Abstract

PLAATJIES-VAN HUFFEL, Mary-Anne. The unsettling story about Allan Boesak's involvement in the struggle against apartheid. Studia Hist. Ecc. [online]. 2018, vol.44, n.1, pp.1-23. ISSN 2412-4265.  http://dx.doi.org/10.25159/24124265/3552.

The poststructuralist assertion is that all meaning and knowledge are discursively construed through language and other signifying practices. In order to decipher the story of Boesak, the author made use of the notions of poststructuralists, namely Foucault, Spivey, Milne, and so forth. The media has been the major authority that delimited, designated, named and established Boesak as an object of the discourse. The media constitutes Allan Boesak and simultaneously constitutes the dominant, prevailing discourse regarding his life and work. The legacy of Boesak is, therefore, portrayed as constituted socially and is consequently inherently unstable. The following subsections are being discussed in the article, namely: the role of the media in construing Boesak; the formation of Boesak as the object of the discourse; Boesak's early involvement; Boesak's engagement with church and society during 1982-1990; and Boesak our leader, we are not throwing a friend to the wolves.

Keywords : Apartheid; Belydende Kring; black theology; Boesak; heresy; liberation theologian; Programme to Combat Racism; theological anthropology; World Alliance of Reformed Churches; Foucault.

        · text in English     · English ( pdf )