Word: swansons
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...just what is apartheid? American writer James North (a.k.a. Daniel A. Swanson '74) has an answer, especially for those who think they already know Real apartheid, Swanson reminds us, is not the almost comical institution of separate shop doorways for Black and white customers, but Black unemployment rates that virtually preclude a Black consumer class altogether. Not the lack of swimming pools in the Black ghetto of Soweto, but a "homelands" policy that ensures a mass migratory labor system ripe for exploitation. Real apartheid is the Black miner who works hundreds of miles from his family, the "Coloured" woman...
...Swanson drives this point home in example after vivid example, and his careful depiction of the human effects of apartheid is the real contribution of his recently released book, Freedom Rising. Amid the campus and national debate about the ethics of divestment vs. engagement vs. apathy, Swanson provides a reminder of just what the fuss is all about...
Freedom Rising is the journalistic culmination of four years of reporting within southern Africa. The 1974 graduate arrived in South Africa. The 1974 graduate arrived in South Africa intending to stay several months, but quickly became professionally and emotionally entangled with the region. During his four years there, Swanson hitchhiked through the South African countryside, lived in the impoverished bantustans, and ate at the tables of white Afrikaners. Before leaving, he would witness the death and imprisonment of many friends and would himself become actively involved in the resistance movement. What results is a compelling portrait of daily life under...
Through dozens of such interviews, Swanson evokes tensions apartheid produces both within and among South Africans, regardless of race. Irrational prejudices form the fabric of daily life, creating a host of often debilitating psychological and social distortions. According to one Afrikaner, one of the first lessons white South Africans receive in their military service is to expect Blacks guerillas to return their fire; many whites would otherwise have considered Blacks incapable of such a feat...
Perhaps more significantly, Swanson's reporting belies many of the South African government's claims about alleged reforms. He shows, for example, how government intimidation thwarts the growth of purportedly legal trade unions and the exercise of alleged journalistic freedoms...