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INTRODUCTION AND UNIVERSITY HISTORIES AS A GENRE

University histories offer the historian another angle with which to investigate the past. In South Africa the growth of universities and higher education took place at a very significant historical moment. In the first place, its establishment followed a century and a half of dramatic change and growth in European universities. Secondly, its significant expansion occurred during a pivotal period in South African history after the discovery of minerals with its accompanying rapid industrialisation and the South African War (1899-1902) which brought the whole of South Africa under the control of Great Britain. Thus, the story of universities and their early history can add to an understanding of this complex period. One of the significant facets of this era is related to the dramatically changing nature of white identities in South Africa. After the events of the War, white South Africans were left to redefine themselves in a changing and changed setting. A new unified white identity known as broad South Africanism was promoted in a number of quarters by the successive administrations of the Transvaal and South African Union. For the purposes of this project, institutions for higher learning were viewed by both the public and the country’s authorities as critical places where the country’s youth could be welded together into a new broad South African nation, learning tolerance and broad-mindedness. The Transvaal University College (TUC) was one such institution which in its early years was committed to furthering this ideal.
Unlike a general trend in universities histories, this thesis will not be a comprehensive history of the TUC in its early years. As will be discussed later in the chapter, a wealth of details of the institution’s early history have already been compiled into a lengthy volume. Instead, this thesis will examine the TUC specifically through the lens of white identity, in particular according to the concept of broad South Africanism. It will thus endeavour to shed light on the relationship between the College and its wider social and political context, in line with more recent trends in the writing of university histories. This study made use of all the relevant available primary documentation for the period under review. This included official documentation of the TUC mainly in the form of Council and Senate minutes, correspondence, student reminiscences, TUC publications, yearbooks, collections of various student societies and ephemera. Every attempt was made to consult all the relevant material available in particularly the University of Pretoria Archives for the period in questionNewspapers, government publications and relevant collections in other archives and repositories have also been consulted.
The thesis comprises of eight chapters. The first is an introduction and besides presenting an overview of the topic, outlining the contents of the thesis and clarifying some terminology, it also considers the nature of university histories as a genre of historical writing. It will begin by briefly defining the university and the field of university histories. In this regard it will investigate the multi-faceted nature of studies of university history and their place within a number of academic disciplines. It will then give a brief overview of some of the more significant trends in the writing of university histories, from the writing of more traditional commemorative histories to studies which use the university in order to shed light on wider social, political and economic questions. It will also review a number of South African university histories in order to highlight the ways in which this field of study has been approached in this country. Finally, there is a review of the histories of the TUC and later University of Pretoria (UP), pointing out the scope, merits and weaknesses of historical publications regarding the institution in light of the chapter’s foregoing discussion of this genre of historical writing.
University development in South Africa, and in particular the establishment of a number of university colleges of which the TUC was one, took place at a time when the university in Europe had undergone almost a century of growth and reform. In order to understand adequately the context in which South African universities and university colleges developed, chapter two will investigate European university developments in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Following a general discussion of aspects of the university’s evolution in Europe at this time, this chapter will also highlight more particularly specific features of university growth in Great Britain as British models had a strong influence on South African university development. This chapter will also briefly consider the spread of universities to the colonial world.
Continuing the theme of university growth and evolution, chapter three will give an overview of university development in South Africa in order to provide the context in which the TUC was established. After outlining university growth until the 1916 University Acts, this chapter will then consider the development of higher education in the Transvaal more specifically. This will cover the period from before the South African War until the start of university classes in Pretoria in 1908, including the establishment of the TUC and the history of its predecessors. It will examine the influence of different university models on the university debate of the time, paying particular attention to aspirations in the Transvaal to establish a teaching university and the division of higher education between the region’s two primary cities, Johannesburg and Pretoria.

Table of Contents

• Abstract
• DEDICATION
  
• LIST OF TABLE
  
• LIST OF FIGURES
• CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTION AND UNIVERSITY HISTORIES AS A GENRE
• The university and university histories – defining the field.
• Trends and approaches
• South African university histories
• University of Pretoria histories
• Conclusion
• CHAPTER II. EXPORTING MODELS: EUROPEAN UNIVERSITIES IN THE NINETEENTH AND EARLY TWENTIETH CENTURIES
• The university in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century
• British models
• Spread to the colonial world
• Conclusion
• CHAPTER III. THE TRANSVAAL HIGHER EDUCATION LANDSCAPE
• Higher education in South Africa
• Higher education in the Transvaal
• The Transvaal Technical Institute
• Het Volk, Smuts and Pretoria
• Conclusion
• CHAPTER IV. THE DEVELOPMENT OF BROAD SOUTH AFRICANISM AND  CONCILIATION
• The South African War and white unity
• Milner, the Kindergarten and English-speaking South Africanism
• Botha, Smuts and Afrikaner conciliation
• The Union of South Africa and white identity
• Conclusion
• CHAPTER V. BROAD SOUTH AFRICANISM AND CONCILIATION IN HIGHER EDUCATION
• Higher education and white unity at the end of the nineteenth century
• Education in the Crown Colony period
• Conciliation in education in the responsible government period
• Union and the search for a national teaching university
• The 1916 University Acts and beyond
• Nation building and higher education
• Conclusion
• CHAPTER VI. INTENDED BROAD SOUTH AFRICANISM AT THE TUC
• The TUC: a broad South Africanist endeavour
• “To sink or swim” (1908-1913)
• Conclusion.
• CHAPTER VII. DISCORD IN BROAD SOUTH AFRICANISM AT THE TUC.
• “We have already been bribed into schism” (1914-1918)
• The flag incident revisited
• Conclusion.
• CHAPTER VIII. EPILOGUE
• IX. BIBLIOGRAPHY

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