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Black Consciousness Movement (BCM)

On 12 September 1977, the Black Consciousness leader Steve Biko died while in the custody of security police. The period leading up to his death, beginning with the June 1976 unrest, had seen some of the most turbulent events in South African history, the first signs that the apartheid regime would not be able to maintain its oppressive rule without massive resistance.

The Soweto riots were followed by continuous unrest: students and workers in the townships of every province boycotted schools, universities and workplaces, and the regime was hard put to restore the apartheid order. By mid-1977, this had by and large been achieved, but elements of resistance and defiance continued to emerge.

Biko’s death threatened to unleash a new wave of protests, and drew the attention of the world to the situation in South Africa. Biko’s funeral on 25 September was attended by some 15000 people, including the American ambassador and 11 other diplomats. A ban on open-air gatherings was extended to March 1978.

The outrage of the US Congress at Biko’s death became evident when 128 of its members from both the Republican and Democratic parties sent a letter to the government urging that it allow an international team to go to South Africa to examine laws relating to political prisoners and detention.

By 18 October, the Cabinet had decided to rack down on the most prominent Blak Consciousness-aligned organisations, and the next day, on 19 October, the government went ahead and banned 18 organisations (listed below). About 70 activists were arrested, including several members of the Soweto Committee of Ten, and many were banned, including Biko’s friend and supporter, editor of the Daily Despatch, Donald Woods . Two newspapers, The World and The Weekend World, were also closed down.

International outrage now took a more serious turn. The US, the Netherlands, Great Britain, West Germany and Belgium all recalled their ambassadors for consultations.

Instead of embarking on a process of reform, the apartheid government took steps to clamp down on resistance, and bolstered its means of keeping the Black population in check. One of the most significant of these was the power to curtail freedom of speech and the publication of material it deemed subversive.

By 28 October, the government enforced the Newspaper and Imprint Registration Act no 19, a version of an earlier act that required that all newspapers be registered and conform to a strict code of conduct. Newspapers were also required to lodge a large amount of money (in the region of R40000) as a deposit before they could publish. The move was essentially a means to ensure that newspapers toed the line and regulated themselves, lest they be banned.

Organisations banned on 19 October 1977:

Black People's Convention (BPC)
South African Students' Organisation (SASO)
South African Students' Movement (SASM)
Union of Black Journalists
Black Community Programmes Limited (BCP)
Black Parents' Association (BPA)
Border Youth Organisation
Soweto Students' Representative Council (SSRC)
African Social Education and Cultural Education (ASSECA)
Black Women's Federation
National Youth Organisation
Eastern Province Youth Organisation
Medupe Writers' Association
Natal Youth Organisation
Transvaal Youth Organisation
Western Cape Youth Organisation
Zimele Trust Fund
Siyazinceda Trust Fund

Timeline: The Black Consciousness Movement

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Steve biko and the black consciousness movement.

Leslie Anne Hadfield Leslie Anne Hadfield Department of History, Brigham Young University
https://doi.org/10.1093/acrefore/9780190277734.013.83
Published online: 27 February 2017

The Black Consciousness movement of South Africa instigated a social, cultural, and political awakening in the country in the 1970s. By the mid-1960s, major anti-apartheid organizations in South Africa such as the African National Congress and Pan-Africanist Congress had been virtually silenced by government repression. In 1969, Steve Biko and other black students frustrated with white leadership in multi-racial student organizations formed an exclusively black association. Out of the South African Students’ Organization (SASO) came what was termed Black Consciousness. This philosophy redefined “black” as an inclusive, positive identity and taught that black South Africans could make meaningful change in their society if “conscientized” or awakened to their self-worth and the need for activism. The movement emboldened youth, contributed to the development of Black Theology and cultural movements, and led to the formation of new community and political organizations such as the Black Community Programs organization and the Black People’s Convention.

Articulate and charismatic, Steve Biko was one of the movement’s foremost instigators and prolific writers. When the South African government understood the threat Black Consciousness posed to apartheid, it worked to silence the movement and its leaders. Biko was banished to his home district in the Eastern Cape, where he continued to build community development programs and have a strong political influence. His death at the hands of security police in September 1977 revealed the brutality of South African security forces and the extent to which the state would go to maintain white supremacy. After Biko’s death, the state declared Black Consciousness–related organizations illegal. Activists formed the Azanian People’s Organization (AZAPO) in 1978 to carry on Black Consciousness ideals, though the movement in general waned after Biko’s death. Since then, Biko has loomed over the history of the Black Consciousness movement as a powerful icon and celebrated hero while others have looked to Black Consciousness in forging a new black future for South Africa.

Black Consciousness
South African Student’s Organization
liberation movements

The Rise of Black Consciousness

The Black Consciousness movement became one of the most influential anti-apartheid movements of the 1970s in South Africa. While many parts of the African continent gained independence, the apartheid state increased its repression of black liberation movements in the 1960s. In the latter part of the decade, the major anti-apartheid organizations worked underground or in exile. The state also increased its extra-legal tactics of intimidation, silencing some activists by kidnapping or killing them. This state action crippled anti-apartheid activity and instilled a sense of fear in the larger black community. The state also began creating so-called homelands—small reserves intended to become independent countries for specific ethnic groups to curb black political opposition and urbanization while retaining access to black labor. All of this perpetuated deep-seated cultural racism in South Africa.

As state repression increased, universities and churches tended to have greater freedom to speak out against the government and facilitated the sharing of ideas. The 1960s saw an increase in Christian social movements and growing opposition to apartheid in churches and ecumenical organizations. Both economic prosperity and greater government control led to higher numbers of black students in primary and secondary schools and the expansion of black universities, segregated according to ethnicity. Although apartheid education restricted black aspirations, these schools also became places of politicization where black students could come together and share ideas and experiences. These elements along with the daily experiences and interpretations of individuals who made up the Black Consciousness movement all contributed to its growth. As emerging young adults unencumbered by the fear of older generations, these activists looked for a way to fundamentally change their society. They did this first by targeting the mind of black people in South Africa. But the movement was also about immediate and relevant action that would make South Africans self-reliant. In other words, it sought a full liberation of black South Africans by starting at the level of the individual, an approach not overtly political to begin with.

SASO and Black Consciousness

The beginning of the movement is marked by the formation of the South African Students’ Organization (SASO), officially launched in July 1969 . Black students at various universities, especially at the University of Natal Medical School–Black Section (UNB), the University of Fort Hare, and the University of the North at Turfloop, became increasingly frustrated with the limits of white student leadership in multiracial organizations. At a National Union of South African Students (NUSAS) meeting held in Grahamstown in 1967 and a University Christian Movement (UCM) conference in Stutterheim in July 1968 , the mostly white leadership would not act decisively to challenge the enforced racial segregation of accommodations for the students at the conference. Led primarily by Steve Biko and Barney Pityana, black students decided to form an exclusively black organization to more effectively advance the cause of the oppressed in South Africa.

