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History of Apartheid Podcast

Early protest under Apartheid 1948-1970

By 28 March 2023November 2nd, 2024No Comments
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About the episode

In this podcast Ciara McCombe speaks to Professor Tom Lodge about early protest under apartheid. Together they discuss two images from the 1950s in order to explore the Defiance Campaign, the Treason Trial, the Freedom Charter, as well as the growing role of Sobukwe, Mandela and the ANC in opposing apartheid.

We are particularly grateful to the Jürgen Schadeberg archive for the use of their images. Prints of Jürgen Schadeberg’s photos can be purchased at www.jurgenschadeberg.com

Podcast length:  66 min 13 sec

Use the Drop-down menu below to view the Questions posed by Ciara McCombe to Professor Tom Lodge in this episode.

Questions and Podcast Timings

00:00 Introduction 

01:49 Why do you think it is important to analyse images when studying apartheid?

3:37 Can you give some background on who the ANC were and their key philosophies before the mid 1950’s?

7:55 Why did the ANC develop strong connections with the communist party? 

9:37 Why do you think Communism was so popular amongst South Africans?

13:43 Why did you choose the image of the Defiance Campaign meeting?

25:12 What else came out of the Defiance Campaign?

32:22 Do you think the audience of the Defiance Campaign were white South Africans or the international community? 

35:06 How important is the freedom charter?

40:02 What was Nelson Mandela’s role in the beginning of the resistance of apartheid?

50:42 Who was Robert Sobukwe and how did he challenge apartheid?

63:39 What happened to the PAC?

”“I can't stress enough how important the press was and the fact that there was, for the first time, a mass media that was directing itself at a black leadership in South Africa. That tended to focus the way that journalists behaved in South Africa.”

Tom Lodge

“End of Round One”, Nelson Mandela and professional featherweight, Jerry Moloi, shadow-sparring at Moloi’s gym in Orlando, September 1957, during the epoch of the Treason Trial.
Photographer: Drum Photographer/ Drum Social Histories / Baileys African History Archive / Africa Media Online

Photographer Jürgen Schadeberg. Courtesy Claudia Schadeberg, Collection: Defiance Campaign South Africa 1952, Jürgen Schadeberg Archives

“Violet Hache at Defiance Campaign” African Trade Union leader, Violet Hache, called on the people at “Freedom Square” in Fordsburg, Johannesburg to defy the ‘unjust laws’ passed by the Apartheid government. 6th April 1952.
Photographer Jürgen Schadeberg. Courtesy Claudia Schadeberg, Jürgen Schadeberg Archives

Biography of Historians

Tom Lodge is Emeritus Professor of Peace and Conflict Studies in the Department of Politics and Public Administration at the University of Limerick. He is the author of several books on African history including Mandela: A Critical Biography (2006) and Sharpeville: An Apartheid Massacre and its Consequences (2011).

Further reading

  1. Saul Dubow, The African National Congress (Sutton Publishing: 2000)
  2. Nomboniso Gasa, ‘Let them build more jails’, in Women in South African History: They Remove Boulders and Cross Rivers  (HSRC Press: 2007)
  3. Tom Lodge, Black Politics in South Africa since 1945 (Longman Higher Education: 1983)
  4. Tom Lodge, Sharpeville: An Apartheid Massacre and Its Consequences (Oxford University Press: 2011)
  5. Tom Lodge, Mandela: a Critical Life (Oxford University Press: 2006)
  6. Naboth Mokgatle, The Autobiography of an Unknown South African (University of California Press: 1971)
  7. Benjamin Pogrund, How Can Man Die Better?: The Life of Robert Sobukwe (Jonathan Ball Publishers: 1997)

General further reading

  1. William Beinart, Twentieth-Century South Africa (Oxford University Press: 2001)
  2. William Beinart and Edward Teversham, ‘South Africa, 1948-1994: From Apartheid State to Rainbow Nation’ in Edexcel AS/A-Level History Textbook, Searching for Rights and Freedoms in the Twentieth-Century (Pearson Education: 2015) 
  3. Steve Biko, I Write What I Like (Harper & Row: 1979)
  4. David Goldblattt, Fifty-one Years (ActarD inc: 2001) 
  5. Connie Field, Have You Heard From Johannesburg (Clarity Films: 2010) Documentary Series 
  6. Peter Hain, Sing the Beloved Country (Pluto Press: 1996)
  7. Nelson Mandela, Long Walk to Freedom (Black Bay Books: 1995)
  8. Thula Simpson, History of South Africa from 1902 to the Present (C. Hurst & Co: 2022)
  9. Leonard Thompson and Lynn Berat, A History of South Africa (Yale University Press: 2014)
  10. Nigel Worden, The Making of Modern South Africa: Conquest, Apartheid, Democracy (Wiley-Blackwell: 2011)
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