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Books > Promotion > Women's Month > Social & Politics
A dozen years in the making, The Inheritors weaves together the stories of three ordinary South Africans over five tumultuous decades in a sweeping and exquisite look at what really happens when a country resolves to end white supremacy. Dipuo grew up on the south side of a mine dump that segregated Johannesburg’s black townships from the white-only city. Some nights, she hiked to the top. To a South African teenager in the 1980s—even an anti-apartheid activist like Dipuo—the divide that separated her from the glittering lights on the other side appeared eternal. But in 1994, the world’s last explicit racial segregationist regime collapsed to make way for something unprecedented. With penetrating psychological insight, intimate reporting, and bewitching prose, The Inheritors tells the story of a country in the throes of a great reckoning. Through the lives of Dipuo, her daughter Malaika, and Christo—one of the last white South Africans drafted to fight for the apartheid regime—award-winning journalist Eve Fairbanks probes what happens when people once locked into certain kinds of power relations find their status shifting. Observing subtle truths about race and power that extend well beyond national borders, she explores questions that preoccupy so many of us today: How can we let go of our pasts, as individuals and as countries? How should historical debts be paid? And how can a person live an honorable life in a society that—for better or worse—they no longer recognize?
Twenty-five years have passed since South Africans were being shot, hacked or burned to death in political conflict. The memory of the trauma has faded where some 20 500 people were killed between 1984 and 1994. Conventional wisdom claims that they died at the hands of a state-backed Third Force. The more accurate explanation is that they died as a result of the people’s war the ANC unleashed. After the people’s war began in September 1984, intimidation and political killings rapidly accelerated. At the same time, a remarkably effective propaganda campaign put the blame for violence on the National Party government and its alleged Inkatha surrogate. Sympathy for the ANC soared, while its rivals suffered crippling losses in credibility and support. By 1993 the ANC was able to dominate the negotiating process, as well as to control the militarily undefeated police and army and bend them to its will. By May 1994 it had trounced its rivals and taken over government. Many books have been written on South Africa's political transition, but none deals adequately with the people's war. This book does. It shows the extraordinary success of the people’s war in giving the ANC a virtual monopoly on power, as well as the great cost at which this was done. Apart from the terror and killings it sparked, the people’s war set in motion forces that cannot easily be tamed. Contemporary South Africa and the problems it confronts cannot be fully understood without a knowledge of the scars and damaging legacy of the people’s war. For this new edition of her seminal work, Anthea Jeffery has revised and abridged her book. She has also included a brief overview of the ANC’s National Democratic Revolution, for which the people’s war was intended to prepare the way. Since 1994, the NDR has incrementally been implemented in many different spheres. It is also now being speeded up in its current and more ‘radical’ phase.
Maggie is a remarkable firsthand account of a teenage girl’s experiences during the AngloBoer War. Margaretha (Maggie) Jooste was only 13 years old when the AngloBoer War broke out and her life was irrevocably changed. After months of house arrest in their Heidelberg (Transvaal) home, she, her mother and younger siblings were sent away to concentration camps in Natal. There they experienced hunger, deprivation and loss, but also surprising acts of kindness from British guards. This very personal account is a story of hardships, but also one of humanity and friendships over enemy lines. A golden threat is the close bond between the Jooste family and the Englishspeaking Russells who lived as neighbours and friends before the war broke out. While the British soldiers and Boer commandos fought the war, the Russells secretly provided food to the Joostes to help them survive, and supported them after the war. A poignant and deeply moving, but also heartbreaking, true story.
With corruption and fraud endemic in democratic South Africa, whistleblowers have provided an invaluable service to society through disclosures about coverups, malfeasance and wrongdoing. Their courageous acts have resulted in the recovery of millions of rands to the fiscus and to their fellow citizens as well as in improved transparency and accountability. But in most cases, the outcomes for the whistleblowers themselves are devastating. Some have been gunned down in orchestrated assassinations, others have been threatened and targeted in sinister dirty-tricks campaigns. Many are hounded out of their jobs, ostracised and victimised. They are pushed to the fringes of society. These are the evocative accounts of South Africa’s whistleblowers, told in their own voices, from across the country. The Whistleblowers also advocates for a change in legislation, organisational support and social attitudes in order to embolden others to have the courage to step up
MaZwane has become a legend in South Africa as a pioneering entrepreneur – and an inspiration for those who ask questions about opportunities in the informal township economy. Her answer to those who doubt whether they can make it, is that you do it through perseverance, sacrifice, seizing opportunities, and offering superior products and service. In 1989 Phumlaphi (‘Rita’) Zwane left KwaZulu-Natal to find work in Johannesburg after becoming a teenage mother. She could count on the love of her family, a matric certificate and her faith, but had no job prospects, and no knowledge of the business world or life in the big cities. Her memoir takes the reader from the tough times of finding her feet in Johannesburg, through a variety of jobs and life experiences, to finally fighting her way to success as a respected member of the township economy and starting the successful Imbizo Shisanyama business. MaZwane tells how she progressed from having virtually no income or permanent home to becoming the first person to formalise and commercialise shisanyama in the townships – and provide a comfortable home and legacy for her children. Along the way, she befriended many people who contributed accommodation, job opportunities, advice, and companionship. With them cheering her on, she learned how to navigate the different and difficult aspects of the hospitality industry – and slowly reach her desired place of independent security. Conquering the Poverty of the Mind shows the true grit of a Zulu girl who believed in herself – and did it against all odds.