SASO laid the foundation for what would grow beyond universities and student groups to become a wider movement. It was in SASO that activists formulated the Black Consciousness philosophy. SASO students also started engaging in community development programs and artistic and literary production and eventually moved into political defiance against the state.

Members of SASO as university students had access to a number of different ideas and engaged with each other—students who came to universities with diverse backgrounds, but similar experiences. They also had access to news media and reading materials through student-activist networks. As they debated and read materials from various parts of Africa and the African diaspora, these students formulated what they began to call Black Consciousness. In addition to the influences of various South African perspectives and their experience in student politics, a number of philosophers and leaders from the African continent and the African diaspora helped shape their thinking. Daniel Magaziner described them as “autonomous shoppers in the marketplace of ideas.” 1 SASO students studied Franz Fanon’s analysis of the psychological impact of colonialism, Jean-Paul Sartre’s dialectical analysis, Zambia’s K. K. Kaunda’s African humanism, and Tanzania’s Julius Nyerere’s version of African socialism that emphasized self-reliance and development for liberation. They also read from black American authors, particularly identifying with the Black Power movement (even adopting the raised fist as a gesture of black pride in South Africa) and analyzing the Black Theology of James Cone. SASO students also drew upon the writings of Brazil’s educationalist, Paulo Freire, from which they derived the idea of “to conscientize”—to awaken people to a critical awareness of their situation and their ability to change their situation.

Black Consciousness began to be defined as “an attitude of mind” or “way of life” of black people who believed in their potential and value as black people and saw the need for black people to work together for a holistic liberation. SASO students explained South Africa’s main problem as twofold: white racism and black acquiescence to that racism. They felt that in general, black people had accepted their own inferiority in society. Without a positive, creative sense of self, black people would not challenge the status quo. “The most potent weapon in the hands of the oppressor [was] the mind of the oppressed,” Biko argued. 2 Thus, Black Consciousness activists worked to change the black mindset, to look inward to build black capacity to realize their own liberation. Biko wrote that colonialism, missionaries, and apartheid had made the black man “a shell, a shadow of man, completely defeated, drowning in his own misery, a slave, an ox bearing the yoke of oppression with sheepish timidity.” He continued:

This is the first truth, bitter as it may seem, that we have to acknowledge before we can start on any programme [ sic ] designed to change the status quo…. The first step therefore is to make the black man come to himself; to pump back life into his empty shell; to infuse him with pride and dignity, to remind him of his complicity in the crime of allowing himself to be misused and therefore letting evil reign supreme in the country of his birth. 3

In affecting a black psychological, social, economic, and even spiritual liberation, activists saw two aspects as vitally important. First, they defined black as a new positive definition that included all people of color discriminated against by the color of their skin. This was a new approach to grouping people divided into apartheid into Coloureds (mixed-race people), Indians, and various black African ethnic groups. They wanted to make South Africa African in the end (though they had a vaguely defined future) but used a political definition of black that referred to a shared experience and outlook that was more cosmopolitan in celebrating black values and culture. A positive black identity would increase black people’s faith in their own potential. Black unity also presented a stronger front against apartheid. SASO came to strongly reject the participation of black South Africans in any apartheid institution that emphasized ethnic separation (including the so-called African homelands). Second, Black Consciousness activists rejected white liberals (whom they defined as any white person seeking to oppose apartheid). They saw white leadership as an obstacle to black liberation because it stifled black leadership and psychological development. As black people understood fully the oppression they experienced firsthand, activists believed they had the insights and knowledge to know what needed to change. White leadership would hinder the development of a truly self-reliant, black society. The phrase “Black man you are on your own” became a slogan of the movement. For many people, including white liberals, this came across as abrasive and startling. Some even accused SASO of promoting reverse racism. For others, it led to a refreshing, emboldened new consciousness.

SASO began with a few black students who worked to recruit other students across black campuses. This was not always easy, but strongholds developed at the University of the North, Zululand, Fort Hare, the Western Cape, and in Durban. SASO students in these various universities traveled around trying to prompt a psychological change among blacks in a number of ways. From the beginning of SASO, students engaged in community work. This began as a way to relieve the suffering of black people in poverty. Yet community projects were also seen as a way to uplift black communities psychologically as well as to improve black self-reliance. Each campus group ran projects in neighboring communities, such as volunteering in local clinics, helping to secure a clean water supply, and running education and literacy programs. The students learned from their experiences and drew upon the methodologies of Freire in particular to help them refine this work.

SASO also spread Black Consciousness through the SASO Newsletter , wherein activists described their philosophy, shared news, and dealt with the nature of their oppression. Asserting the right to speak was important for these activists and they claimed this right in the newsletter, along with other literary forms such as poems and plays. The newsletter also reported on various student meetings where students developed their thinking, debated strategies for the future, and discussed how to engage with the broader community. So-called formation schools—weekend or holiday camps—served as training grounds where students debated societal issues and learned organizational strategies. Acutely aware of the politically hostile environment within which it worked, SASO made it a point to train a number of layers of leadership to ensure the organization would continue if state repression were to hit.

A marker of the “attitude” and “way of life” of Black Consciousness activists was the way they carried themselves. The clothes they wore, their demeanor when interacting with white people, and the music they listened to all portrayed confidence and pride in blackness. The young women involved in the Black Consciousness especially challenged the status quo with new styles by throwing away their skin-lightening creams and wigs and wearing their hair in natural Afros. They also wore bold styles in clothing that pushed the boundaries of what was acceptable at the time, such as very tight pants. Some even smoked cigarettes in public. Though female students were involved in the movement from the beginning—prominent SASO women include Vuyelwa Mashalaba, Deborah Matshoba, Daphne Matshoba, Lindelwe Mabandla, Mamphela Ramphele, Thenjiwe Mthintso—the movement was dominated by male students. Women’s issues were tabled in favor of focusing on black liberation. Female activists had to excel at male ways of debating to gain an influence in SASO. The students also held parties where young women were treated more as objects of sexual desire. For some, this means that women had more conservative roles in the movement; however, some women did gain leadership in the movement, especially in community projects where they challenged conventional gender roles.

The Broader Movement

Before the state took action to suppress Black Consciousness, its influence had expanded beyond university campuses. With the spread of ideas and expansion of organizations linked to Black Consciousness, what began as a student organization grew into a movement with a broad, diffused impact that can be difficult to generalize about or trace precisely.

