The Individual, Auto/biography and History in South Africa

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Tabata’s biography did not emerge organically. Nor was it uncontested. It was produced by conscious biographic work by Dora Taylor, particularly from the early 1960s. And as much as Tabata’s biography was asserted as part of the movement’s political work, so it was also contested along with challenges to his exercise of power. It is to this record of biographic work and contestation that we must now turn. 394
CHAPTER SEVEN DORA TAYLOR AND THE NARRATION OF I.B. TABATA’S LIFE: BIOGRAPHICAL RELATIONS AND RECIPROCAL CONSTRUCTIONS In order to comprehend the history of I.B. Tabata’s biography more fully, it is necessary to understand the relations through which it was produced. Indeed, Tabata’s biography was produced through quite definite biographical relations, which were constituted in the public sphere as well as in settings that were behind the scenes. One such biographical relation ‐ perhaps the most significant ‐ was his connection with Dora Taylor, with whom he had a structured, ongoing relationship in a borderland between the public and the private domains. This relationship was sustained through different phases from at least the early 1940s. It was Dora Taylor who was Tabata’s primary biographer, who produced the biographic narrations that were required as the politics of presidentialism took root in the 1960s as a decisive mode of political campaigning on the part of the Unity Movement in exile. This biographic work culminated in the creation of an archival collection, which was repatriated to South Africa and incorporated into a university archive as a legacy of resistance history and political leadership. In the previous chapter, we saw that Dora Taylor’s relationship with I.B. Tabata was that of the political associate and assistant. From about 1941, her political energies became almost exclusively directed towards assisting Tabata in his correspondence and in his political writing. Often, Taylor’s work has been understood as that of the secretary and amanuensis. However, it is possible to argue that it extended beyond this, with Taylor being the co‐author of ideas and strategies, as well as a range of written works that were published under Tabata’s name or pseudonym. In this chapter, we examine the relationship between Tabata and Taylor more fully, in an attempt to historicise its development and understand its various dimensions. This is absolutely necessary because 395
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The Individual, Auto/biography and
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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This dissertation
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committee members selected me to ta
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TABLE OF CONTENTS Acknowledgements
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Authorship, individuation and the b
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ABBREVIATIONS AAC All‐African Con
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INTRODUCTION The research for this
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transformation in the Eastern Cape?
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South African society provided the
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manifest dishonesty. Through a case
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genealogy of biographic mediation w
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tribute to Tabata that Taylor const
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CHAPTER ONE AUTO/BIOGRAPHY, NARRATI
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self‐constitution and the “styl
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intercourse entailed in this metaph
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1930s, with decreasing institutiona
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psychological characteristics” wh
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entextualised in diverse ways”, c
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While all mankind may be the subjec
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life’ and career as the focus hav
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development, a “narrative of inte
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denies the centrality of the subjec
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story, creating a ‘transferential
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een backward‐looking. Their commu
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[w]e need to attend to the historic
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enacted, lived in particular conjun
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‘representivity’ would constitu
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through particular enunciative stra
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ones. 114 Modernity gave rise to li
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These, in turn, have a profound eff
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are also to be found in the ‘stor
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historian, personal and political,
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sites of the ‘memorial complex’
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These biographies of ‘great polit
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der Post family. 17 Even Bertolt Br
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While the limitations of Jones’ b
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and work had emphasised the serious
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accused Mother Teresa of promulgati
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Mother Teresa, “hoping some of he
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sainthood”, the amount of miracle
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This biographic world of saint vene
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dared to be that person”. She “
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and popular circuits of exchange an
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institutions that make up the exhib
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participation in annual heroic comm
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Biographic memorial productions hav
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myths, while radio and television p
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the monument was removed during the
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about the past, as “political eli
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suggesting that use was merely made
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and “The Annual Salute to Greatne
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the use of his image”. 106 Moreov
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In this radical biographic interpre
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In addition to this standard biogra
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National Civil Rights Museum in Mem
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Although Mao’s image had been use
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more varied … [and] far more exci
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esistance hero in general, of hope
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issues about image‐making and aut
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Lumumba who could stand in oppositi
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CHAPTER THREE RESISTANCE STUDIES AN
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in “a wide range of inventive pol
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marginalised, grassroots people [an
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Since the 1970s, the terrain of res
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In an obvious sense, these studies
