Browsing by Subject "history"
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- ItemOpen AccessThe 2000 year old computer: the antikythera mechanism(2014-09-29) Wolfe, DavidIn 1900 the first ancient marine wreck was discovered in the Mediterranean. It took a century to understand that the most interesting and unique find was a series of small bronze barnacle encrusted fragments. When investigated with sophisticated technology, they turned out to be from an analogue mechanical computer, built about 70 BCE and capable of predicting planetary positions and eclipses of the Sun and the Moon both in the past and the future. Its sophistication is centuries earlier than any mechanism that even began to emulate such a device. How did it work and who could have designed and built it? This double lecture will offer answers to these absorbing questions.
- ItemOpen AccessThe birth of modern astronomy(2013) Wolfe, Davidby Emeritus Professor David Wolfe, University of New Mexico and visiting lecturer, Physics Department, UCT. Professor Wolfe explores the foundations of astronomy, beginning with the ancient Egyptians, Greeks and Babylonians, to the early modern period and the works of Brahe, Kepler, Copernicus and Newton in condifying the mathematical and theoretical models that underpin modern astronomy.
- ItemOpen AccessThe book of all books(2012) Reisenberger, Azila TalitLecture series presented by Dr Azila Talit Reisenberger, Head of Hebrew, School of Languages and Literature, University of Cape Town. The Bible is one of the most widely-read and influential pieces of literature in the world, but many people are surprisingly unaware of the long history of the component books that make up the central text of both Judaism and Christianity. These audio lectures will be of interest to anyone who wishes to learn more about the history of the Bible and the vast cultural and religious meanings of this collection of books.
- ItemOpen AccessCole Porter: around the world on sings of Song(2012) Colborne, DesmondOf all the great American songwriters of the golden age of popular song Cole Porter was the most cosmopolitan. He owned a stylish apartment in Paris, partied with high society on the French Riviera and in grand Venetian palazzi, moved between Broadway and Hollywood and travelled widely, even visiting Cape Town on one of his many cruises. This audio lecture will be of interest to those who wish to know more about Cole Porter's life and music.
- ItemOpen AccessContinuing Conversations at the Frontier(2010) Mulaudzi, Maanda; Schoeman, H M; Chirikure, ShadreckResearchers involved or interested in the 500 Year Initiative (FYI) gathered at the University of Cape Town in June 2008 to explore how different disciplines engaged in historical studies may better communicate and collaborate within and between each other. Appropriately titled ‘Continuing Conversations at the Frontier’, participants in this conference challenged themselves to cross the theoretical and methodological borders separating archaeology, history, geography, anthropology and linguistics, in order to understand how and under what influence modern southern African identities have taken shape over the past 500 years. These conversations made it clear that new insights are not only reliant on new data, but that it is equally important to expose our methodologies and processes of gaining understanding. In addition to confronting disciplinary boundaries and methods, social and spatial frontiers were key loci for discussion, although it became apparent that historians and archaeologists have approached frontiers in different ways. We briefly explore the roots of these approaches.
- ItemOpen AccessCurriculum formation: a case study from History(Taylor & Francis, 2011) Shay, SuellenDrawing on the work of Bernstein and Maton and using a case-study approach, this study explores the formation of an undergraduate history curriculum at the University of Cape Town. This article focuses on two periods of curriculum formation referred to as history as canon and history as social science. With respect to these two curriculum periods the findings reveal the privileging of different kinds of historical educational knowledge, as well as the promotion of different student identities. The article also argues for the need for a more fine-grained conceptual framework for the study of knowledge and curriculum in higher education. The article concludes by highlighting the importance of this kind of research as pressure for curriculum reform intensifies in South Africa.
- ItemOpen AccessDesigned to divide: public toilets in Cape Town, 1880-1940(2018) Argent, Lucienne; Kar, BodhisattvaThis dissertation seeks to explore the frequently overlooked site of public toilets in relation to the politics of production and maintenance of social hierarchies in Cape Town between 1880 and 1940. In particular, it examines how public toilets both reflected and operationalised new understandings of demarcation of space, and disciplining and distribution of bodily functions. Rather than providing a comprehensive history of this municipally provided facility, this dissertation aims at exploring the ways in which the scanty, scattered and seemingly technical archive on public toilets can be used to understand the co-production of the built environment and social values.The emphasis on the spatial and the corporeal aspects of this history not only allows us to challenge the abstraction of the ‘public’ with which historians usually operate, but also to recognize how, for the city officials, the human body’s capacity to generate waste was both a source of anxiety and a means of constructing “inferiority” among particular groups of people. The dissertation consists of a chapter-length introduction, followed by three chapters based on primary research. In conversation with a range of conceptual and comparative academic literature, the introductory chapter identifies and examines the key theoretical questions underlying a possible history of public toilets in late nineteenth-century and early twentieth-century Cape Town. Chapter One interrogates the public-ness of the so-called public toilets, by Abstract critically engaging the intersections of race, class and gender, and by calling attention to their role in the maintenance of social hierarchies. Chapter Two focuses primarily on the question of infrastructure and design, trying to place the relationship between material designs and physical bodies at the centre of a history of practices. Chapter Three is concerned with the use and control of public toilets, and traces the ways in which both toilet users and attendants negotiated the values and habits that city officials tried to enforce in and through this institution. This research has drawn on a variety of archival sources, including Mayor’s Minutes, Reports of the Medical Officers of Health, correspondence between the city council and members of the public, Select Committee Reports, articles in and letters to the press, maps of the city, architect’s plans, as well as contemporary fictional literature.
