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<plimb@library.uwa.edu.au>
In connection with Paul Landau's stimulating essay on
Photography & Colonial Vision (H-Africa 27 May 1999), I
wonder if colonial photography/ers can be accused of
*consistent* historical falsification?
In other connections, the practice of the exclusion of
peoples from the writing or representation of history have
been characterised as historical falsification. What was the
role of photography in Africa in this regard: adjunct and/or
accomplice to historical falsification?
The recent book on colonial photography in Namibia is very
instructive in this regard but I am particularly interested
in the relationship between HISTORY as a discipline and
colonial photography. In the first part of the 20th century
there was a tendency by professional South African
historians, then entirely white, to marginalise or ignore
blacks and their organisations. One scours in vain, for
example, even more liberal histories, such as E.A. Walker,
_A History of South Africa_ (London: Longmans, 1928) for any
mention of the ANC or indeed of 20th century Africans. But
then there aren't any photographs in this work. When did
historians in Africa first start to employ photographs and
in what ways?
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