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Under the conditions of deepening r
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Crucially, this feature found expre
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established through his professiona
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scepticism, 35 the use of this noti
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“glimpse into the inner mind of o
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Higgs and Steven Gish also followed
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understand the background, politica
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national and land questions” conc
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Higgs’ study was largely a chrono
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South Africans to protest against t
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In these traditional ‘masculinist
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1980s in South African scholarship,
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academic institutions involved in t
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struggles over municipal controls d
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that during the 1950s, a period see
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away from biographic images of cons
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orthography with “self‐appointe
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middle section had vacillated. Anot
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Biography has also been a vehicle f
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After collecting oral testimony fro
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and ‘jumping the fence’ led to
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whose value depended on their accur
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(probably Nkadimeng) in a resettlem
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determine the voice and style in wh
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memory into a written academic prod
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Biography for social history was a
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esistance history sought to provide
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and La Hausse were completed by sch
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consciousness, conversations, and/o
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A foray into biography in the work
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ceased to be the major site for the
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study did not go far enough in the
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continued political role”. It was
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In exploring these issues of image,
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While Clingman’s study has posed
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state they contested”, as the col
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focusing on the creation of systems
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and survival against the onslaught
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and reconciliation in South Africa.
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accustomed to clear hierarchies bet
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South African public history. This
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unifier and a liberator of the mind
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these ways, the Mayibuye Centre was
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together, these booklets attempted
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Biography also provided the basis o
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As part of these transformations, M
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leader, Bill Andrews. 58 Written fr
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It is this biographic impetus which
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the post‐apartheid present, and t
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Ngcelwane, whose family had had bee
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of softnesses and roughnesses” of
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extended to other arenas of public
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These images of the Business Day re
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once stood in central Pretoria, was
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declared a national monument on 12
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University’s Mark Haywood felt th
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Ministry of Water Affairs and Fores
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to the present. This project would
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was missed to develop a complex her
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contemplation and celebration were
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Morris Isaacson High School, Regina
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The Museum was really inaugurated,
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through biographic presentation. Bu
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2003. Thabo Mbeki expressed the poi
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In contrast, Ronnie Kasrils, Modise
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narratives and moral trajectories o
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visual terms as part of a president
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especially one who had been a long
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applications had to make a biograph
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In April 2003, the Nelson Mandela F
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ooklet was organised as a chronolog
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single sitting”. 191 However, it
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In 1999, Anthony Sampson, who had b
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eating breakfast and even shaving a
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(Mandela’s birth place), on the b
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“triumph of the human spirit”,
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sought to contest the tendency for
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deepening in Robben Island’s cult
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follow the advice of Anthony Sampso
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was asked to speak about the accuse
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new conditions of exile was the con
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importance of relations of cultural
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construction of Nelson Mandela has
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iography in public and commercial s
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artist, Jacob Khumalo, who had exhi
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epresentatives on the Nelson Mandel
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eliance, self‐respect and self‐
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PART TWO BEYOND MODERNIST HISTORY:
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marginality. Among the materials in
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Gradually, in drips and drabs, the
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While Fort Hare in the Eastern Cape
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for the field of political biograph
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microfilm collection contained a su
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and Karis may have received from Ta
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and reserve dwellers, arguing that
