The Oxford Handbook of Oral History

2012 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Oral History ◽  
Hurricane Katrina ◽  
South African ◽  
Digital Technology ◽  
Truth And Reconciliation ◽  
Current State ◽  
Truth And Reconciliation Commissions ◽  
Falklands War ◽  
The Holocaust ◽  
The Impact

The Oxford Handbook of Oral History brings together forty authors on five continents to address the evolution of oral history, the impact of digital technology, the most recent methodological and archival issues, and the application of oral history to both scholarly research and public presentations. The volume offers diverse perspectives on the current state of the field and its likely future developments. Some of its chapters survey large areas of oral history research and examine how they developed; others offer case studies that deal with specific projects, issues, and applications of oral history. From the Holocaust, the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commissions, the Falklands War in Argentina, the Velvet Revolution in Eastern Europe, to memories of September 11, 2001 and of Hurricane Katrina, the efforts of oral historians worldwide are examined and explained in this text.

Crimes and Accountability in Shakespeare

1998 ◽  
Vol 92 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-40 ◽  
Author(s):  
Theodor Meron
Keyword(s):  
South African ◽  
Truth And Reconciliation Commission ◽  
Former Yugoslavia ◽  
Final Solution ◽  
The South ◽  
Reconciliation Commission ◽  
High Ranking ◽  
Truth And Reconciliation ◽  
The Holocaust

Accountability for crimes, a theme central to Shakespeare’s plays, is also extraordinarily pertinent to our times. Newspapers have reported on the care taken by the leaders of the former Yugoslavia to order atrocities against “enemy” populations only in the most indirect and euphemistic way. Even the Nazi leaders constantly resorted to euphemisms in referring to the Holocaust. No explicit written order from Hitler to carry out the final solution has ever been found. At the height of their power, the Nazis treated the data on the killing of Jews as top secret. Similarly, a high-ranking member of the former security police told the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission that written instructions to kill antiapartheid activists were never given; squad members who carried out the killings simply got “a nod of the head or a wink-wink kind of attitude.”

The Role of the Legal Profession in the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission

2002 ◽  
Vol 20 (3) ◽  
pp. 273-298
Author(s):  
Heidy Rombouts ◽  
Stephan Parmentier
Keyword(s):  
South African ◽  
Legal Profession ◽  
Transition To Democracy ◽  
Truth And Reconciliation Commission ◽  
Truth Commission ◽  
The South ◽  
Reconciliation Commission ◽  
Truth And Reconciliation ◽  
The One ◽  
The Impact

In situations of a transition to democracy, the legal profession tends to have a strong impact. While this is quite clear in the case when criminal prosecutions are initiated against perpetrators of gross human rights violations, and when amnesty provisions are enacted for some violations, it is far less obvious in cases when a truth commission is set up. The current article looks into the role that the legal profession, i.e. the judiciary, the bar and the non-governmental organisations, has played in the notorious case of the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC). It draws on the systems analysis of political life by David Easton, which identifies how demands (input) that rise in society, are processed (conversion) and produce results (output), which provide new inputs to the political system. This ‘flow model’ is applied to two separate processes during the life of the TRC: the Special Legal Hearing of October 1997, and the legal challenges put to the Commission in Court in 1996. Our analysis reveals a number of interesting conclusions. One is that the organised profession approached the Special Legal Hearing from a very legalistic point of view, despite the non-judicial character of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission at large. This stands in contrast with the position of the Constitutional Court, which recognised the limits of the traditional judicial system and came out in support of the TRC. Another conclusion is that, although the participation of the judges and the magistrates in the Special Legal Hearing was limited to written submissions, their influence proved very large, as they threatened the TRC with a constitutional crisis. Finally, throughout the two processes under review, breaches became visible within the legal profession, between the ‘progressive’ non-governmental organisations and the ‘conservative’ organised profession on the one hand, and between the organised profession on the one hand and the judges on the other hand. In sum, it can convincingly be concluded that the impact of the legal profession remains quite important when a truth commission is opted for in a context of transition to democracy.

scholarly journals The ATID project: teaching the holocaust! through digital storytelling

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eli Kowaz
Keyword(s):  
Student Engagement ◽  
Digital Media ◽  
Digital Technology ◽  
Historical Events ◽  
Holocaust Education ◽  
General Application ◽  
Content Learning ◽  
Proposed Model ◽  
The Holocaust ◽  
The Impact

This paper aims to develop a Holocaust education protocol template with the goals of maximizing student engagement, enhancing the student experience, boosting retention of information, and facilitating the individual's identification with the historical events of the Holocaust. The protocol proposed is of general application and is suitable for other current and historic events. At the same time, the Holocaust is a powerful and appropriate event for illustrating the impact of digital media on education, and in particular, it highlights head on the issue of historical distance from actual events and the ways in which digital technology and media can reduce the risk of losing key sources of testimonial experience that are so often central to the student’s appreciation and understanding of such events. This proposed conceptual protocol is founded on three basic dimensions: Content, Learning Sequencing, and Digital Media. These dimensions are interactive and overlapping in the proposed model.!

