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South African Sports History and the Archive
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 25 April 2022
Extract
The history of sport in South Africa is about more than mere games. Within the preface to his study of The Games Ethic and Imperialism, J.A. Mangan expressed the wish that he:
Would not like [the] study of cultural diffusion to be naively and erroneously catalogued under “Games”. It is concerned with much more: with ethnocentricity, hegemony and patronage, with ideals and idealism, with educational values and aspirations, with cultural assimilation and adaptation and, most fascinating of all, with the dissemination throughout the Empire of a hugely influential moralistic ideology.
Arguably, nowhere more than in South Africa have such processes been played out through sport. This makes the country an ideal case study for sports historians. Based on experiences from my Masters and PhD studies, this paper will provide a contemporary perspective of studying South African sports history as well as form part of the discussion at the June 2011 SCOLMA conference, ‘Sport in Africa: History, Politics and the Archive’.
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References
Notes
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