scholarly journals Spatial and temporal thresholds in installation art: Jan van der Merwe’s Eclipse

2021 ◽  
Vol 86 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Louisemarié Combrink
Keyword(s):  
South African ◽  
Installation Art ◽  
Theoretical Framework ◽  
Concentration Camps ◽  
Refugee Camps ◽  
The South ◽  
Rose Petals ◽  
War Zones ◽  
No Man's Land ◽  
As If

The notion of thresholds and their potential to suggest liminality is usually associated with spatialities. However, I contend this notion can be extended to layered temporal thresholds and temporal liminalities. I present this argument, using postclassical narratological concepts as theoretical framework, with reference to the South African artist Jan van der Merwe’s installation artwork Eclipse (2002). In this work, various spatial thresholds can be distinguished that relate to issues of conflict, mourning, exclusion, surveillance and the suggestion of death. This is achieved by means of a no man’s land experienced when entering the artwork, where the viewer-participant finds him or herself compelled to follow a footpath surrounded by barbed wire on which clothes made of rusted metal are suspended. This journey culminates in a wall that presents three screens showing rose petals being dropped, as if into a grave. Various possible places suggest themselves: refugee camps, concentration camps, war zones and a cemetery. I argue that these spatialities are made possible by temporal thresholds that accompany them. Apart from the patina of the rusted material that suggest the passing of time, the moving flower petals in the screens repeat constantly to create not only liminal temporalities in terms of the artwork at large, but also an iterative sense of the ongoing culmination of these temporalities in death. Opsomming Die idee van drempels en hul potensiaal om die liminale te suggereer word tipies met ruimtelikhede geassosieer. Desnieteenstaande voer ek aan dat hierdie gedagte verbreed kan word na gelaagde tydmatige drempels en tydmatige liminaliteite. Ek bied hierdie argument vanuit die kader van postklassieke narratologie as teoretiese raamwerk en met verwysing na die Suid-Afrikaanse kunstenaar Jan van der Merwe se installasiekunswerk Eclipse (2002). In hierdie werk kan ʼn aantal tydmatige drumpels onderskei word wat telkens kwessies van konflik, bewening, uitsluiting, dophou en die suggestie van dood aan die hand doen. Dit word bewerkstelling deur die ervaring van ʼn niemandsland wanneer die kunswerk betree word, omdat die aanskouer-deelnemer noodgedwonge ʼn voetpaadjie moet volg wat deur doringdraad omhul is en waarop klere wat uit geroeste metaal gesuspendeer is. Hierdie reis kulmineer in ʼn muur waarop drie skerms gemonteer het wat roosblare toon, asof in ʼn graf. Daar word gesinspeel op verskeie moontlike plekke: vlugtelingkampe, konsentrasiekampe, oorloggebiede en ʼn begraafplaas. Ek voer aan dat hierdie ruimtelikhede moontlik gemaak word deur tydmatige drumpels wat hand aan hand met die ruimtes gesuggereer word. Benewens die patina van die geroeste materiaal wat verband hou met die verloop van tyd, stel die herhalende beweging van die blomblare in die skerms ook liminale tydsfere aan die orde binne die kunswerk as geheel, en dryf ook – op iteratiewe wyse – hierdie tydsfere op die spits om ʼn suggestie van die dood aan die hand te doen.

scholarly journals Putting it into Practice: Using Feminist Fractured Foundationalism in Researching Children in the Concentration Camps of the South African War

2006 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 14-50 ◽  
Author(s):  
Liz Stanley ◽  
Sue Wise
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
South African ◽  
Writing Process ◽  
Concentration Camps ◽  
The South ◽  
Research Project ◽  
Joint Research ◽  
South African War ◽  
Joint Research Project ◽  
Official Records

Feminist fractured foundationalism has been developed over a series of collaborative writings as a combined epistemology and methodology, although it has mainly been discussed in epistemological terms. It was operationalised as a methodology in a joint research project in South Africa concerned with investigating two important ways that the experiences of children in the South African War 1899-1902, in particular in the concentration camps established during its commando and ‘scorched earth’ phase, were represented contemporaneously: in the official records, and in photography. The details of the research and writing process involved are provided around discussion of the nine strategies that compose feminist fractured foundationalism and its strengths and limitations in methodological terms are reviewed.

White Man’s War

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Boje
Keyword(s):  
South African ◽  
Concentration Camps ◽  
The South ◽  
South African War ◽  
Black Resistance ◽  
Racist Attitude

This chapter examines the Boers’ involvement in, and labors during, the South African War. It first considers the Boer–black relations, citing the Boers’ racist attitude toward blacks before and during the South African War. It then looks at blacks in Boer service; black resistance to Boer hegemony fostered by Ethiopianism and manifested in the activities of armed gangs; and blacks’ service with the British troops, particularly Bergh’s Scouts. It also discusses the black concentration camps and concludes with an analysis of the claims that blacks murdered and mutilated whites, contextualized in the colonial mythology of black savagery and recontextualized in terms of a general descent into murderous brutality.