Cultural Movement

The movement had cultural dimensions, linked in varying degrees to formal organizations. Black Consciousness ideas resonated with poets and theater groups in particular. Some worked directly with SASO. For example, a group of black students and actors from Durban, many of Indian descent, performed their plays at SASO events (these activists formed the Theatre Council of Natal or TECON as well as the South African Black Theatre Union or SABTU). Their plays, such as Black on White and Resurrection , examined what it meant to be black and oppressed in South Africa. Participants and playwrights such as Asha Rambally Moodley and Strinivasa Moodley joined Black Consciousness organizations, while others simply continued to use theater as a way to raise a critical awareness among black communities. Poets such as Oswald Mtshali, Mongane Wally Serote, Don Mattera, Mafika Pascal Gwala, and James Matthews, among others, similarly dealt with black oppression and sought to inspire hope in black self-determination with positive images and themes of resistance and redemption. Black Consciousness promoted music with black themes and origins and influenced the outlook and material in Sowetan literary magazines, such as The Classic , New Classic , and Staffrider . 4 As Mbulelo Mzamane has argued, Black Consciousness effectively used culture as a form of affecting a black awakening and resisting white supremacy in an oppressive political climate. 5

Black Theology

Black Consciousness also contributed to the development of Black Theology in South Africa. Ecumenical organizations, Christian activists, and Black Consciousness adherents all influenced each other. The University Christian Movement (UCM) established a project spearheaded by Sabelo Stanley Ntwasa on Black Theology coming from the United States—an interpretation of Christianity that taught that Christ came to liberate the poor and oppressed, the black populations in the United States and South Africa. SASO joined the UCM in engaging Black Theology in the South African context and resolved to influence a change in leadership in South African churches. SASO and other Black Consciousness organizations supported conferences focused on examining Christianity’s relevancy to black South Africans. 6 A number of those influenced by Black Theology later became leaders of Christian resistance and contextual theology, such as Alphaeus Zulu, Manas Buthelezi, Desmond Tutu, Allan Boesak, and Frank Chikane. Activists worked closely with radical priests and ecumenical organizations, significantly putting these Christian ideals into action. 7

Black Community Programs

In September of 1971 , the Christian Institute and the South African Council of Churches appointed Bennie Khoapa as the director of a division of their Special Project on Christian Action in Society (Spro-cas 2). As the head of the Black Community Programs (BCP), Khoapa combined Christian action with the Black Consciousness philosophy. The organization sought to coordinate among other agencies run by and in the black community and to conscientize black South Africans through publication projects that provided relevant news for black people and promoted a positive black identity. The BCP eventually moved to run its own projects when activists working for the organization found themselves restricted to their home areas by banning orders in 1973 . For example, it ran health clinics such as the Zanempilo Community Health Center in the Eastern Cape, managed cottage industries like the Njwaxa leatherwork factory also in the Eastern Cape, and opened resource centers at its regional offices. It published a yearbook, Black Review . The BCP gave practical expression to Black Consciousness ideals. BCP publications encouraged black publishing in South Africa and became a trusted source of positive information in black communities. Research in villages where the BCP ran its projects has demonstrated that health and economic projects in the Eastern Cape improved black people’s physical conditions and helped villagers gain a greater sense of human dignity. Through this work, the BCP also significantly addressed women’s issues and female activists proved themselves as capable leaders and respected colleagues. 8

The Black People’s Convention

At the same time that some activists saw community and cultural work as essential for reaching their goals, others advocated for a national organization to push for more immediate political change. This led to the formation of the Black People’s Convention (BPC). In 1971 at meetings of various black agencies to discuss the formation of a national coordinating organization (including the Interdenominational African Ministers’ Association and the Association for the Educational and Cultural Advancement of the African People), proponents of establishing an overtly political organization (such as Aubrey Mokoape and Harry Nengwekhulu) gained a majority over those who saw community development as a more sure way of building up strength for future political work. The BPC was launched in July 1972 and held its first national conference in December, where Winifred Kgware was elected as one its first president. The principal aim of the BPC was defined as fostering black political unity in the Black Consciousness sense in order to achieve psychological and physical liberation. This included creating an egalitarian society, developing Black Theology, and condemning foreign countries working with the apartheid government, among other objectives. The BPC was the first black national political organization formed since 1960 and took a strong stance of non-participation in the apartheid system. Membership did not grow as rapidly or as widely as the BPC hoped. By the end of 1973 , the BPC had forty-one branches. Still, the BPC helped organize the pro-FRELIMO rallies and continued to refine its future vision for South Africa, including the much debated Mafeking Manifesto that outlined a specific mixed-economy future for South Africa. 9

Youth and Leadership

Activists also influenced high school students and the development of youth movements, directly and indirectly. SASO and the BCP held youth leadership conferences or formation schools that engaged students in critical social analysis and taught organizational skills. These meetings eventually led to the formation of regional youth organizations and the National Youth Organization (NYO, formed in 1973 ). In Soweto, where student organizations had already been operating, SASO students and events in general helped spread Black Consciousness among high school students. SASO leader Onkgopotse Abraham Tiro, expelled from the University of the North, and other SASO students ended up teaching in high schools in Soweto. The already existing African Student Movement changed its name to the South African Student Movement (SASM), to be more inclusive. It was SASM that organized the June 16, 1976 , Soweto student march against the use of Afrikaans as a medium of instruction that led to widespread uprisings. Although the Black Consciousness movement cannot claim credit for orchestrating the Soweto Uprisings, the movement’s bold assertion of black self-worth and self-reliance clearly influenced high school students, and SASM aligned itself to Black Consciousness organizations. The student uprisings of 1976 , along with other adult leaders who became involved in running community programs in Soweto (such as Ramsey Ramokgopa and Oshadi Mangena), are evidence of the way Black Consciousness ideas changed South African thinking among different groups of people in various corners of the country. 10

Clashes with the State

State repression profoundly shaped the context and direction of the Black Consciousness movement. Aware of the way the state cracked down on resistance in the early 1960s, SASO leaders deliberately avoided confrontation with the state in order to evade crippling state action. Still, activists took care to nurture leadership so that replacements were ready to fill in positions if the police detained people in leadership roles. Initially, the state saw the formation of an exclusively black student organization as fitting with apartheid. However, it soon understood that Black Consciousness undermined the whole philosophy behind apartheid and increasingly bore down on the movement and its leaders. The state’s efforts to silence activists included bans on individuals (legal orders that restricted a person’s movement, political involvement, and public presence), numerous detentions without trial (for up to 180 days at times), and constant police surveillance and intimidation. Activists learned to outwit the police. Their youthful energy and audacity sustained their activity in this politically hostile environment. They also found hope in suffering at the hands of the state because they viewed it as a sacrifice that advanced South Africa closer to liberation. 11

Confrontation with the state escalated first in 1972 , when Tiro, the Student Representative Council president at the University of the North, gave a speech criticizing the university’s white leadership and the racial discrimination infused in its education. The university expelled Tiro. This sparked a number of black student strikes across the country. Many of these students were in turn expelled and at the beginning of 1973 ; the state placed banning orders on a number of SASO leaders including Biko, Pityana, Nengwekhulu, Saths Cooper, Strini Moodley, and Bokwe Mafuna. This scattered activists throughout the country, although they found ways to continue their work.

