THAT’S HISTORY? Thirty Years After the End of Apartheid

In May 2024, South Africa and the world will mark 30 years since the formal end of apartheid. To commemorate this milestone, a group of South Africanist scholars will gather in Princeton to examine developments in South African history and historiography over the past three decades. Among the questions to be considered are: What effect has the formal end of apartheid had on South African history and its historiography? What difference, if any, has the advent of a nonracial democracy in South Africa made to the demographic composition of who studies and teaches South African history? What new directions, what new archives, what new questions and what new methods have those studying South African history taken in the past thirty years? What of the liberal-radical controversies of old, and of the exceptionalism that has bedeviled studies of South Africa? And, more importantly, what future for the study of the South African past?

Organized by: Professor Jacob S.T. Dlamini (Princeton University), Dr. Laura Phillips (North West University), and the Center for Collaborative History (Princeton University).

Sponsored by: African Humanities Colloquium | Center for Collaborative History | Humanities Council | University Center for Human Values