ne of South Africa's most beautiful and dynamic cities hosts this Winter Quarter program, which focuses on the fascinating history and culture of Africa. At the heart of the program is the three-course sequence "African Civilization in Africa," which follows precolonial, colonial and postcolonial African history (with some emphasis on southern Africa). Apart from excursions in and around Cape Town, the program features an extended visit to Kruger National Park, a major game preserve that has become central to environmental and land management debates in South Africa. In addition to the civilization sequence, students take an introductory course in Zulu.

The Dynamic South African Panorama

his intensive Winter Quarter program introduces students to African civilizations. In the first course, students explore the political, social, and cultural histories of precolonial Africa. The second course, "Colonial Africa: Economy and Cultures," investigates the ways in which Africa and its diasporas have been represented both from outside and from within, the politics of knowledge past and present, and the politicos who represent the continent in different ways. The third course, "The Postcolonial African Landscape," involves a discussion and personal entry into the topics of environment, ecology, space, and nature, all contested in contemporary Africa. The highlight of this course is a nine-day visit to Kruger National Park, one of Africa's most widely known and contested game preserves. Students will tour the preserve and realize how "nature" has been carved out of land seized from viable indigenous communities. The course discussions will lead into questions of representation, possession, repatriation, land reform, politics and economics, and how South Africa has come to stand, in the eyes of South Africans of different social backgrounds, for very different pasts, presents and futures.

Students will engage with local scholars, historians, and mentors, and will simultaneously study Zulu, one of the many local African languages. They will be exposed to the ways in which the very language structure and the sociology of language reflect the thought, the day-to-day life, and the social environment of this very dynamic and changing African panorama.