Historical process and the constitution of subjects : I.D. du Plessis and the reinvention of the "Malay"

Jeppie, Shamil

Historical process and the constitution of subjects : I.D. du Plessis and the reinvention of the "Malay"

Bachelor Thesis

1987

Publisher

University of Cape Town

Department

Department of Historical Studies

Faculty

Faculty of Humanities

Abstract

The purpose of this thesis is to examine how a ruling-class actor attempted to reinvent and reconstitute an ethnic subject. Dr I.D. Du Plessis was, among other things, an Afrikaner litterateur and Commissioner of Coloured Affairs between 1930 and 1962, the period covered by this thesis. In Cape Town he applied himself to "preserve" what was known as "the malays". Although having an historical presence in Cape Town, defining the "malays" was always a problem as their very basis was in the process of being eroded as industrialisation forced social and communal changes. But the specificity of the "malays" was not an ethnic specificity with a rigid system of control and leadership, and staunchly cast against other sets of "identities" (such as Indians or "coloureds"). As chapter one shows, Du Plessis initiated the project at a conjuncture when the existence of ethnic units was presumed and the efforts to "preserve" them were profoundly political. A background to his ideological location is also discussed. From his particular location he journeyed amongst the "malays" and attempted to reinvent them as a specific ethnic unit fixed in space and time. Chapter two presents Du Plessis' model of "malay ethnicity" and its roots in history.

Keywords

Muslims - South Africa - Cape Town

African Studies

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