History Society visit to Robben Island on Saturday.

Trending article '"A Necessary Evil?': (Southern) Rhodesia’s Diplomatic and Economic Relations with Zambia, 1963 to 1973' in Journal of Southern African Studies by our recent PhD graduate Teverayi Muguti Teverayi Muguti & his supervisor Prof. Sandra Swart Sandra Swart tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.10…

New #BookReview on: The Lion’s Historian: Africa’s Animal Past, by Sandra Swart doi.org/10.1080/025824…… #animalhistory #Africa Stellenbosch History Department

Marc Bloch, a historian who will be familiar to our Honours students who did Dr Chet Fransch's option, is to be honoured in the Pantheon, the place of memorialisation for France's eminent citizens. (If only all governments treated historians that way.) lanouvellerepublique.fr/a-la-une/a-str…

Graduation day today: Munashe Chideya PhD (in absentia), Margaret Le Roux MA, our Honours class & a lot of BAs.

Another academic year begins: orientation session for new Honours students followed by a catch-up for all our graduate students.

Our 2025 Honours cohort today enjoyed an introduction to the Cape Archives, with a tour of the stacks and a demonstration of conservation techniques - before doing battle with 19th century handwriting in the reading room.

A packed room for the first seminar of the year: Sishuwa Sishuwa presents a paper co-authored with Duncan Money '"I will get your shop shut": An Italian butcher, the vice-president's wife, and the fusion of the party and the state in early independent #Zambia.'

Busy day: Prof. Patricia Hayes of UWC spoke to grad students on using photos as historical sources. Dr Ruhan Fourie Ruhan Fourie spoke on “'Oorlog om die Volksiel!': Organised anticommunism & the mainstreaming of the rooi gevaar” with Dr Anell Daries Anell Stacey as discussant.

Open Day this weekend at Stellenbosch University - colleagues and graduate students were at the History Department table in Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences (SU) to talk to prospective future students about why it's a great idea to study history.

Today's event on 'Resistance & Restoration' was the first in a collaboration with University of Warwick. From maties: PhD student Adson Samwel, Prof. Sandra Swart Sandra Swart & Dr Samantha Masters. From Warwick: Prof. David Anderson, PhD student Ian Caistor-Parker & Prof. Daniel Branch.

The Honours class enjoyed the annual weekend away in the mountains at Slanghoek - a chance to present and talk about the first drafts of their research proposals, to get to know one another and to enjoy the outdoors between the discussions.

Congratulations to Sishuwa Sishuwa's PhD student Emmanuel Phiri, judged among the top 3 speakers at the Faculty PhD colloquium. Phiri, here with the vice-deans, spoke on 'Brewing Defiance: Colonial State Policies & the Marginalization of Women on Zambia’s Urban Copperbelt, 1927-1939'.

Winner of the Southern African Historical Society's Student Essay Prize 2024! Congratulations, Benjamin Crous!! Benjamin Crous Stellenbosch History Department #capecolony #children #abolition doi.org/10.1080/025824…

Are racial identities permanent or can they be changed? If they can, when, how, and why? And why are people less accepting of racial identity change than, say, gender or sex change? US historian Paul Spickard from University of California explored these questions at our seminar yesterday.

PhD students' seminar today: Nikiwe Veshe on "Unequal hierarchies and the positioning of the bushmen & basters in South Africa's Gordonia district, 1900-1930"; Rumbidzai Chitaukire on "Experiences of Women in the Informal Economy during Covid-19 & its aftermath in Zimbabwe".

As part of our collaboration with Warwick University, Prof. Daniel Branch spoke to students about research experience in Kenya: the need for humility, accept no archive is perfect, realise you'll never escape how your identity is seen, & finding personal amid political histories.

Senior lecturer Sishuwa Sishuwa comments on proposed constitutional amendments in Zambia.

Applications for the Lisa Maskell PhD programme in History are now open for applicants from African countries. It is a prestigious 3-year, fully funded scholarship at Stellenbosch University, one of the continent's top universities. Deadline: 31 July arts.sun.ac.za/2025/05/28/lis…

Lecturer Justin Pearce was a co-editor of this anthology on contemporary #Angola 50 years after independence.