State repression of Black Consciousness activists intensified in the next few years, especially as activists took more overt action against the state. A particularly important move in this direction was the pro-FRELIMO rallies held at the University of the North and in Durban in September 1974 to celebrate the liberation of a neighboring country from European colonialism and express their support for the people of Mozambique. The minister of justice declared the rallies illegal just before they were to take place. The leaders of SASO and the BPC decided to go through with their original plans, even if it meant violent clashes with police. Police did indeed break up the rallies using some violence. This led to further arrests and detentions of activists and a publicized court case that essentially put Black Consciousness on trial ( State v. Cooper et al., also known as the SASO-BPC trial). Nine men were tried and convicted of encouraging racial hostility. 12 Even if not all Black Consciousness activists agreed with the way the rallies were held, this move marked them more firmly as enemies of the state and gave the movement a more public place in anti-apartheid politics.

Police harassment, detentions, and bannings spiked again after the 1976 student uprisings and continued into 1977 . This took a toll on the lives of many activists. Detentions put a psychological strain on individuals and their families, and increasingly brutal torture inflicted physical damage. Four Black Consciousness activists died between 1972 and 1977 as a result of the actions of South African security forces: Mthuli ka Shezi was pushed onto a train track in 1972 , Tiro was letter-bombed in Botswana in 1974 , Mapetla Mohapi (SASO organizer) was killed in the Kei Road police station in 1976 , and Biko died at the hands of the security police in 1977 .

Bantu Stephen Biko, the most prominent figure of the Black Consciousness movement, was not the only student, thinker, writer, and community project director in the movement, but he did play a significant role in forming SASO, spreading the Black Consciousness philosophy, and running and advising the BPC, among other informal roles. His charismatic personality drew people to him. His death at the hands of the South African security police thus had significant repercussions for the Black Consciousness movement and made him a famous martyr.

Born at Tarkastad on December 18, 1946 , to Mzingaye and Alice Duna Biko, Biko grew up in Ginsberg (a small township of King William’s Town in the Eastern Cape). Biko’s father was a policeman (studying for a law degree by correspondence) until he died of an illness in 1950 . Biko’s mother subsequently supported her four children—Bukelwa, Khaya, Bantu, and Nobandile—by working as a domestic maid, then a cook at Grey Hospital in King William’s Town. Biko’s mother was a committed Christian and was often remembered for the way she helped people in need in the township or people in transit at the train station nearby. This kind of community involvement and devotion influenced each of her children in their chosen professions later in life.

The Ginsberg community was a small but racially and economically diverse and vibrant community in the 1950s and 1960s. Biko lived with Coloured neighbors, and Ginsberg’s Weir Hall hosted a number of musical events. There were also a number of sports clubs. Although the community had politically involved people, Biko himself was not interested in politics as a young boy. His siblings, friends, and classmates remember him as being a highly capable student but one who was very playful and sociable. His academic achievements won him support from his community, which organized a bursary for him to join his older brother at the Lovedale Institution to finish high school when he was sixteen years old. His brother’s political activities with the Pan Africanist Congress led to his detention and then expulsion from Lovedale in 1963 . This experience politicized Biko. He resented the abuse of authority by the police, especially as he thought about his brother’s experience. His schooling had also been interrupted, leaving him at home to think while his peers busied themselves with school work. In 1964 , he continued his schooling at St. Francis College, a Roman Catholic school in Mariannhill in the then Natal province. There he further distinguished himself as an outstanding student and questioned authorities and their Christian beliefs. He also held stimulating intellectual debates about African independence with other students.

Biko’s scholastic achievements won him a spot at the UNB medical school, the only place where black people could study medicine during apartheid. There Steve interacted with black people of various backgrounds and began to play a role in student politics at the university. He joined NUSAS and also interacted with the UCM. It is through these student networks that he began working with other students such as Pityana to start SASO. He traveled around the country with Pityana and others to persuade students at black colleges and universities to join SASO and to explain the Black Consciousness philosophy. He served as SASO’s first president. His room at the medical school residency served as the SASO office. After one year in office, SASO elected Pityana as president and Biko took the role of publications officer. Using the pseudonym Frank Talk, he instituted a series in SASO’s newsletter entitled, “I Write What I Like,” where he tackled a number of issues and explained Black Consciousness. Former friends and activists remember Biko as one who enabled others, rather than seeking leadership roles. He also continued to find joy in his associations with people—of all racial backgrounds—mixing intellectual and political conversations with his socializing. He was known for his demanding work ethic as well as his ability to hold his drink.

During his time in Durban he met and married a nursing student, Nontsikelelo (Ntsiki) Mashalaba, with whom he had two sons, Nkosinathi (b. 1971 ) and Samora (b. 1975 ). Biko loved his family and spending time with his children; however, he did not put boundaries on his romantic and sexual relationships with women. It was also during his time in Durban that Biko met and worked with Ramphele, with whom he had a long-standing affair. He and Ramphele had a daughter, Lerato (who lived for two months in 1974 ), and a son, Hlumelo (b. 1978 ). Biko had affairs with a number of other women as well. One, Lorrain Tabane, gave birth to Biko’s daughter Motlatsi (b. 1977 ). Although their student days were marked by parties with women and drinking, a number of Biko’s friends later confronted him about his womanizing, as did his wife and Ramphele. Yet Biko seems to have been unwilling or unable to resolve the controversies and pain he caused through this behavior before his death. While he worked well with many women as colleagues and fellow activists, he at times struggled to concede that traditional gender roles could change. 13

In 1972 , Biko was expelled from medical school and left to find a way to support his young son and wife (who was also fired because of her husband’s political involvement). This led to his employment by Khoapa as a field officer for the BCP, his only official employment ever. In Durban, he worked on coordinating among various black organizations and on producing the Black Review . In 1973 , his banning sent him back to Ginsberg. This changed his work and the direction of the BCP. He set up an Eastern Cape branch of the BCP in King William’s Town, from where he helped establish the Zanempilo clinic, took over the Njwaxa project, ran the BCP office and resource center, continued to assist with publications, and started other bursary and grocery coop programs in Ginsberg. He also continued to be involved politically, despite constant police surveillance and attempts to arrest and detain him, and started studying for a law degree by correspondence. Even when he was further restricted by the government from working officially for the BCP in 1975 , he continued to advise on the projects and political matters. The BPC even elected him as an honorary president in 1977 to give him authority to cultivate unity among the various black political groups in the country at the time. Working against the apartheid security forces was a challenge, especially when Biko felt isolated and watched his fellow activists and friends suffer. But Biko also found ways to circumvent police surveillance and to challenge their authority. He was detained, arrested, and accused several times (though never convicted). He was also called to testify at the SASO-BPC trial, which gave him a public platform to define Black Consciousness and display his debating skills. He also famously befriended Donald Woods, the white East London Daily Dispatch newspaper editor, which gave the movement inroads into the media and other networks.