- ItemOpen AccessEpidemics in South African history(2013) Phillips, Howardby Professor Howard Phillips, Department of Historical Studies, University of Cape Town, this lecture series explores five major epidemics that have ravaged South Africa, namely smallpox, the bubonic plague, Spanish Flu, Polio and HIV. This lecture series will be useful for anyone interested in learning about epidemics in SA history.
- ItemOpen AccessGreat Zimbabwe in the 21st century(2013) Chirikure, Shadreckby Dr Shadreck Chirikure, Department of Archaeology, University of Cape Town. This audio lecture explores the famous Southern African archaeological site Great Zimbabwe. This resource is useful for anyone interested in learning more about Great Zimbabwe.
- ItemOpen AccessHI in group interactions: HCG 44(2017) Hess, Kelley M; Cluver, M E; Yahya, Sahba; Leisman, Lukas; Serra, Paolo; Lucero, Danielle M; Passmoor, Sean S; Carignan, ClaudeExtending deep observations of the neutral atomic hydrogen (H I) to the environment around galaxy groups can reveal a complex history of group interactions which is invisible to studies that focus on the stellar component. Hickson Compact Group 44 (HCG 44) is a nearby example, and we have combined H I data from the Karoo Array Telescope, Westerbork Synthesis Radio Telescope, and Arecibo Legacy Fast ALFA survey, in order to achieve high column density sensitivity (N _{H {I}}
- ItemOpen AccessThe history of Western medicine: from Imhotep to Christiaan Barnard(2014-09-23) Aaronson, Ian AThis course will trace the roots of Western medicine from the ancient world to the subsequent landmarks in contemporary thought which formed the foundations of modern medicine. It will trace western medicine from its origins in the priest/physicians of ancient Egypt and the revolutionary concepts of Hippocrates in ancient Greece, to the beginnings of scientific discovery in the Renaissance and the Age of Enlightenment, culminating in the explosion of advances in the last decades of the twentieth century. Each lecture, illustrated by contemporary objects, manuscripts, drawings, engravings and paintings, will place this evolution in thought in the context of society at the time. LECTURE TITLES: *1. The ancient world – Egypt, Greece and Rome: 3000 BCE–500 CE; *2. Darkness to the first rays of light: 500–1450 CE (podcast not available); *3. The Age of Enlightenment and the birth of science: 1450–1800 CE;* 4. The nineteenth century: squalor and progress; *5. The twentieth century and beyond: breaking barriers
- ItemOpen AccessHomer's Epic, 'The Iliad': a world classic in a South African context(2013-02) Whitaker, RichardFor anyone interested in learning more about the interpretation and translation of Homer's epic in a South African context. A lecture series by Emeritus Professor Richard Whitaker, translator, writer, freelance travel writer. Homer’s epic poem, the Iliad, which tells the tale of Troy, has been continuously loved, read and translated for two and a half thousand years. This course will explain why the poem has achieved classic status, and then will explore the poem in a South African context. After an introduction to the archaic Greek world of Homer and the epic, it will look at the plot and major themes of the Iliad, analysing aspects such as the nature of the hero, heroic values and the representation of women. Translation is a vital part of the Iliad’s history, as most readers have always read the epic in translation. The course will compare selected passages in English translations by Alexander Pope (1720), Christopher Logue (War Music, 1959–2005) and the lecturer’s recent southern African version (2012) to show that every translation is an interpretation. Using the lecturer’s own translation, the course will demonstrate how the Iliad can be understood in the light of South Africa’s present and past. Similarities will be drawn between the world of the epic and aspects of South African society, such as the assessment of bride-price in cattle and poetic praise singing as a central way in which a person’s identity survives into the future in an oral culture. LECTURE TITLES: 1. Homer and the Iliad: Where? When? How?; 2. ‘Muse sing the anger of Achilles’: the plot of the Iliad; 3. Major themes of the epic: gods and heroes, life and death; 4. The Iliad in English: translation as interpretation; 5. Understanding the Iliad in a southern African context. Recommended reading: * Griffin, J. 1980. Homer on Life and Death. Oxford: Clarendon Press. * Steiner, G. 1996. Homer in English. London: Penguin. * Whitaker, R. 2012. The Iliad of Homer: a Southern African Translation. Cape Town: New Voices.
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- ItemOpen AccessThe meanings of Timbuktu(2010) Jeppie, Shamil; Diagne, Souleymane BachirThis volume, authored by leading international scholars, begins to sketch the 'meaning' of Timbuktu within the context of the intellectual history of West Africa, in particular, and of the African continent, in general. The Meanings of Timbuktu strives to contextualize and clarify the importance of efforts to preserve Timbuktu's manuscripts for Mali, for Africa and for the intellectual world. A fascinating read for anyone who wishes to gain an understanding of the aura of mystique and legend that surrounds Timbuktu.
- ItemOpen AccessPublic health in Cape Town 1923-1944: diphtheria, dairies and the discovery of the child(2000) Watermeyer, KatyThe idea of modernity, I suggest, was one of the chief tropes through which Europe constructed itself as a centre, as the centre, and the rest of the planet as a – its – periphery ...