Feminist studies in religion and a radical democratic ethos 1

1995 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 122-144
Author(s):  
Elizabeth Schüssler Fiorenza
Keyword(s):  
Political Culture ◽  
South African ◽  
Theoretical Framework ◽  
Religious Studies ◽  
Feminist Studies ◽  
South African Context ◽  
The South ◽  
African Context ◽  
Just Society ◽  
Institutional Location

AbstractFeminist studies in religion contribute to the fashioning of a radical democratic political culture and the creation of an egalitarian politics of meaning. In the South African context feminist studies are important elements in the emergence of a democratic and just society since they provide a theoretical framework and intellectual space for transforming kyriarchal knowledges and deeply inculcated values of oppression. Several issues are addressed, namely the nature of feminist religious studies, feminist religious studies as a knowledge producing discourse, and the institutional location of feminist studies in religion.

scholarly journals Whatever happened to God’s holiness? The holiness of God and the theological authenticity of the South African neo-Pentecostal prophetic activities

2021 ◽  
Vol 42 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Collium Banda
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
South African ◽  
Research Question ◽  
Theoretical Framework ◽  
The South ◽  
Human Needs ◽  
Theological Perspective ◽  
Doctrine Of The Church ◽  
The Church

The controversial activities of the neo-Pentecostal prophets (NPPs) in South Africa raise many theological questions. From a systematic theological perspective that affirms the importance of Christian doctrines in regulating church worship and practice, this article uses God’s holiness to evaluate the theological authenticity of the NPPs’ controversial activities. The research question answered in the article is: how can an understanding of the holiness of God empower Christian believers to respond meaningfully to the controversial practices? The article begins by describing the theoretical framework of God’s holiness. This is followed by describing the NPPs’ shift from prophecy focusing on holiness to one focused on human needs. Furthermore, this shift among the NPPs from holiness to human needs is attributed to celebrity cultism through which the prophets thrust themselves as powerful figures who are able to solve people’s problems. Afterward an analysis is made of how the holiness of God is violated by the NPPs’ controversial practices. Finally, some steps are suggested for NPPs and their followers to take to align their activities with God’s holiness. The contribution of the article lies in highlighting the importance of God’s holiness as a standard of measuring the Christian authenticity of the controversial activities of the NPPs in South Africa.Intradisciplinary and/or interdisciplinary implications: The article uses insights from the doctrine of God’s holiness, the role of biblical prophecy and the doctrine of the church, to critique the controversial activities of the NPPs in South Africa.

scholarly journals Vreemdeling in jou eie land? Teologiese riglyne vanuit 1 Petrus, met ’n juridiese begronding

2005 ◽  
Vol 39 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
J. J. Janse van Rensburg ◽  
Gerrit J. Pienaar
Keyword(s):  
South African ◽  
Positive Attitude ◽  
Present Position ◽  
The South ◽  
South Africans ◽  
1 Peter ◽  
The Past ◽  
South African Constitution ◽  
Point Of Departure ◽  
As If

Stranger in one’s own country? Theological guidelines from 1 Peter with a juridical foundationSome South Africans, more specifically Afrikaans-speaking citizens, experience their present position as that of being foreigners in their own country. Many of the privileges they had enjoyed in the past do not exist anymore. Moreover, it seems as if Afrikaners continuously lose other privileges too. In this article an attempt is made to apply the motif of alienation in 1 Peter to the mentioned situation as well as to highlight relevant stipulations in the South African constitution. The aim with this point of departure is to equip preachers and pastors with a biblically-valid perspective on the problem experienced. Such a perspective can contribute to a more positive attitude among Afrikaner Christians experiencing this kind of alienation and thus urge them to answer to their calling in a spirit of hopefulness.

In Captivity

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Boje
Keyword(s):  
South African ◽  
Medical Staff ◽  
Daily Life ◽  
Prisoners Of War ◽  
Concentration Camp ◽  
Concentration Camps ◽  
The South ◽  
Group Solidarity ◽  
South African War ◽  
In Captivity

This chapter examines the life of Boers held captive by the British during the South African War, with particular emphasis on inmates’ grievances relating to water, meat, clothing, work, and lack of freedom. It first provides an overview of the captives’ lifestyle at the Winburg concentration camp as well as camp personnel and medical staff before discussing the issue of disease and death in the camp. It then considers the freedom that prisoners of war (POWs) had to make existential choices, with reference to the suborning of prisoners by the British and the prisoners’ efforts to maintain group solidarity. It also discusses defiance and compliance by the inmates and concludes with an assessment of daily life in the POW concentration camps.

Officers, Gentlemen and Thieves: The Looting of Monasteries during the 1903/4 Younghusband Mission to Tibet

2003 ◽  
Vol 37 (1) ◽  
pp. 81-109 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Carrington
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
South African ◽  
Early Years ◽  
Concentration Camps ◽  
The South ◽  
Military Action ◽  
South African War ◽  
Systematic Scheme ◽  
The Military

During the early years of British conquest in India [and elsewhere] indiscriminate and frenzied looting often followed military action. Certainly, the acquisition of plunder had always been used as an incentive for the troops, though its distribution was often disproportionate and the source of much discontent. Officially appointed prize agents ought to have lessened any animosity, though like the Admiralty Prize Courts which were a ‘public scandal’, the military agents were mostly thought to be ‘sharks’ and men often went collecting for themselves rather than for the ‘official’ pot. By the latter half of the nineteenth century, collection of plunder had also become the ‘collecting’ of curios and artefacts for both personal and institutional reasons. This material had become increasingly important in the process of ‘othering’ Oriental and African societies and was exemplified in the professionalism of exploration and the growth of ethnographic departments in museums, the new ‘temples of Empire’. The gathering of information may have reached new heights but the British attempt at a monopoly on knowledge was not particularly ordered or controlled and events within the Empire offered the world's press numerous opportunities for criticism. Nearer home, reports of looting often became ammunition in the hands of liberal critics of Empire who had their cause strengthened after the disastrous events of the South African War with its burning, looting and removal of non-combatants to concentration camps. So looting may have become morally questionable, but it was institutionalized and symptomatic of the British imperial state's desire for artefacts with which to provide information about ‘exotic’ societies. There was literally a ‘scramble’ for information out of which, it was hoped, an ordered and systematic scheme of knowledge would realize the dream of an ‘imperial archive’ in which fantasy became reality and ultimate knowledge became ultimate power.

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