Texts in black and white: co-constructing racialised identities in post-apartheid South Africa

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dc.contributor.advisorFoster, Don
dc.contributor.authorGartushka, Itai
dc.date.accessioned2020-12-31T13:44:11Z
dc.date.available2020-12-31T13:44:11Z
dc.date.issued2020
dc.description.abstractThis thesis poses the following question: are post-apartheid racialised identities constructed relationally? More specifically, this thesis investigates the co-construction of black and white racialised identities within the realm of South African public discourse. To this aim, it draws on editorials and letters to the editor which appeared in the City Press and the Sunday Times newspapers from 1994 to 2011. Informed by Foucauldian Discourse Analysis, the analysis focuses on the relationality between blackness and whiteness through a consideration of two major discourses. These discourses, labelled Bold New Blackness and Enduring Whiteness, are presented as templates for post-apartheid racialised identity construction. The analysis is comprised of three interrelated parts. The first part demonstrates that the respective templates construct racialised identities in terms of oppositional views regarding the apartheid past and the emerging post-apartheid future. Nevertheless, as each template contains references to the racialised other, it is suggested that racialised identity is co-constructed independently within each template. The second part shows that the way in which blacks and whites are positioned is constructed through constant reference across the two oppositional templates. In turn, it is suggested that racialised identity is co-constructed interdependently between the templates via an endless cycle of opposition. The third part delves into black and white subjectivities, revealing that the templates are neither wholly independent nor wholly interdependent. Instead, it is suggested that racialised identity is co-constructed through a set of entanglements, disentanglements and re-entanglements between blackness and whiteness. In this way, the thesis elucidates the post-apartheid tensions and complexities that exist around black and white racialised identity co-construction. Moreover, given that the vast majority of existing studies have presented black and white racialised identities as independent constructions to be examined separately within the respective fields of blackness and whiteness studies, this thesis highlights the fruitfulness of simultaneously utilising these otherwise disparate fields of study.
dc.identifier.apacitationGartushka, I. (2020). <i>Texts in black and white: co-constructing racialised identities in post-apartheid South Africa</i>. (Doctoral Thesis). University of Cape Town. Retrieved from http://hdl.handle.net/11427/32506en_ZA
dc.identifier.chicagocitationGartushka, Itai. <i>"Texts in black and white: co-constructing racialised identities in post-apartheid South Africa."</i> Doctoral Thesis., University of Cape Town, 2020. http://hdl.handle.net/11427/32506en_ZA
dc.identifier.citationGartushka, I. 2020. Texts in black and white: co-constructing racialised identities in post-apartheid South Africa. Doctoral Thesis. University of Cape Town. http://hdl.handle.net/11427/32506en_ZA
dc.identifier.ris TY - Doctoral Thesis AU - Gartushka, Itai AB - This thesis poses the following question: are post-apartheid racialised identities constructed relationally? More specifically, this thesis investigates the co-construction of black and white racialised identities within the realm of South African public discourse. To this aim, it draws on editorials and letters to the editor which appeared in the City Press and the Sunday Times newspapers from 1994 to 2011. Informed by Foucauldian Discourse Analysis, the analysis focuses on the relationality between blackness and whiteness through a consideration of two major discourses. These discourses, labelled Bold New Blackness and Enduring Whiteness, are presented as templates for post-apartheid racialised identity construction. The analysis is comprised of three interrelated parts. The first part demonstrates that the respective templates construct racialised identities in terms of oppositional views regarding the apartheid past and the emerging post-apartheid future. Nevertheless, as each template contains references to the racialised other, it is suggested that racialised identity is co-constructed independently within each template. The second part shows that the way in which blacks and whites are positioned is constructed through constant reference across the two oppositional templates. In turn, it is suggested that racialised identity is co-constructed interdependently between the templates via an endless cycle of opposition. The third part delves into black and white subjectivities, revealing that the templates are neither wholly independent nor wholly interdependent. Instead, it is suggested that racialised identity is co-constructed through a set of entanglements, disentanglements and re-entanglements between blackness and whiteness. In this way, the thesis elucidates the post-apartheid tensions and complexities that exist around black and white racialised identity co-construction. Moreover, given that the vast majority of existing studies have presented black and white racialised identities as independent constructions to be examined separately within the respective fields of blackness and whiteness studies, this thesis highlights the fruitfulness of simultaneously utilising these otherwise disparate fields of study. DA - 2020 DB - OpenUCT DP - University of Cape Town LK - https://open.uct.ac.za PY - 2020 T1 - Texts in black and white: co-constructing racialised identities in post-apartheid South Africa TI - Texts in black and white: co-constructing racialised identities in post-apartheid South Africa UR - http://hdl.handle.net/11427/32506 ER - en_ZA
dc.identifier.urihttp://hdl.handle.net/11427/32506
dc.identifier.vancouvercitationGartushka I. Texts in black and white: co-constructing racialised identities in post-apartheid South Africa. [Doctoral Thesis]. University of Cape Town, 2020 [cited yyyy month dd]. Available from: http://hdl.handle.net/11427/32506en_ZA
dc.language.isoeng
dc.publisherUniversity of Cape Town
dc.publisher.departmentDepartment of Psychology
dc.publisher.facultyFaculty of Humanities
dc.subject.otherPsychology
dc.subject.otherIdentity Construction
dc.titleTexts in black and white: co-constructing racialised identities in post-apartheid South Africa
dc.typeDoctoral Thesis
dc.type.qualificationlevelDoctoral
dc.type.qualificationnamePhD
uct.type.publicationResearch
uct.type.resourceDoctoral Thesis
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