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Indeed, in this genealogy, the most
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and was conducted as part of a wide
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In making these assessments, Hirson
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policy that had envisaged redivided
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formation of APDUSA in January 1961
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“effectively … smashed within t
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opportunities that presented themse
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and verbal performances, which have
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political leadership was exercised
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CHAPTER SIX FROM COLLECTIVE LEADERS
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special protest meetings in convene
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upture was coming to a head, when h
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principles”. 18 Another aspect of
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included on the back cover of such
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political training did not take pla
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pertinent to the themes of this cha
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cause, rather than the leader”. T
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341
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Page 363 and 364: asic passport‐type pen picture sa
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Page 369 and 370: of individualised leadership may ha
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Page 379 and 380: ooted in the past”, he suggested,
Page 381 and 382: During 1949 and 1950, amid mounting
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Page 385 and 386: Elsewhere on the left, Tabata’s b
Page 387 and 388: occurred in which Tabata was subjec
Page 389 and 390: Tabata, as an individual, bore a po
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Page 395 and 396: Education for Barbarism marked Taba
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Page 403 and 404: While Tabata’s presidency may hav
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Page 407: circulated as the embodiment of its
Page 411 and 412: Soon after Tabata arrived in Cape T
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Page 415 and 416: was “tolerably easy”. In fact,
Page 417 and 418: her text had been “written in its
Page 419 and 420: the eastern Cape about which she wr
Page 421 and 422: While she was writing The Rôle of
Page 423 and 424: out of the strains and pressures of
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Page 427 and 428: moved into Gool’s newly rented ho
Page 429 and 430: off by expressing his “envy” of
Page 431 and 432: They had a full life and she a full
Page 433 and 434: emotional and sexual desires as the
Page 435 and 436: Fashioning Tabata’s biography Vir
Page 437 and 438: continued to rework and re‐edit T
Page 439 and 440: us”. Goolam Gool, he had argued,
Page 441 and 442: political practice”. Tabata assur
Page 443 and 444: Nine that the AAC and Unity Movemen
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Page 447 and 448: production of I.B. Tabata made a mi
Page 449 and 450: political work in the movement, in
Page 451 and 452: political leadership. By that time,
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Page 455 and 456: their political exchanges. 9 Later,
Page 457 and 458: where “fierce debates and discuss
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education as well as mechanisms of
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identification”. This identity cl
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need for leadership”. Tabata invi
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Likewise, concepts of strategic val
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was also invited to join along with
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fundamental and genuine manner and
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them. Sihlali’s presidentship of
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expressed had been “essentially h
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By the 1950s, increased internal bl
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way of their own greatness?” 76 A
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“suspended” from the movement,
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Thereafter, Alexander and his comra
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“mounting to a climax”. Jane Go
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From around 1960, leaders of the Un
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The movement’s ‘architect’ al
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with the other liberation movements
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The ADC was a means of Tabata “ri
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ureaucratic abuse and of trying to
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econstituted APDUSA represented an
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NUM. They found instead a hostility
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significance of deceased ‘heroes
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A man … surrounded by a sea of pe
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and Alie and Ursula Fataar had assi
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491
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in “his contribution” to the li
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Almost unexpectedly, at his funeral
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497
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community of Lesseyton interred one
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The final entry of Tabata’s body
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heritage sites and collections. I w
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discovered heritage constructions o
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national heritage, even when those
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elevant information from my researc
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disrespectful. And the fact that th
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what I offer here is more than a st
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(e) Central Archives Depot, Pretori
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Ilizwi leSizwe, Vol. 1, No 2, 18 Oc
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(b) Other Videos Hell’s Angel: Mo
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(f) CD‐Roms Nelson Mandela: The s
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Hector Pieterson Memorial and Museu
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7. INTERVIEWS AND RECORDINGS OF SPE
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William Beinart and Colin Bundy, Hi
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Stephen Clingman, The Novels of Nad
Page 545 and 546:
Jurgen Habermas, The Structural Tra
Page 547 and 548:
Dominic LaCapra, Writing History, W
Page 549 and 550:
David Morley and Ken Worpole (eds),
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James D Sexton (ed), Son of Tecum U
Page 553 and 554:
Susan G Wynne (Compiler), South Afr
Page 555 and 556:
Elizabeth S Cohen, ‘Court Testimo
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Brian Elliot, ‘Biography, Family
Page 559 and 560:
Baruch Hirson, ‘Ruth Schechter: F
Page 561 and 562:
Desiree Lewis, ‘Winnie Mandela: T
Page 563 and 564:
Bill Nasson, ‘A Sharecropper’s
Page 565 and 566:
Hilary Sapire, ‘African Political
Page 567 and 568:
Dora Taylor, ‘They Speak of Afric
Page 569 and 570:
Kwame Anthony Appiah, ‘Cosmopolit
Page 571 and 572:
Twentieth Century’, Paper present
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