University of Johannesburg Department of History

Two MA postgraduates from our department, Refilwe Raphadu and Tebatso Pooe (photographed here) have begun an exciting spell working as tour guides at the South African National Monument & Museum at Delville Wood, France. This is part of a new partnership between our department, the Delville Wood Commemorative Museum Trust and the Commonwealth War Graves Commission. Two further MA students will take Refilwe and Tebatso's place in two months.

Between 15th and 20th July 1916, the South African Brigade consisting of 3153 men, including the 'Native Labour Corps' (black South African soldiers) fought against the Germans at the Battle of Delville Wood. Ordered to hold the wood at all costs, the Brigade endured such heavy artillery bombardment that by the time the battle ended, 1709 were wounded and 763 killed. They held the wood, but many black and white South Africans paid the ultimate sacrifice.

We wish Refilwe and Tebatso all the best!

Our department recently co-hosted a conference marking the 50th Anniversary of the Soweto Uprising, together with Wits History Workshop and UNISA. A number of our postgraduates presented their work at the conference and have now had their research on '76 published in Amandla's latest edition, available here: https://www.amandla.org.za/50-years-of-the-76-uprising/

Starting tomorrow!

Please RSVP through this link https://forms.gle/3cBzSRXWLSQSG769A
full programme to be announced soon!

Coming up soon!

Please RSVP through this link https://forms.gle/3cBzSRXWLSQSG769A
full programme to be announced soon!

Our next department seminar

Litigating Evidence of Frontier Violence: Libel Law and Public Men in Colonial South Africa and New Zealand

Chris Holdridge (North-West University)

This paper focuses on bodies of evidence in two libel trials in the British Empire. In 1879, Attorney-General Thomas Upington sued the Cape Argus, which alleged he undermined justice around the Koegas massacres of Korana and San men, women, and children when he moved two murder trials from the Cape Supreme Court to the Circuit Court, Victoria West. Both juries acquitted the white murder accused, while surviving ‘prisoner-of-war’ women and children were controversially apprenticed as domestic and farm labourers. In Bryce v Rusden (1886) before the Queen’s Bench, London, former Minister of Native Affairs John Bryce sued historian George Rusden over passages in his History of New Zealand (1883) that he murdered Māori women and young boys when serving in 1868 during Titokowaru’s War. Rusden’s publisher Chapman & Hall withdrew the book from circulation before the trial. Both trials found for the plaintiff: a mere £5 damages for Upington; and £5,000 for Bryce, which was financially ruinous for Rusden. Confined within national historiographies, historians rarely position such libel cases within imperial questions of press censorship, and global and local circulation of information, secret or published, including the selection and silences around what information mattered. As causes célèbres, they reveal how public opinion and Victorian jurisprudence articulated truth and justice through affect (manly reputation and humanitarian concern) and colonial power through the rule of law. As libel trials balanced fair comment and public benefit with the right to reputation, courts examined the truth of published accusations against public men. This included extensive evidence not only in official blue-books, but also witness depositions from settlers, Māori, Korana, and San; anonymous private letters by whistleblowers including missionaries, former governors, court interpreters, and judges, including the unmasking of whistleblower identity; and, remarkably, human remains of Indigenous victims. When read together, these libel trials not only reveal how public men used nineteenth-century law to shape colonial societies, but are also archives of colonial violence relevant to present conversations around truth, justice, and colonial pasts.

Time: May 12, 2026 04:00 PM Harare, Pretoria
Venue: History Department Common Room, University of Johannesburg, Auckland Park Campus
Or, Zoom: https://zoom.us/j/92647069201

For the paper write to sjwsparks @ uj.ac.za

Graduation: the happiest time of year! Hearty congratulations to all our postgraduates (and their supervisors) for all of their hard work!

Last week, Prof Hlonipha Mokoena (Director, Wits Institute for Social and Economic Research) presented a fascinating seminar on her recent book: https://witspress.co.za/page/detail/The-Nightwatchman/?k=9781776149377

On Thursday Dr Stephen Sparks will be discussant at the launch of a new edited collection on South African historiography:

https://books.aosis.co.za/index.php/ob/catalog/book/478

Date: 16 April 2026
Time: 17:00
Venue: NorthWest University Main Gallery, Potchefstroom Campus
RSVP here: https://forms.cloud.microsoft/r/P19zr3RzLM

Our next departmental seminar:

Hlonipha Mokoena (WISER, Wits University)
‘Representing Black Men in Colonial South Africa’

Seminar attendees are strongly encouraged to read the introduction and chapter 2 of Professor Mokoena’s recently published book: https://www.witspress.co.za/page/detail/The-Nightwatchman/?k=9781776149353 in advance. Email Dr Stephen Sparks for a pdf.

April 14, 2026, 4pm, Harare/Pretoria
Venue: History Common Room, University of Johannesburg, Auckland Park Campus, A2
or: https://zoom.us/j/91075943738
Meeting ID: 910 7594 3738

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Dr Tshepo Moloi is part of a Human Rights Day debate at the Apartheid Museum this Saturday, 21 March.