University of South Africa library : from the Soweto rebellion to the beginning of the end of apartheid, 1976-1990
Loading...
Authors
Suttie, Mary-Lynn
Issue Date
2006
Type
Article
Language
en
Keywords
Academic libraries , Apartheid , Higher education , Library history , University of South Africa (Unisa)
Alternative Title
Abstract
This article explores the history of the University of South Africa
(Unisa) library from 1976 to 1990. It situates the growth of information
services in distance education in South Africa within the context of
political protest associated with the Soweto uprising of the mid 1970s
and the states of emergency of the mid 1980s. It traces the vicissitudes of
the library as it charted a course through educational instability, rising
student expectations, the declining value of the South African currency,
and increased bureaucratisation and computerisation to offer an efficient
and comprehensive service to a wider, more racially mixed, constitutency
than the apartheid government ever anticipated. This naturally
earned Unisa considerable state approval because it could be paraded as
a national, 'non-racial' university at a time when apartheid aroused
universal opprobrium. An attempt is also made in the article to reassert
the importance of library history as a credible field of research through a
case study of South Africa's largest academic library. Its alleged political
complicity and ambivalent reputation are examined on the basis of
archival and published sources and assessed against the critical debates
of the apartheid state which permeated historical, educational and
information discourses from the 1970s to the unbanning of the liberation
movements in 1990.
Description
Citation
Suttie, M-L, 2006, 'University of South Africa library : from the Soweto rebellion to the beginning of the end of apartheid, 1976-1990 2006', Mousaion Journal, vol. 24, no. 2, pp. 283-312
Publisher
Unisa Press
License
Journal
Volume
Issue
PubMed ID
DOI
ISSN
0027-2639