This research is concerned with the notion of being human. It acknowledges the dislocation of black people through themselves, a process which was exacerbated during, the colonial era and further through apartheid. The interest in this research is due to the historical dehumanisation of black people through dispossession and subjection to foreign rule and culture, by white people. The historical accounts of dehumanisation and disparity, through either pigmentation, poverty or an inferiority complex, led to black people viewing their humanity in terms of materialism and individualism in the present context. This research explores how materialism and individualism have affected black people's understanding of themselves and self-determinism. It is argued in the United States through Black Theology, the notion of the Black Church in the South African context and through Black Consciousness that the humanity of black people is affirmed historically and to date. / Philosophy and Systematic Theology / M.Th. (Systematic Theology)

This study focuses on Steve Biko’s Africana existential phenomenology, with particular emphasis on the themes of blackness, black solidarity and liberation. The theoretical foundation of this thesis is Africana existential phenomenology, which is used as a lens to understand Biko’s political thought. The study argues that thematic areas of blackness, black solidarity, and liberation are inherent in Africana existential phenomenology. These thematic areas give a better understanding of existential questions of being black in the antiblack world. What is highlighted is the importance and the relevance of the revival of Biko’s thinking towards creating other modes of being that are necessary for the actualisation of blacks as full human subjects. / Political Sciences / M.A. (Politics)

This thesis is not structured as a conventional empirical study (theoretical background, method, results, discussion), but instead consists of an iterative series of attempts at making sense of same-race prejudice – hopefully systematically homing in on a richer and more acute understanding of the phenomenon. The chapters are grouped together in pairs or triplets – each grouping addressing different but related perspectives on the problem. Chapters 1 and 2 are contextual, setting the scene historically and conceptually. Chapters 3, 4 and 5 introduce three different perspectives on using phenomenology as a means of approaching the issue of same-race prejudice. Chapters 6 and 7 are dedicated to looking at the themes of same-race prejudice, a critical interrogation of the themes from the interview discussions, the literature and how same-race prejudice is experienced, played out and sustained. Chapter 8 links back to Chapter 1 by casting another look at sensitivity and responsiveness to same-race prejudice by organisations whose work is supposedly on prejudice eradication. The chapter further links with both Chapters 3 and 4 by calling upon a phenomenological understanding to humanity as what can bring a liveable change to humanity regarding same-race prejudice. Chapter 9 serves as a summary of all the chapters, what each individually and collectively hoped to achieve, and the general findings and statements about same-race prejudice from the chapters’ theoretical discussions, research interviews, and critical interrogation of both the mundane and theoretical understanding. / Psychology / D. Phil. (Psychology)

This study explores the crisis of representation in black South African protest and ‘post’-apartheid literature. Conversant with the debates on the crisis of representation in black South African protest literature from the 1960s to the late 1980s, the dissertation proposes a re-reading of the ‘crisis’ by locating it in the black writer’s struggle for an aesthetic with which to express the existential crisis of blackness. I contend that not only protest but also contemporary or ‘post’-protest black South African literature exhibits a split or fractured mode of writing which is characterised by the displacement/unheimlichheid produced by colonialism and apartheid, as well as by the contentious nature of that which this literature endeavours to capture – the fraught identity of blackness. In my exploration of the split or double narratives of Mongane Serote’s To Every Birth Its Blood, K. Sello Duiker’s Thirteen Cents, and Kopano Matlwa’s Coconut, I examine the representation of blackness through the themes of violence, trauma, powerlessness, failure, and unhomeliness/unbelongingness – all of which suggest the lack of a solid foundation upon which to construct a stable black identity. This instability, I ultimately argue, suggests a move beyond an Afrocentric perspective on identity and traditional tropes of blackness towards a more processual, fluid, and permeable post-black politics.

The dissertation is titled: “Blackness as the way to and state of salvation: A search for true salvation in South Africa today”. The research was prompted by the question of salvation and what it means for blacks. The provocation arose out of the problem and/or interpretation of classical theology on the subject of soteriology. The biblical text of the Song of Songs 1:5: “I am black and beautiful, O daughters of Jerusalem, like the tents Qedar, like the curtains of Solomon”, is used as key to the argument. Origen (an early Christian theologian, who was born and spent the first half of his career in Alexandria) interpretation of the preceding biblical text is identified as problematic for blackness and African salvation. The problem identified with his interpretation of the said text and its theology and/or soteriology is that, first; he identifies and affirms the “ugliness’ of the black external and physical colour and/or conditions. Secondly, his theology and/or soteriology is identified as dualistic, separating the physical and the soul, which the researcher challenges and is against it as does not reflect the understanding of soteriology and/or theology by Africans. The researcher attacks and argues against the ugliness of blackness and dualism as a white and Eurocentric logic and problem. The researcher in his argument exposes whiteness and eurocentrism as problematic. The problem associated with whiteness is its claim that it is beautiful and positions itself as the way of and to salvation. Moreover, whiteness is problematised as a racial identity, position of power, structural evil and sin, exploitative, oppressive, and as related to capitalism. In response, the researcher, a black theologian argues against the theology of Origen and labelling it as European and white. The researcher exposes blackness as beautiful, powerful, and as a way of life. For the researcher, salvation must be understood as holistic and as here and now, situated in the black conditions. The researcher argues against dualism and individualism in favour of a holistic and a communal African approach that is not exclusive and self-centered. This approach is inclusive of the belief in God, the self, others human beings and the natural environment. He is propagating a black theology that is in favour of blackness as life, beautiful, powerful, liberating, and socialistic. / D. Th. (Systematic Theology)