4 - Apartheid’s University: Notes on the Renewal of the Enlightenment
Journal of Higher Education in Africa,
Vol. 5 No. 1 (2007): Journal of Higher Education in Africa
Abstract
This paper sets to work on strategies for forging new and critical humanities at the institutional site of the university that appears to be trapped in the legacies of apart- heid. The paper suggests that the university’s responses to apartheid might hold the key for the realignment of its critical commitments in the post-apartheid present. Rather than merely invoking the Enlightenment traditions of the modern university as sufficient grounds for proclaiming a post-apartheid reorientation, I track the career of notions of academic freedom and university autonomy in the outlines of complicity. I show how the concepts of academic freedom and autonomy obscured a prior contract with the state and how that complicity extended a process of sub- jection. By deploying the postcolonial strategy of ab-using the Enlightenment, the paper outlines the failure of opposing apartheid in the name of academic freedom and autonomy. That failure, I argue, resulted in an inability to investigate the relationship be- tween the university and the state and blinded the university to its role in the crea- tion of racial subjects. Rather than merely casting the university in terms of the foundational concepts of academic freedom and university autonomy, I suggest that it might be more productive to consider the epistemological and political potential of a renewed reference to the Enlightenment. Apartheid’s University, cast as conti- nuity of the Enlightenment legacy, might allow us to rewrite its abject script in the direction of resisting the forms of subjection supported by that process of normali- sation.
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- Biko, S., 1987, I Write What I Like, Portsmouth: Heinemann.
- Cape Argus, 1968, ‘Attitude to ‘Sit-in’ Short-Sighted’, August 22.
- De Kiewiet, C.W., 1960, ‘Academic Freedom’, National Conference on Educa- tion: University of Natal.
- Foucault, M., 1984, ‘What is Enlightenment?’ in P. Rabinow, ed., The Foucault Reader, New York: Pantheon Books. pp. 32–50.
- Goosen, G., Hall, M., and White, C., 1989, Rethinking UCT: The Debate over Africanisation and the Position of Women, Cape Town: University of Cape Town, Centre for African Studies.
- Habermas, J., 1989, The New Conservatism: Cultural Criticism and the Histori- ans’ Debate, trans.S. Weber Nicholson, Cambridge, Massachusetts: MIT Press. Higgins, J., 1990, ‘The Scholar-Warrior versus the Children of Mao: Connor Cruise O’Brien in South Africa’, in B. Robbins, ed., Intellectuals: Aesthetics, Politics, Academics, Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. pp. 291–318.
- Hofmeyr, J., 1988, ‘Graduation Address, University of Witwatersrand: 16 March 1946’, in Phyllis Lewson, ed., Voices of Protest, Cape Town: A.D Donker. pp.189–196.
- Jay, M., 1973, The Dialectical Imagination, Toronto: Little Brown.
- Jordan, A.C., n.d., ‘Herrenvolkism and Higher Education’, ACJ, 4/116/7 Box 26, NAHECS Collections, Fort Hare University, South Africa.
- Malherbe, E.G, 1946, ‘Race Attitudes and Education’, Hoernlé Memorial Lecture, South African Institute of Race Relations.
- Mamdani, M., 1996, Citizen and Subject, Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton Uni- versity Press.
- Marx, K., 1994[1856], The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte, New York: International Publishers.
- Mathews, Z.K, 1981, Freedom for My People, Cape Town: David Phillip. Nethersole, Reingard, 2001, ‘The Priceless Interval: Theory in the Global Inter-stice’, Diacritics, Vol. 31, No. 3, pp. 30–56.
- Readings, B., 1996, The University in Ruins, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
- Spivak, G. C., 1995, ‘Academic Freedom’, Pretexts: Studies in Writing and Cul- ture, Vol. 5, Nos. 1–2, pp. 117–156.
- Suid Afrikanse Uitsaai Korporasie, Hoorbeeld oor Universiteits Kollege van Weskaapland, 1969,CHR Archives, University of the Western Cape.
- Taylor, P., 1995, ‘Response to Spivak: Deconstruction is an Academic Philoso- phy’, Pretexts: Studies in Writing and Culture, Vol. 5, Nos. 1–2, pp. 157–168.
- Varsity, 1968, ‘Mafeje Protest Today’, August 7.
- Weber, S., 2001, Institution and Interpretation, California: Stanford University Press.
- Witz, L., 2003, Apartheid’s Festival, Bloomington: Indiana University Press.
References
Biko, S., 1987, I Write What I Like, Portsmouth: Heinemann.
Cape Argus, 1968, ‘Attitude to ‘Sit-in’ Short-Sighted’, August 22.
De Kiewiet, C.W., 1960, ‘Academic Freedom’, National Conference on Educa- tion: University of Natal.
Foucault, M., 1984, ‘What is Enlightenment?’ in P. Rabinow, ed., The Foucault Reader, New York: Pantheon Books. pp. 32–50.
Goosen, G., Hall, M., and White, C., 1989, Rethinking UCT: The Debate over Africanisation and the Position of Women, Cape Town: University of Cape Town, Centre for African Studies.
Habermas, J., 1989, The New Conservatism: Cultural Criticism and the Histori- ans’ Debate, trans.S. Weber Nicholson, Cambridge, Massachusetts: MIT Press. Higgins, J., 1990, ‘The Scholar-Warrior versus the Children of Mao: Connor Cruise O’Brien in South Africa’, in B. Robbins, ed., Intellectuals: Aesthetics, Politics, Academics, Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. pp. 291–318.
Hofmeyr, J., 1988, ‘Graduation Address, University of Witwatersrand: 16 March 1946’, in Phyllis Lewson, ed., Voices of Protest, Cape Town: A.D Donker. pp.189–196.
Jay, M., 1973, The Dialectical Imagination, Toronto: Little Brown.
Jordan, A.C., n.d., ‘Herrenvolkism and Higher Education’, ACJ, 4/116/7 Box 26, NAHECS Collections, Fort Hare University, South Africa.
Malherbe, E.G, 1946, ‘Race Attitudes and Education’, Hoernlé Memorial Lecture, South African Institute of Race Relations.
Mamdani, M., 1996, Citizen and Subject, Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton Uni- versity Press.
Marx, K., 1994[1856], The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte, New York: International Publishers.
Mathews, Z.K, 1981, Freedom for My People, Cape Town: David Phillip. Nethersole, Reingard, 2001, ‘The Priceless Interval: Theory in the Global Inter-stice’, Diacritics, Vol. 31, No. 3, pp. 30–56.
Readings, B., 1996, The University in Ruins, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Spivak, G. C., 1995, ‘Academic Freedom’, Pretexts: Studies in Writing and Cul- ture, Vol. 5, Nos. 1–2, pp. 117–156.
Suid Afrikanse Uitsaai Korporasie, Hoorbeeld oor Universiteits Kollege van Weskaapland, 1969,CHR Archives, University of the Western Cape.
Taylor, P., 1995, ‘Response to Spivak: Deconstruction is an Academic Philoso- phy’, Pretexts: Studies in Writing and Culture, Vol. 5, Nos. 1–2, pp. 157–168.
Varsity, 1968, ‘Mafeje Protest Today’, August 7.
Weber, S., 2001, Institution and Interpretation, California: Stanford University Press.
Witz, L., 2003, Apartheid’s Festival, Bloomington: Indiana University Press.