As a follow up to the bestselling Killing Kebble: An Underworld Exposed (2010), Ministry of Crime: An Underworld Explored examines how organised crime, gangsters and powerful political figures have been able to capture the law enforcement authorities and agencies. These various organisations have been eviscerated, hollowed out and left ineffective. They have been infiltrated and compromised and, as a result, prominent underworld figures have been able to flourish in South Africa, setting up elaborate networks of crime with the assistance of many cops. The criminal justice system has been left exposed and it is crucial that the South African public knows about the capture that has occurred on different levels.
In December 2010 while in Port Elizabeth, Andy Kawa was abducted, attacked and raped for 15 hours at Kings Beach. Her attackers were never caught. She successfully sued the police for failing to properly investigate her attack. In November 2018, Port Elizabeth Judge Sarah Sephton found police officers were 'grossly negligent' in the performance of their duties with regards to her case both in the search and investigation. This is Andy's story.
Anne Biccard has worked as an emergency doctor in Johannesburg for more than 30 years. It is a job that is both terrifying and thrilling, where death can be outwitted by skill and quick thinking, and the pressure eased by dark humour. The coronavirus, however, has added another dimension of fear. In this heartwarming and at times hilarious memoir she recounts some of the cases that have burst in through her doors, such as the woman who mistook her Dettol for beer and the man who tried to run down his cardiologist. There is sadness, too, as she remembers the patients who didn't make it. Above all, she writes of the camaraderie and dogged determination of health workers holding fast in the face of the Covid-19 nightmare as they battle, every day, to save a stranger's life.
They Called Me Queer is a collection written by Africans who self-identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, intersex and asexual (LGBTQIA+). Across the continent, and throughout the world, South Africa has become known for its tolerance towards us, the LGBTQIA+ community. However, even if being who we are is legal, we live in a devastatingly segregated and unequal society, where the combination of race, class, gender and sexual identities still heavily impacts every part of our lives. This collection of stories is a testimony to who we are. It is an assertion of our struggles, but also our triumphs, our joys. These are our stories of acceptance and rejection, of young love and old lovers, of the agonising thrills of coming out and coming into ourselves, of our sex lives, of our families and communities. Writing by Haji Mohamed Dawjee, Lwando Scott, Ling Sheperd, Maneo Mohale, Chase Rhys, Wanelisa Xaba, Jamil F Khan, Khanya Kemami, Janine Adams, Craig Lucas and others.
“There was no definite decision on the length of the [hunger] strike – it was to go on until their demands for release were met, or until collapse. They became slow and flagging and they didn’t talk much.” Previously banned and unavailable in South Africa, Helen Joseph writes a moving personal account of enduring the Treason Trial - one of the longest and most important trials in South African history. She shares stories of the Pony Post -the trialists' own postal service and language, the treatment of prisoners, and the ‘real heroes’ of the Trial: the wives of the accused. She writes honestly and details the trialists' perseverance, struggles, compassion and commitment to fighting oppression for all South Africans. This edition is a vital addition to curating our South African history and to our ever-growing Pocket Series.
"I wrote this book because I believe the road to financial freedom is a journey everyone can embark on. I wrote this book with you in mind. You, who perhaps have never been taught anything about how money works. You, who have been too intimidated to pick up and read a book about personal finance because you were too scared of the jargon. You, who want to #getyourmoneyright. I had you in mind when I wrote this book." – Mapalo Makhu If you are a millennial who is trying to figure out how money works, this book is for you. With simple, relatable and sometimes amusing stories about how to manage money on a day-to-day basis, you will learn how to change your mindset about money, get out of debt and stay debt-free, invest your money and, ultimately, live your best life. You’re Not Broke, You’re Pre-Rich will help you, the young professional, to think differently about money, while covering pertinent topics like black tax, savings, budgeting, emergency funds and financial scams, as well as estate and retirement planning (and why you should care right now!). It is the best class you never attended… in a book!
In her much anticipated memoir, Sisonke Msimang writes about her exile childhood in Zambia and Kenya, young adulthood and college years in North America, and returning to South Africa in the euphoric 1990s. She reflects candidly on her discontent and disappointment with present-day South Africa but also on her experiences of family, romance, and motherhood, with the novelist’s talent for character and pathos. Militant young comrades dance off the pages of the 1970s Lusaka she invokes, and the heady and naive days of just-democratic South Africa in the 1990s are as vividly painted. Her memoir is at heart a chronicle of a coming-of-age, and while well-known South African political figures appear in these pages, it is an intimate story, a testament to family bonds and sisterhood. Sisonke Msimang is one of the most assured and celebrated voices commenting on the South African present – often humorously; sometimes deeply movingly – and this book launches her to an even broader audience. |
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