Biko continued to work on unifying the various black groups even under his banning orders. The last trip he took outside of his restricted banning area led him to Cape Town with fellow activist Peter Jones on August 17, 1977 , to meet with various people including Black Consciousness activists as well as Neville Alexander of the Unity Movement. The meetings never materialized. Fearing negative repercussions if they stayed too long, Jones and Biko turned back the next day. They were stopped at a roadblock just outside of Grahamstown. A problem with opening the trunk of the car they had borrowed made the police suspicious. When the police found out they had detained two leaders of the Black Consciousness movement, they arrested the two and sent them to security police headquarters in Port Elizabeth. Biko and Jones suffered physical torture at the hands of the security police.

On September 6, the police took their physical beatings of Biko too far. Police testimonies indicate that Biko’s refusal to submit to disrespectful treatment led the police to beat him and run him into the wall. Biko collapsed. Instead of providing medical treatment, the police chained him to a gate in a standing position. They only called in a district surgeon the next day. Despite evidence of brain damage, the police kept Biko naked and chained up in his cell until his conditioned worsened. On September, the police loaded Biko naked into the back of a police van and drove him through the night to Pretoria Central Prison for medical care. He was pronounced dead there on September 12, 1977 .

The announcement of Biko’s death sparked an international outcry. At first the government said Biko had died of a hunger strike. However, evidence from a postmortem examination proved that Biko had died of head injuries. An inquest into the death of Biko was held, but no one was convicted. Later evidence showed that the police and the medical professionals involved lied at the inquest about the timing of the care Biko received and the cause of the nature of the physical scuffle that led to Biko’s death. When the case was brought to the post-apartheid Truth and Reconciliation Commission, the hearings shed further light on the physical struggle that led to Biko’s death and the medical doctors’ complicity but left members of the Biko family dissatisfied with the police officers’ disclosure. The TRC denied amnesty to all of the police officers involved in the hearings. Biko’s death remains a poignant example of the brutality and dishonesty of government security forces as well as the medical sector during apartheid.

Thousands of people attended Biko’s funeral in King William’s Town. A few weeks later, the government banned all Black Consciousness–related organizations including SASO, the BCP, the BPC, and other sympathetic organizations, newspapers, and individuals. Because of Biko’s role in the Black Consciousness movement and the nature of his death, he became the movement’s main martyr. This has influenced the way in which he has been celebrated and remembered. Biko is often placed at the center of histories of the Black Consciousness movement. He was one of the first liberation movement heroes to be memorialized in the post-apartheid era with a statue, his gravesite, and his home being dedicated in 1997 , the 20th anniversary of his death. Soon afterwards, his widow and oldest son, Nkosinathi, formed the Steve Biko Foundation, which contributes to the celebration and shaping of Biko’s character. Yet many have claimed Biko as a progenitor or hero. Community members, people involved in the projects he ran, his friends and colleagues, political parties, and public intellectuals look to Biko. Almost all remember his good characteristics (although his peers are more willing to recognize his faults). He is particularly seen as someone who sacrificed for the nation when in the post-apartheid period leaders from liberation movements are charged with corruption and self-serving politics. He has also been elevated as a leading intellectual and political activist, someone who spoke out boldly and affirmed black dignity. For some, he stands as a revolutionary, while others see him as entrenched in community work.

Post-1977 Black Consciousness Directions

The apartheid state dealt a heavy blow to the Black Consciousness movement after Biko’s death when it declared all Black Consciousness–related organizations illegal. However, activists regrouped in various ways to continue their work. As Mbulelo Mzamane, Bavusile Maaba, and Nkosinathi Biko wrote, different views about the end goal of Black Consciousness manifested themselves in the directions activists took after 1977 . 14 Some continued with community development projects as a practical way of advancing the material position of black people while also improving black self-perceptions. For example, Malusi and Thoko Mpumlwana started the Zingisa Education Fund in the place of the Ginsberg Education Fund and later established the Trust for Christian Outreach and Education (an umbrella for other community development organizations). Ramphele established the Ithuseng Community Health Centre in Tzaneen, where she had been banned, based on the Zanempilo Community Health Centre model.

On the other hand, disagreements already stirring in the movement surfaced about what kind of action would move South Africa closer to freedom and the validity of an analysis that saw economic class as the main cause of inequality. Those advocating a more direct confrontation with the state had already begun to join armed organizations outside the country. Other activists still in the country saw an above-ground political organization as the best way to embody Black Consciousness and affect change. In 1978 , a group of activists met in Roodepoort to form the Azanian People’s Organisation (AZAPO), designed to defy state repression and carry on the work of the BPC. While AZAPO sought to address various aspects of the black experience, it soon adhered to a more socialist interpretation and approach, even emphasizing workers’ concerns. Black Consciousness leadership in Ginsberg had previously highlighted the importance of changing unequal economic structures that disadvantaged the black majority and activists had begun exploring the idea of “black communalism,” but AZAPO now adopted a more explicit class analysis, which it called “scientific socialism.” Activists in AZAPO saw Black Consciousness’s focus on black self-reliance as making it a distinctively different organization, in opposition to other socialist-leaning organizations like the ANC and its supporters. This resulted at times in physically violent clashes. (The PAC and AZAPO have also clashed at times. 15 ) Activists in exile formed the Black Consciousness Movement of Azania (BCMA) as a sort of wing to AZAPO that operated in the 1980s.

Other activists took their conscientized outlook with them as they joined various existing organizations such as the ANC and the PAC. For them, Black Consciousness was an “attitude of mind” and “way of life” that black people needed to adopt, no matter what political organization they belonged to. Some activists in exile, for instance, who had been part of the BCMA eventually decided an additional organization was unnecessary and joined other organizations.

