Identity and white English South Africans

Category: , , , , By Roger Saner
What also interests me about Apartheid is the white English role. Most English people in SA seem unaware that the British concentration camps were responsible for the deaths of 26,000 Afrikaner women and children. This is not a legacy to be lightly skipped over, and one that ties directly into one of the most thorny issues for English South Africans: identity. Who are we? We're not British, although many of us hold British passports (or can get ancestral visas, or flee to the UK when we get the chance). We're not Afrikaans, so therefore we're not responsible for Apartheid (so I've heard from many English people). "Apartheid was something which the Afrikaners were responsible for, not us. We had no say. In all levels of government the only people who were employed were Afrikaans." So we withdrew from the public sphere and happily existed in the neutral space between oppression and oppressed, mirroring the behaviour of everyone else.

And so, while not being the creators of Apartheid, we supported it by our silence. The saying, "All it takes for evil to flourish is for good men to do nothing" applies to us. And applies specifically to our churches...and our theology. I have not seen any widespread work in South African English churches to rethink how we relate to the public sphere, and to how our theology needs to change in order to explain how we might respond to new Apartheids in a different way. In fact, it has been a continuation of business as usual, of a continuing existence in the neutral ground of prosperity, allowing our theology to continue our existence in the same way.

This is not good enough!
 

4 comments so far.

  1. Steve Hayes February 11, 2008 at 3:41 AM
    Very good question, and one worth discussing. It might be good if you enabled the "Link to this post" feature in Blogger to allow it to be linked to and discussed more widely, though Blogger's "Blog this" function can also work.
  2. Roger Saner February 11, 2008 at 2:07 PM
    I couldn't find that exact setting ("Link to this post") but enabled one or two other things I thought would work. Maybe my template doesn't load that?
  3. Anonymous February 22, 2008 at 11:23 AM
    Our church has a Restitution & Reconciliation group which has been running as an experiment of sorts. What we have found is that the sessions that have worked best were those when "restitution ect" was not the focus but relationship was the focus (dinners and that kind of thing - seeing where each other lives). This year the focus is just gonna be doing projects together. I still find the idea a little contrived, although on some level its working I guess. Real relationships are real relationships and they form if you're open to them. Just an side (another unrelated tangent) - refugee issue is a big one now and saw the most awesome docci/drama made in Joburg called "Conversations on a Sunday afternoon" - a whole ohter can of worms we need to be addressing!!!
  4. Laura March 22, 2008 at 5:59 PM
    "neutral ground of prosperity"
    Wow, what a great turn of phrase.

    Thanks for this post. I really worry about this... I feel like God extended our country a huge amount of grace in our relatively peaceful transition to democracy. And I feel like the church, in response, really needs to be the driving force for justice and restoration. But I look at the church (and I'm in a church I love, this is not a grumble about my church!) and it almost seems like the church could be in another country!

    South Africa is grappling with issues of injustice and transformation and brokenness and racism and corruption and all sorts of fears. And it feels like the church either has nothing to say, or just no interest in speaking to those issues.

    And it makes me so sad because the country *needs* the church to speak (and act). The church is God's agent to change the world.

    Personally I think the place to start is for our churches to be South African churches, that remember the past together and celebrate South African public holidays together and talk about topical issues. Not to become all about politics - thats not the point - but to actually be *in* the world we live in.

    And I think of how God was always telling the Israelites to remember their past and tell stories and pass on their history to their children, how he even commanded them to celebrate specials days for their nation.

    And I think about how we could do that today, and I think it could be quite exciting... :)

Something to say?

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