Apartheid and South Africa
MIT OpenCourseWare offers this history course on the rise and fall of apartheid in South Africa, tracing the legal, spatial, economic, and political structures that built the racist order and the forces that brought it down. Topics include industrialization and the growth of a Black working class, land alienation and rural struggles, township poverty and violence, Black education policy, the African National Congress, and the Black Consciousness Movement. The course also examines how race, ethnicity, and sexuality were constructed under apartheid law and how various movements resisted it. Materials include the syllabus, reading lists, and assignments used in MIT's classroom version of the course, free to access through MIT OpenCourseWare with no certificate offered. It suits students wanting a structured grounding in twentieth century South African history and the mechanics of a state-enforced racial order.