,+accessed+21+April+2015.>Google Scholar
Niehaus, I. (2001) ‘Witchcraft in the new South Africa: from colonial superstition to postcolonial reality’ in Moore, H. and Sanders, T. (eds) Magical Interpretations, Material Realities: modernity, the occult and witchcraft in postcolonial Africa. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Niehaus, I. (2013) Witchcraft and a Life in the New South Africa. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Niehaus, I. with Eliazaar Mohlala, E. and Shokane, K. (2001) Witchcraft, Power and Politics: exploring the occult in the South African Lowveld. London: Pluto Press.Google Scholar
Peires, J. (1981) The House of Phalo: a history of the Xhosa people in the days of their independence. Berkeley CA: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Peires, J. (1989) The Dead Will Arise: Nongqawuse and the Great Xhosa Cattle-killing Movement of 1856–57. Johannesburg: Ravan Press.Google Scholar
Portelli, A. (1991) The Death of Luigi Trastulli and Other Stories: form and meaning in oral history. Albany NY: State University of New York Press.Google Scholar
Portelli, A. (1997) The Battle of Valle Giulia: oral history and the art of dialogue. Madison WI: University of Wisconsin Press.Google Scholar
Portelli, A. (2003) The Order Has Been Carried Out: history, memory, and meaning of a Nazi massacre in Rome. New York NY: Macmillan.Google Scholar
Ranger, T. (2006) ‘Scotland Yard in the Bush: medicine murders, child witches, and the construction of the occult: a literature review’, Africa 77 (2): 272–83.Google Scholar
Reader, D. (1961) The Black Man's Portion: history, demography and living conditions of East London. Cape Town: Oxford University Press for the Institute of Social and Economic Research, Rhodes University.Google Scholar
Redding, S. (1996) ‘Government witchcraft: taxation, the supernatural, and the Mpondo Revolt in the Transkei, South Africa, 1955–1963’, African Affairs 95 (381): 555–79.Google Scholar
Republic of South Africa (1998) Report of the Select Committee on Social Services on Traditional Healers, 4 August 1998, No. 144. Cape Town: Parliament of the Republic of South Africa.Google Scholar
Reynolds, P. (2000) ‘The ground of all making: state violence, the family and political activists’ in Das, V., Kleinman, A., Ramphele, M. and Reynolds, P. (eds) Violence and Subjectivity. Berkeley CA: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Rich, P. (1984) White Power and the Liberal Conscience: racial segregation and South African liberalism, 1921–60. Manchester: Manchester University Press.Google Scholar
Scheper-Hughes, N. (2004) ‘Who's the killer? Popular justice and human rights in a South African squatter camp’ in Scheper-Hughes, N. and Bourgeois, P. (eds) Violence in War and Peace: an anthology. Oxford: Blackwell.Google Scholar
Stuart, J. (1913) A History of the Zulu Rebellion 1906 and of Dinuzulu's Arrest, Trial and Expatriation. London: Macmillan.Google Scholar
Switzer, L. (1993) Power & Resistance in an African Society: the Ciskei Xhosa and the making of South Africa. Madison WI: University of Wisconsin Press.Google Scholar
Ter Haar, G. and Ellis, S. (2009) ‘The occult does not exist: a response to Terence Ranger’, Africa 79 (3): 399–412.Google Scholar
Thomas, C. (2007) Tangling the Lion's Tale: Donald Card, from apartheid era cop to crusader for justice. East London: Donald Card (self-published).Google Scholar
Turok, B. (1969) ‘They died singing’, Sechaba 3 (9): 11.Google Scholar
Vansina, J. (1985) Oral Tradition as History. London: James Currey.Google Scholar
Webb, C.de, B. and Wright, J. (eds) (1982) The James Stuart Archive of Recorded Oral Evidence Relating to the History of the Zulu and Neighbouring Peoples. Volume 3. Pietermaritzburg: University of Natal Press.Google Scholar
Witz, L. (2003) Apartheid's Festival: contesting South Africa's national pasts. Bloomington IN: Indiana University Press.Google Scholar
Xaba, T. (2007) ‘Marginalized medical practice: the marginalization and transformation of indigenous medicines in South Africa’ in de Sousa Santos, B. (ed.) Another Knowledge is Possible: beyond northern epistemologies. London: Verso.Google Scholar