Writing white on black : modernism as discursive paradigm in South African writing on modern Black art

[摘要] In this thesis I deconstruct key concepts, terminologies, and rhetorical conventions employed in white SouthAfrican writing on modern black art. I trace the genealogy of the dominant discursive practices of theapartheid era to the cultural discourses of the colonial era, which in turn had their origins in theEnlightenment. This genealogical tracing aims to demonstrate that South African art writing of the 20thcentury partook of a tradition of Western writing that was primarily intent upon producing the Westernsubject as a rational Enlightenment agent via the debased objectification of the colonial Other. In theprocess of the deconstruction, I identify the most significant discursive shifts that occurred from the 1930's,when the first publications emerged, to the 1990's, when South Africa's new political dispensation openedup a different cultural landscape.

[发布机构] Stellenbosch University