Voices of South Africa

3 credits

The advanced sociology class, Voices from South Africa, will use art (fiction, film, music, memoir) produced by South African authors to study the history and present challenges facing that country. The question which drives this class is: how can we use the art produced in a society as a gateway into knowing more about its social realities. To answer this question, I have 3 principles: (1) inclusivity - we will include work from all the major communities within the mosaic of South Africa: indigenous, descendants of the British and Dutch settler colonies, mixed race, and Indian. Current gender and sexuality issues, heavily reflected in the literature, will also be included. (2) there is a historic timeline built into the curriculum: we will be studying current depictions of the time before Western contact, of the colonial experience, the independence struggle, along with an extensive look at the present situation in which new challenges are informing the work of South African writers; and (3) A comparative perspective is also offered in which students can focus either on comparing South African artists to artists from other African countries, or they can compare Apartheid as it manifested itself in South Africa and other places.