This article sketches the contested history of Black respectability in South Africa from the early part of the nineteenth century until the post-1994 dispensation. It argues that the assumption by numbers of, in particular, mission converts of the outward trappings of respectable Christian life was a form of resistance to colonial rule which was at least as threate...

Immediately after the emancipation of Cape Town's enslaved population on 1 December 1838, the former enslaved moved en masse out of the houses in which they had previously lived. In this article, we investigate why they did so, where they went and how the exodus reshaped the social geography of the city. We argue that their departure from their former owners' house...

This article analyses a Land Claims case concerning the former commonage of Salem village. The case, which was appealed to the Constitutional Court, was notable for hearing two renowned historians, Martin Legassick and Hermann Giliomee, as expert witnesses for the opposing parties. They gave testimony on the consequences of privatisation in the 1940s. Thereafter, a...