History after apartheid

Abstract

[From introduction] The purpose of my lecture tonight is to consider some possible future trends and issues in the discipline of South African history in the post-apartheid era. Before doing that I need to say something about two influences or traditions that have left a troublesome legacy and require critical examination. I am referring to the two ‘E’s’: empiricism and eurocentrism. Now it is true that both of these have wilted under serious assaults from scholars in the past 25 years. But both remain present in many sorts of texts; both remain embedded in what we might call ‘the everyday commonsense view of the world’ - so that they continue to constitute a problem