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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 22 April 2010
In the last decade and a half, the historiography - though not the society - of South Africa has been transformed. In 1970, there was not the same vitality that then characterised much of the historical work north of the Zambesi. In 1984, Southern African historical studies are by far the most lively anywhere in the continent. Indeed, even if with their typical parochialism those who survey modern trends in historiography have not noticed it, many facets of the so-called “new” social history are peculiarly well represented in the South African literature. The spectacularly fast urbanisation of South Africa since the mineral revolution at the end of the last century and the concomittant intensification of capitalist agriculture have naturally provided subjects enough, and they have been worked out with an exemplary attention to detail and texture. Perhaps the driving force behind this work has been a concentration on the ways in which Africans, both in town and in the countryside, were able to make and remake their worlds, in conflict with and in the interstices provided by the racist white society and government.
1. This material can best be found in the various issues of the Journal of Southern African Studies. See also, in particular, van Onselen, Charles, Studies in the Social and Economic History of the Witwatersrand, I, New Babylon, II, New Nineveh, 2 vols (London, 1982)Google ScholarMarks, Shula and Atmore, Antony (eds), Economy and Society in Pre-In-dustrial South Africa, (London, 1982Google ScholarMarks, Shula and Rathbone, Richard (eds), Industrialisation and Social Change in South Africa: African class formation, culture and consciousness, 1870 - 1930, (London, 1982)Google ScholarElphick, Richard and Gilidmee, Hermann (eds), The shaping of South African Society, 1652 - 1820, (London, 1979)Google ScholarRoss, Robert, Cape of Torments: Slavery and Resistance in South Africa, (London, 1983)Google ScholarBonnter, Philip, Kings, Commoners and Concessionaires: The Evolution and Dissolution of the Nineteenth Century Swazi State, (Cambridge, 1982)Google ScholarBeinart, William, The Political Economy of Pbndoland, (Cambridge, 1982)Google ScholarGuy, Jeff, The Destruction of the Zulu Kingdom: The Civil War in Zululand, 1879 - 1884, (London 1979)Google ScholarPeires, Jeff, The House of Phalo: A History of the Xhosa people in the days of their independence, (Johannesburg, 1982)Google ScholarDelius, Peter, The Land belongs to Us: The Pedi Polity, the Boers and the British in the Nineteenth Century Transvaal, (Johannesburg, 1983).Google Scholar The future volume of essays by William Beinart and Colin Bundy on politics in the Transkei will be a considerable contribution to this literature.
2. According to report, there were 300 Black trade unionists present for the open day of the History Workshop conference held recently at the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg.
3. The most important of these is based in the University of the Witwatersrand. For the first fruits, see Ted Matsetela, “The life story of Nkgono Mma-Pooe.aspects of sharecropping and proletarianisation in the northern Orange Free State, 1890 1930", in Marks and Rathbone (eds), Industrialisation and Social Change, which begins “Nkgono Mma-Pooe, Emelia Mahlodi Pooe, is a relative of. mine."
4. This is unfortunately not always the case with the privately held archives. See the complaints of Charles van Onselen against the archives of the Chamber of Mines and Barlow-Rand, in the Introduction to Studies in the Social and Economic History of the Witwatersrand.