Different interpretations of Black Consciousness and various activists have persisted as people ask what it means to be free in a post-apartheid South Africa. AZAPO is still a political party, although a minor one (and it too has had breakaway factions). Others have written in the same style as Frank Talk. Some have interpreted Black Consciousness simply as promoting black economic and political ascendency or a celebration of black culture (which has translated into clothing lines, for instance). Others look to Black Consciousness for answers about how to uproot residual colonialism. In the early 2000s, younger generations of South Africans, transcending political party boundaries, looked to Black Consciousness as a radical challenge to prevailing racial structures. For example, university student movements in 2015 and 2016 evoked Black Consciousness when critiquing university curriculum and claiming a voice as youth. Some of these students saw a lack of black pride and economic inequality in South Africa as evidence of continued black oppression. Thus, black South Africans continue to evoke Black Consciousness.

Discussion of the Literature

Many scholars and writers have been inspired by Steve Biko and the Black Consciousness movement. This has resulted in a relatively large body of scholarship with authors primarily from South Africa and the United States taking perspectives ranging from the biographical and commemorative, political science, philosophy, history, and literary and visual arts. The amount of scholarship along with various news articles, commentaries, and short-run periodicals demonstrates the power of Biko as an icon and shows that people find relevancy in the movement’s ideas and history. Yet, many works reiterate common themes with an emphasis on Biko’s intellectual and political work.

The first authors who wrote about the Black Consciousness movement in the 1970s and 1980s included sympathetic political scientists and those seeking to commemorate Biko. A collection of Biko’s own writings was published along with a memoir by Biko’s friend, Father Aelred Stubbs, in 1978 , soon after Biko’s death. Various editions of this collection, entitled I Write What I Like , have appeared many times since. Three other books published at the same time similarly sought to publicize Biko’s ideas and expose the brutality of the apartheid regime, including Donald Woods’s Biko . 16 In a more scholarly vein, political scientists Gail Gerhart, Robert Fatton Jr., and CRD Halisi situated Black Consciousness in relation to other black political ideologies to discuss its ideas on race and citizenship. 17

The 1990s saw further commemoration of Biko, but a greater analysis of the Black Consciousness movement. Bounds of Possibility , a volume edited by Biko’s former colleagues and activists, included a brief biography of Biko and commemorative essays as well as various examinations of different aspects of the movement. Even though it perpetuated the focus on Biko, it broadened the analysis of the movement to touch on theology, cultural production, community engagement, and gender. Saleem Badat and Thomas Karis and Gerhart’s work in the late 1990s presaged greater historical analysis and summary of the movement found in subsequent works. 18 For example, in 2006 , Mbulelo Mzamane, Bavusile Maaba, and Nkosinathi Biko’s chapter in The Road to Democracy in South Africa , vol. 2, gave the most comprehensive summary of the movement to that date, and Bhekizizwe Peterson’s chapter in the same volume focused on Black Consciousness literary and other cultural work. 19 Former activists, friends, and politicians continued to add their personal reflections in monographs and edited collections, particularly at anniversaries of Biko’s death. 20 Biographies and edited collections in the early 2000s dealt with Black Consciousness’s philosophical, intellectual, and cultural production. This came as people questioned what it meant to be black and liberated in a post-apartheid, globalized world. For example, Andile Mngxitama, Amanda Alexander, and Nigel Gibson’s Biko Lives! began with a substantial section entitled “Philosophical Dialogues,” and Nigel Gibson and Lewis R Gordon have focused on Black Consciousness’s relation to Fanon and existential thought, respectively. 21

More historical analyses were published as the 1970s became more distant. These works explored the origins, contexts, and impact of the 1970s movement. Daniel R. Magaziner published the first historical monograph of Black Consciousness. His The Law and the Prophets examined the movement’s intellectual history in the context of its time. Leslie Anne Hadfield provided an in-depth analysis of the movement’s extensive community development work in Liberation and Development . 22 Other scholars have emphasized Biko’s longer intellectual heritage, manifested in the museum exhibit at the Steve Biko Centre in Ginsberg, and in Xolela Mangcu’s biography of Biko. 23 These, along with other works published at the same time, notably dealt with questions about the place of women and youth in the movement. 24

Scholars of other disciplines such as art history and theology have continued to explore various parts of the movement and Biko’s impact in depth. 25 Updated collections of Biko’s writings continue to be published. Repeated references to Black Consciousness in South African politics and the growth in scholarly work about the movement indicates that new questions will draw out different aspects of the history of Black Consciousness and Biko in the future. 26 However, many works continue to commemorate Biko and the intellectual aspects of the movement at the expense of greater coverage, complexity, and historical sensitivity. This also has the effect of confining analyses to the Black Consciousness movement of the 1970s, with Biko’s death in 1977 seen as the close of that era. More work on the various actors and broader reach of the movement, including a focus on different regional experiences and contemporary adaptations of Black Consciousness, could prove to be enlightening and productive avenues for further research.

Primary Sources

In relation to the beginnings of Black Consciousness with SASO, there is a relative abundance of published primary sources and sources accessible online. These include Biko’s writings, literary and organizational publications, memoirs and interviews published in edited volumes. On the other hand, many written records from the time when state repression and police harassment increased have been lost or destroyed. Furthermore, after 1977 , the movement was more diffused, resulting in a less cohesive archive for this time period. The written record thus poses challenges for reconstructing the history of the Black Consciousness movement and Biko. Historians have turned to various different sources to create a fuller picture of the movement. Most notably, they have conducted numerous oral histories to fill in the gaps of the written record.

Public Archives

In addition to published primary sources, there are two main archival repositories in South Africa that hold substantial collections on Biko and the Black Consciousness movement, both written and oral sources. The Steve Biko Foundation has created an archive, now housed at the Steve Biko Centre in Ginsberg. This collection brings together sources from major public and personal archives concerning Biko, Black Consciousness, Black community programs of the 1970s, and many of Biko’s contemporaries. It includes copies of the South African Department of Justice files related to Steve Biko and Black Consciousness activists, copies from papers at the University of the Witwatersrand, the Bruce Haigh Special Collection, documents pertaining to the TRC Amnesty Application by the killers of Steve Biko, cuttings from the Daily Dispatch 1972 to 2003 , master’s and doctoral theses, and the collections of scholars such as Magaziner and Hadfield (including the transcripts of the oral histories they conducted).

The Historical Papers division of the William Cullen Library at the University of Witwatersrand has an extensive collection of material related to human and civil rights in South Africa. It has accessions with materials on: Steve Biko; SASO; AZAPO and the Azanian Student’s Organization; the Black People’s Convention; the SASO-BPC trial; and the research materials of Thomas Karis and Gail M. Gerhart used to write From Protest to Challenge (also available on microfilm at the Center for Research Libraries in Chicago). It also holds several valuable accessions on related organizations, such as the papers of the Christian Institute and the South African Council of Churches and their joint program, Spro-cas, the parent organization of the BCP and the papers of the University Christian Movement, and NUSAS. Some of these materials have been digitized and can be accessed online through the archive’s website.

