The Mandelas at Harlem’s Africa Square
The Mandelas and Africa's place in African American politics and popular culture.
South Africa
Cape Town’s Inner Ugly
Patricia De Lille, one of South Africa's most popular post-apartheid politicians, claims she tried to redress spatial apartheid in Cape Town, but the legacy of her seven year run as mayor is one of violent forced removals and a refusal to upgrade informal settlements.
Postcolonial theory and the strong arm of identity
The major problem with the term "decolonization" is its status as empty signifier, argues South African psychologist Wahbie Long.
Mandela’s dreams
Media studies scholar Sharon Sliwinski asks whether dreaming can be recast as a vital form of resistance to political violence. A review of her book.
What to do about South Africa’s flailing economy
Any deviation from economic orthodoxy in South Africa is made coterminous with the most extreme cases, like Zimbabwe and Venezuela.
How many immigrants live in South Africa?
The UN and South Africa's Statistics Service are exaggerating immigrant numbers and playing with people's lives in South Africa.
Arundhati Roy in Johannesburg—An essay on essays
In a world of fake news, shallow analysis and torrid pontificating, combining empirical evidence with emotive expression, is what give Roy's essays legs.
Exile, Return, Home?
Many will read Sisonke Msimang's new memoir for its musings on exile and home, but it is also a political telling of the complicated South African transition.
The school hairstyle protest in Soweto
When black students at an elite school in South Africa's capital protested over how teachers treated them over their hair, everyone noticed. It's not the same in township schools.
Nelson Mandela and US imperialism
In his writings and speeches, Nelson Mandela exposed the links between American power, capitalism and racism.
Limping towards irrelevance
How can South Africa's biggest trade union federation, Cosatu, remain relevant in the face of declining membership and a failing formal economy?
Obama, Mandela and the limits of liberalism
American liberals’ continued refusal to engage seriously with the global collapse of the postwar liberal order.
Winnie Mandela and the historians
Historians have surprisingly said little about Winnie Madikizela-Mandela, before or since her April 2018 passing.
The post Trump fortunes of South Africa’s white nationalists
South Africa's white nationalists are finally in the spotlight, thanks to Donald Trump. Nobody likes what they see.
The global ways of white supremacy
White supremacy always relies on an international interdependence as Trump's support for white extremists in South Africa shows.
Xenophobia and party politics in South Africa
All political parties in South Africa try to mobilize voters based on their and voters' xenophobia and they're outdoing each other with an election scheduled for 2019.
What happened on Bird Island
The pain caused by the South African Apartheid government has been widely recorded. But we may not have heard the half of it.
A story of love in the time of the constitution
The relationship of South African former Public Protector Thuli Madonsela with her daughter is a perfect metaphor for the state of the country's politics.
Afri-comics in the afterlife
Lily Saint talks with historian William Worger about the archive of sponsored comics by South Africa's Apartheid government that he is amassing at UCLA.
Marikana and the end of South African exceptionalism
South Africa's problems are no longer specific to the apartheid legacy, but about more global issues of poverty and inequality.