Event Title

"Fallism" and the Politics of Being a Student in South Africa, Past and Present

Location

Hart 115

Start Time

12-5-2016 11:25 AM

End Time

12-5-2016 11:40 AM

Description

Over the past year, a student movement that has come to be known as "Fallism" has swept South Africa. Student protests under the banner "Rhodes Must Fall" advocated the removal of a statue of Cecil Rhodes and the "decolonization" of the University of Cape Town and peer institutions. Subsequent protests have demanded that "Fees Must Fall" at universities across the country. The emergence of what student activists now call "Fallism" demonstrates some striking continuities with student protest politics under apartheid: "Fallists" invoke 1960s-1970s Black Consciousness student thinkers like Steve Biko, and aim to make campuses "ungovernable" as protestors did in the 1980s. But Fallists also reject many heroes of their parents' generation, dismissing Nelson Mandela and other African National Congress leaders as "sell-outs." This presentation examines the role that both historically-rooted experiences and selective readings of political history have played in fueling student politics in post-apartheid South Africa.

Comments

Moderator: Heather Pacheco-Guffrey

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May 12th, 11:25 AM May 12th, 11:40 AM

"Fallism" and the Politics of Being a Student in South Africa, Past and Present

Hart 115

Over the past year, a student movement that has come to be known as "Fallism" has swept South Africa. Student protests under the banner "Rhodes Must Fall" advocated the removal of a statue of Cecil Rhodes and the "decolonization" of the University of Cape Town and peer institutions. Subsequent protests have demanded that "Fees Must Fall" at universities across the country. The emergence of what student activists now call "Fallism" demonstrates some striking continuities with student protest politics under apartheid: "Fallists" invoke 1960s-1970s Black Consciousness student thinkers like Steve Biko, and aim to make campuses "ungovernable" as protestors did in the 1980s. But Fallists also reject many heroes of their parents' generation, dismissing Nelson Mandela and other African National Congress leaders as "sell-outs." This presentation examines the role that both historically-rooted experiences and selective readings of political history have played in fueling student politics in post-apartheid South Africa.