An examination of post-apartheid social transformation through the representation of black women in South African history textbooks.

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to understand how Black women are represented in South African NCS and CAPS history textbooks. This was conducted by employing social transformation as a theoretical framework. In order, for the set research questions to answer I conducted this study using the interpretivist paradigm, a longitudinal qualitative approach, and a case study methodology which consisted of collecting data from a sample size of six history textbooks, three from NCS and three from CAPS history textbooks. The findings for both NCS and CAPS history textbooks were divided into two main themes agency and non- agency. It is within these two main themes that sub themes emerged illustrating different representations of Black women and how these themes have transcended from one curricula to another. The findings further illustrate some similarities and differences between the textbooks in terms of how they represent Black women and highlight that the representation of Black women is still based on the marginalisation in the roles and identity in history.