Two other archives hold important materials. The Unisa Documentation Centre for African Studies at the University of South Africa main library in Pretoria has organizational brochures and documents related to the BCP, BPC, and SASO that are not found elsewhere, along with other miscellaneous Black Consciousness papers. For research on AZAPO and the BCMA, the National Heritage and Cultural Studies Centre (NAHECS) at the University of Fort Hare has the most extensive collection in their accession on the Azanian People’s Organization/Black Consciousness Movement (AZAPO/BCM).

Digital and Filmed Collections

Primary sources may also be found in online collections: Digital Innovation South Africa (DISA) digital library has copies of Black Consciousness publications such as the SASO Newsletter and Black Review ; the Aluka digital library’s Struggles for Freedom in Southern Africa Collection includes a sampling of interviews and documents from Gerhart Interviews, Karis-Gerhart Collection, Magaziner Interviews, and NUSAS (but Aluka requires a subscription to access those materials); the Google Arts and Culture online exhibits includes a series on Biko with photographs and some documents. The South African History Online website includes a number of pages on Steve Biko, the Black Consciousness Movement, SASO, the BPC and SASO trial, and various activists with a sampling of primary documents linked to some of the pages. The Overcoming Apartheid website includes a multimedia resource page on the Black Consciousness movement with interviews from various activists. And finally, “The Black Consciousness Movement of South Africa—Material from the collection of Gail Gerhart,” filmed for the Cooperative Africana Microform Project (CAMP) is available on microfilm at the Center for Research Libraries in Chicago, Illinois.

Links to Digital Materials

Digital Innovation South Africa (DISA) .

Google Arts and Culture Institute: Steve Biko .

Overcoming Apartheid .

South African History Online .

Steve Biko: The Black Consciousness Movement

The saso, bcp & bpc years.

By Steve Biko Foundation

Stephen Bantu Biko was an anti-apartheid activist in South Africa in the 1960s and 1970s. A student leader, he later founded the Black Consciousness Movement which would empower and mobilize much of the urban black population. Since his death in police custody, he has been called a martyr of the anti-apartheid movement. While living, his writings and activism attempted to empower black people, and he was famous for his slogan “black is beautiful”, which he described as meaning: “man, you are okay as you are, begin to look upon yourself as a human being”. Scroll on to learn more about this iconic figure and his pivotal role in the Black Consciousness Movement...

“Black Consciousness is an attitude of mind and a way of life, the most positive call to emanate from the black world for a long time” - Biko

1666/67 University of Natal SRC

On completion of his matric at St Francis College, Biko registered for a medical degree at the University of Natal’s Black Section. The University of Natal professed liberalism and was home to some of the leading intellectuals of that tradition. The University of Natal had also become a magnet attracting a number of former black educators, some of the most academically capable members of black society, who had been removed from black colleges by the University Act of 1959. The University of Natal also attracted as law and medical students some of the brightest men and women from various parts of the country and from various political traditions. Their convergence at the University of Natal in the 1960s turned the University into a veritable intellectual hub, characterised by a diverse culture of vibrant political discourse. The University thus became the mainstay of what came to be known as the Durban Moment.

At Natal Biko hit the ground running. He was immediately influenced by, and in turn, influenced this dynamic environment. He was elected to serve on the Student's Representative Council (SRC) of 1966/67, in the year of his admission. Although he initially supported multiracial student groupings, principally the National Union of South African Students (NUSAS), a number of voices on campus were radically opposed to NUSAS, through which black students had tried for years to have their voices heard but to no avail. This kind of frustration with white liberalism was not altogether unknown to Steve Biko, who had experienced similar disappointment at Lovedale.

Medical Students at the University of Natal (Left to Right: Brigette Savage, Rogers Ragavan, Ben Ngubane, Steve Biko)

Correspondence designating Biko as an SRC delegate at the annual NUSAS Conference

In 1967, Biko participated as an SRC delegate at the annual NUSAS conference held at Rhodes University. A dispute arose at the conference when the host institution prohibited racially mixed accommodation in obedience to the Group Areas Act, one of the laws under apartheid that NUSAS professed to abhor but would not oppose. Instead NUSAS opted to drive on both sides of the road: it condemned Rhodes University officials while cautioning black delegates to act within the limits of the law. For Biko this was another defining moment that struck a raw nerve in him.

Speech by Dr. Saleem Badat, author of Black Man You Are on Your Own, on SASO

Reacting angrily, Biko slated the artificial integration of student politics and rejected liberalism as empty echoes by people who were not committed to rattling the status quo but who skilfully extracted what best suited them “from the exclusive pool of white privileges”. This gave rise to what became known as the Best-able debate: Were white liberals the people best able to define the tempo and texture of black resistance? This debate had a double thrust. On the one hand, it was aimed at disabusing white society of its superiority complex and challenged the liberal establishment to rethink its presumed role as the mouthpiece of the oppressed. On the other, it was designed as an equally frank critique of black society, targeting its passivity that cast blacks in the role of “spectators” in the course of history. The 7th April 1960 saw the banning of the African National Congress and the Pan African Congress and the imprisonment of the leadership of the liberation movement had created a culture of apathy

Bantu Stephen Biko

“ We have set out on a quest for true humanity, and somewhere on the distant horizon we can see the glittering prize. Let us march forth with courage and determination, drawing strength from our common plight and our brotherhood. In time we shall be in a position to bestow upon South Africa the greatest gift possible - a more human face.”

Biko argued that true liberation was possible only when black people were, themselves, agents of change. In his view, this agency was a function of a new identity and consciousness, which was devoid of the inferiority complex that plagued black society. Only when white and black societies addressed issues of race openly would there be some hope for genuine integration and non-racialism.

Transcript of a 1972 Interview with Biko

At the University Christian Movement (UCM) meeting at Stutterheim in 1968, Biko made further inroads into black student politics by targeting key individuals and harnessing support for an exclusively black movement. In 1969, at the University of the North near Pietersburg, and with students of the University of Natal playing a leading role, African students launched a blacks-only student organisation, the South African Student Organisation (SASO). SASO committed itself to the philosophy of black consciousness. Biko was elected president.

Black Student Manifesto

The idea that blacks could define and organise themselves and determine their own destiny through a new political and cultural identity rooted in black consciousness swept through most black campuses, among those who had experienced the frustrations of years of deference to whites. In a short time, SASO became closely identified with 'Black Power' and African humanism and was reinforced by ideas emanating from Diasporan Africa. Successes elsewhere on the continent, which saw a number of countries, achieve independence from their colonial masters also fed into the language of black consciousness.