Systematic Reviews of Research in Basic Education in South Africa

2021 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
South African ◽  
Systematic Reviews ◽  
Basic Education ◽  
Standard Form ◽  
Current State ◽  
Educational Inquiry ◽  
New Generation ◽  
The Impact ◽  
First Time

Maringe ought to be commended for putting together an invaluable contribution to our understanding of research into a complex education system in South Africa. This volume provides a useful foundation to the current state of education quality in South Africa including the impact of interventions. It also brings to the fore challenges still facing education transformation. The evidence presented which, taken together, lays out a coherent view of how improvements could be made. Albert Chanee Head of Planning, Gauteng Department of Education For too long the weight of educational scholarship produced in South Africa has been limited to that simple and standard form called the literature review. Now, for the first time, education researchers are provided with an African-based text on the concepts and methods of conducting systematic reviews. In this exceptional work of editorship, Felix Maringe brings together some of the leading researchers on South African education to model and demonstrate how to review a significant body of research on a chosen topic which is adjudicated strictly on the basis of the quality and efficacy of the evidence in hand. I have no doubt that this remarkable book will become a standard reference for educational researchers in and beyond the African continent. It will also lift the quality of educational inquiry by equipping a new generation of scholars with the capacity for doing evidence-based research that compels the attention of policymakers, planners and practitioners alike. Prof Jonathan Jansen Stellenbosch University

The Relationship Between Trust and Truth and Reconciliation Commissions in Post-Conflict Sub-Saharan Countries

2020 ◽  
Vol 7 (7) ◽  
pp. 882-909
Author(s):  
Julie Keil ◽  
Alexander Stegbauer
Keyword(s):  
South African ◽  
Armed Conflicts ◽  
African Countries ◽  
Truth And Reconciliation ◽  
Post Conflict ◽  
Truth And Reconciliation Commissions ◽  
Trust In Institutions ◽  
Sub Saharan ◽  
Election Violence ◽  
The Relationship

Sub-Saharan African countries have conducted Truth and Reconciliation Commissions (TRC) from the early 1970’s to 2020 in twenty-one different countries.  TRCs have been chosen by states after armed conflicts, attempted or completed coups or in several cases after contested elections and election violence, in attempt to agree at a common “truth” to the events and to bring reconciliation to individual victims and polarized groups within the state.  Most TRCs have claimed the need to build trust in institutions, government and communities as one of the reasons for the conduct of a TRC.  However, despite extensive scholarly study of TRCs in general, and some study of sub-Saharan African TRCs (particularly the South African TRC) there is a lack of study of the relationship between TRCs and the development of trust.  This study utilizes Afrobarometer data regarding trust in various governmental and quasi-governmental entities in ten Sub-Saharan African states that conducted a TRC.  This study concludes that the processes in strong TRCs are related to the improvement in trust in some of the entities, but others are unaffected or show decreases in trust because the processes generally used in the TRC were not effective in creating trust.

The Complexity of Sport: Universal Challenges and Their Impact on Women in Sport

2018 ◽  
Vol 26 (2) ◽  
pp. 89-98 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gwendolyn M. Weatherford ◽  
Betty A. Block ◽  
Fredrick L. Wagner
Keyword(s):  
Quality Assurance ◽  
Digital Technology ◽  
Equal Opportunity ◽  
The State ◽  
Current State ◽  
Women In Sport ◽  
The World ◽  
Points Of View ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Experiences Of Women

The experiences of women in sport continue to necessitate deliberation, reflection, new ways of thinking, and further discourse in the continued pursuit of opportunity and equality. The subsequent and parallel impact on the roles that women play in sport as athletes and leaders are revealed by identifying the complexities and social realities that are vying and contending for relevance. The notion of complexity offers a novel conceptualization revealing contexts and competing points of view that challenge progress and equality for women in sport. Complexity refers to the state of the world assailed by increased amounts of data, facts, tasks, evidence, and arguments that yield uncertainty in the current age and unpredictability for the future. Universal challenges characteristic of complexity include globalization; digital technology; interpenetration of the wider society; participation, access, and equal opportunity; marketization; competition; and quality assurance and assessment. As a result, these old and new realities raise questions related to what we know about the current state of sport, sport experiences of women, and the properties of sport that seem difficult to manage. The purpose of this paper is to offer complexity as a theoretical lens by which to examine sport, discuss the universal and formidable challenges that face sport, and, more specifically, discuss the impact they have on women in sport.

