In an effort for my blog to be better understood, I think it is important to explain a little about apartheid in South Africa. Some may already be well versed regarding the topic and may likely be better educated than me, in which case please feel free to skip the brief history lesson. I hope that the following does not come off as a reductionist look at the rich history of the country, as I intend to merely put some of what I have been privileged to experience in context.
Apartheid was a government implemented system of racial segregation that took place in South Africa between the 1940s until 1994. Racial segregation took place before the 1940s, but was adopted as official policy following the election of 1948 during which the National Party came into control. Under apartheid, racial divisions became further institutionalized.
Four distinct racial groups were created: White, Black/African, Coloured and Indian. For Americans, the term ‘coloured’ sounds both old-fashioned and racist, but in South Africa it is still used and in my interactions I have found that most people classified as Coloured still openly refer to themselves as Coloured. For this reason and the purpose of explanation, I will use this term as well as the other racial classifications, although somewhat warily. It is difficult for Americans to grasp the difference between Black and the term Coloured, a classification given to people of mixed descent. Given the long lines of ancestry all humans have, it seems that most people have a ‘mixed’ descent of some sort, but that is another topic.
The Group Areas Act (consisting of three parliamentary acts put in place during the 1950s and 1960s) assigned racial groups to different residential and business areas in South Africa, restricting the best land for Whites. Non-Whites on these pieces of land were forcibly removed from their homes and moved to areas that fit the racial classification they were given by the apartheid government. Voting rights were denied to non-Whites during the apartheid era (with variation throughout, including voting rights for Coloureds and Indians before the first truly free election in 1994). Acts during this time period made mixed marriages illegal, the education system cripplingly unequal, and issued forms of identification that limited where non-Whites could travel. The government used wide-sweeping legislation including the Suppression of Communism and Terrorism Acts to imprison individuals involved in resistance movements.
A string of factors including protest and intense internal resistance, international pressure, and a floundering economy, led to negotiations, which concluded with elections in 1994 in which all races could vote. The African National Congress (the ANC, still in power in most of South Africa today) led by Nelson Mandela, came out victorious. It is impossible to view South Africa as I am experiencing it today outside of the context of its recent apartheid past. The election in 1994 and the new constitution, often regarded as the most liberal constitution in the world, has not fixed all or even most issues of inequality and the country faces an array of challenges today, some of which are considered directly rooted in apartheid.
I will write more soon on my experience in a homestay over the weekend in a place called Ocean View, a place that can be much easier understood with some of this background knowledge.
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