scholarly journals Reframing the Tower of Babel narrative for economic justice within the South African context

2016 ◽  
Vol 72 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark Rathbone
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
South African ◽  
Economic Justice ◽  
Truth And Reconciliation Commission ◽  
The South ◽  
Tower Of Babel ◽  
Truth And Reconciliation ◽  
Reformed Church ◽  
The People ◽  
The Impact

The Tower of Babel narrative is profoundly connected to the history of South Africa and its interpretation in the Dutch Reformed Church document entitled Human Relations and the South African Scene in the Light of Scripture (1976), which was used to justify apartheid. In this article, it is argued that this understanding of the narrative is due to racist framing that morally justified the larger apartheid narrative. The Tower of Babel narrative was later reframed for liberation and reconciliation by Desmond Tutu. However, apartheid had an impact not only on the sociopolitical dynamics of South Africa. Submissions to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission by business and labour highlight the impact of apartheid on the economy and specifically black labour. These revelations are responsible for new questions regarding the economics of the narrative that arise and may enrich the understanding of the Tower of Babel narrative. This focus on the economic aspect of the narrative is also supported by historical research on the Tower of Babel narrative that reveals that the dispersion of the people on the plain of Shinar may refer to the demise of the Sumerian empire, which was among other influences brought about by a labour revolt. In this regard, the narrative is a theological reflection on the demise of an unjust economic system that exploited workers. The purpose of this article is to critically explore this economic justice aspect embedded in the narrative in order to determine whether this reframing of the narrative is plausible. This is particularly important within the post-apartheid context and the increase of economic problems such as unemployment, poverty and economic inequality.

En(countering) Silence – Some Thoughts on Historical Justice after Memoricide

2020 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Fanie du Toit
Keyword(s):  
Oral History ◽  
Transitional Justice ◽  
Lived Experiences ◽  
Truth Telling ◽  
Mass Violence ◽  
Social Consensus ◽  
Truth And Reconciliation ◽  
Truth And Reconciliation Commissions ◽  
Historical Justice ◽  
Post War

AbstractThis essay argues that public historians and transitional justice experts need one another’s input in at least two crucial tasks facing nations after episodes of mass violence. In challenging the silence that typically envelopes post-war situations, the faithful recording of lived experiences of victims after violence is both a necessity and exceedingly complex. Here, oral history initiatives can significantly assist forensic investigations to develop a fuller picture of the suffering and crimes committed, but also to turn truth-telling into a healing experience for victims who often find forensic truth-telling on its own re-traumatizing. Conversely in efforts to memorialize wars, periods of oppression and struggles of liberation, public historians will do well to take seriously the testimonies of Truth and Reconciliation Commissions and other truth-telling fora in order to ensure that any exclusionary narratives which may arise after the conflict are themselves disrupted, even as a social consensus is fostered on the need to realize all the necessary guarantees of non-recurrence to avoid a return to a bad past.

scholarly journals The ATID project: teaching the holocaust! through digital storytelling

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eli Kowaz
Keyword(s):  
Student Engagement ◽  
Digital Media ◽  
Digital Technology ◽  
Historical Events ◽  
Holocaust Education ◽  
General Application ◽  
Content Learning ◽  
Proposed Model ◽  
The Holocaust ◽  
The Impact

This paper aims to develop a Holocaust education protocol template with the goals of maximizing student engagement, enhancing the student experience, boosting retention of information, and facilitating the individual's identification with the historical events of the Holocaust. The protocol proposed is of general application and is suitable for other current and historic events. At the same time, the Holocaust is a powerful and appropriate event for illustrating the impact of digital media on education, and in particular, it highlights head on the issue of historical distance from actual events and the ways in which digital technology and media can reduce the risk of losing key sources of testimonial experience that are so often central to the student’s appreciation and understanding of such events. This proposed conceptual protocol is founded on three basic dimensions: Content, Learning Sequencing, and Digital Media. These dimensions are interactive and overlapping in the proposed model.!

Dealing with the past and transitional justice: building peace through accountability

2006 ◽  
Vol 88 (862) ◽  
pp. 311-325 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yasmin Sooka
Keyword(s):  
South African ◽  
Transitional Justice ◽  
Truth And Reconciliation Commission ◽  
The South ◽  
Reconciliation Commission ◽  
Truth And Reconciliation ◽  
The Past ◽  
Sierra Leonean ◽  
Truth And Reconciliation Commissions ◽  
Guiding Principles

Based on her experience as a member of the South African and the Sierra Leonean truth and reconciliation commissions, the author formulates guiding principles and looks at the circumstances in which a truth and reconciliation commission constitutes an appropriate instrument to deal with transitional justice issues. The author also identifies possible contributions that truth and reconciliation commissions can make during a period of transition.

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