SASO's Definition of Black Consciousness

Cover of a 1971 SASO Newsletter

“ In 1968 we started forming what is now called SASO... which was firmly based on Black Consciousness, the essence of which was for the black man to elevate his own position by positively looking at those value systems that make him distinctively a man in society” - Biko

Cover of a 1971 SASO Newsletter

Cover of a 1972 SASO Newsletter

Cover of SASO newsletter, 1973

Cover of a 1975 SASO Newsletter

Steve Biko speaks on BCM

The Black People’s Convention By 1971, the influence of SASO had spread well beyond tertiary education campuses. A growing body of people who were part of SASO were also exiting the university system and needed a political home. SASO leaders moved for the establishment of a new wing of their organisation that would embrace broader civil society. The Black People’s Convention (BPC) with just such an aim was launched in 1972. The BPC immediately addressed the problems of black workers, whose unions were not yet recognised by the law. This invariably set the new organisation on a collision path with the security forces. By the end of the year, however, forty-one branches were said to exist. Black church leaders, artists, organised labour and others were becoming increasingly politicised and, despite the banning in 1973 of some of the leading figures in the movement, black consciousness exponents became most outspoken, courageous and provocative in their defiance of white supremacy.

BPC Membership Card

Minutes of the first meeting of the Black People's Convention

In 1974 nine leaders of SASO and BPC were charged with fomenting unrest. The accused used the seventeen-month trial as a platform to state the case of black consciousness in a trial that became known as the Trial of Ideas. They were found guilty and sentenced to various terms of imprisonment, although acquitted on the main charge of being party to a revolutionary conspiracy.

SASO/BPC Trial Coverage SASO/BPC Trial Coverage BPC Members

SASO/BPC Coverage

Poster from the 1974 Viva Frelimo Rally

Their conviction simply strengthened the black consciousness movement. Growing influence led to the formation of the South African Students Movement (SASM), which targeted and organised at high school level. SASM was to play a pivotal role in the student uprisings of 1976.

Barney Pityana, Founding SASO Member

In 1972, the year of the birth of the BPC, Biko was expelled from medical school. His political activities had taken a toll on his studies. More importantly, however, according to his friend and comrade Barney Pityana, “his own expansive search for knowledge had gone well beyond the field of medicine.” Biko would later go on to study law through the University of South Africa.

Steve Biko's Order Form for Law Textbooks

Upon leaving university, Biko joined the Durban offices of the Black Community Programmes (BCP), the developmental wing of the Black People Convention, as an employee reporting to Ben Khoapa. The Black Community Programmes engaged in a number of community-based projects and published a yearly called Black Review, which provided an analysis of political trends in the country.

Black Community Programmes Pamphlet

Overview of the BCP

BCP Head, Ben Khoapa

86 Beatrice Street, Former Headquarters of the BCP

"To understand me correctly you have to say that there were no fears expressed" - Biko

Ben Khoapa, Beatrice Street Circa 2007

Biko's Banning Order

When Biko was banned in March 1973, along with Khoapa, Pityana and others, he was deported from Durban to his home town, King William’s Town. Many of the other leaders of SASO, BPC, and BCP were relocated to disparate and isolated locations. Apart from assaulting the capacity of the organisations to function, the bannings were also intended to break the spirit of individual leaders, many of whom would be rendered inactive by the accompanying banning restrictions and thus waste away.

Following his banning, Biko targeted local organic intellectuals whom he engaged with as much vigour as he had engaged the more academic intellectuals at the University of Natal. Only this time, the focus was on giving depth to the practical dimension of BC ideas on development, which had been birthed within SASO and the BPC. He set up the King William’s Town office (No 15 Leopold Street) of the Black Community Programmes office where he stood as Branch Executive. The organisation focused on projects in Health, Education, Job Creation and other areas of community development.

No 15 Leopold Street , Former King William's Town Offices of the BCP

It was not long before his banning order was amended to restrict him from any meaningful association with the BCP. Biko could not meet with more that one person at a time. He could not leave the magisterial area of King William’s Town without permission from the police. He could not participate in public functions nor could he be published or quoted.

Zanempilo Clinic, a BPC Clinic

These restrictions on him and others in the BCM and their regular arrests, forced the development of a multiplicity of layers of leadership within the organisation in order to increase the buoyancy of the organisation. Notwithstanding the challenges, the local Black Community Programme office did well, managing among other achievements to build and operate Zanempilo Clinic, the most advanced community health centre of its time built without public funding. According to Dr. Ramphele, “it was a statement intended to demonstrate how little, with proper planning and organisation, it takes to deliver the most basic of services to our people.” Dr. Ramphele and Dr. Solombela served as resident doctors at Zanempilo Clinic.

Community Member from Njwaxa

Other projects under Biko’s office included Njwaxa Leatherworks Project, a community crèche and a number of other initiatives. Biko was also instrumental in founding in 1975 the Zimele Trust Fund set up to assist political prisoners and their families. Zimele Trust did not discriminate on the basis of party affiliation. In addition, Biko set up the Ginsberg Educational Trust to assist black students. This trust was also a plough-back to a community that had once assisted him with his own education.

Click on the Steve Biko Foundation logo to continue your journey into Biko's extraordinary life. Take a look at Steve Biko: The Black Consciousness Movement, Steve Biko: The Final Days, and Steve Biko: The Legacy.

—Steve Biko Foundation:

Steve Biko: The Inquest

Steve biko foundation, 11 february 1990: mandela's release from prison, africa media online, detention without trial in john vorster square, south african history archive (saha), what happened at the treason trial, steve biko: final days, 9 august 1956: the women's anti-pass march, steve biko: the early years, the signs that defined the apartheid, steve biko: legacy, leadership during the rise and fall of apartheid.

Corrections

What was the Black Consciousness Movement in South Africa?

The Black Consciousness Movement was a resistance movement during the apartheid era that restored the dignity of black South Africans.

black consciousness movement biko solidarity

As colonialism in South Africa transformed into the brutality of apartheid , the role of black people in South African society was pushed to a position of absolute contempt. Black people worked the most menial jobs. They worked in the mines and on the farms. Many cleaned the houses of white people and worked in their gardens. Others were infantilized to the point where white people referred to black adults as “boy” or “girl.” Not only was their dignity stripped by the society in which they lived, but in their own minds, they were instilled with a sense of no self-worth. Anger at their predicament often turned to self-pity as they grew tired of fighting against such a powerful adversary.

In the 1960s, after the jailing of many African National Congress and Pan-Africanist Congress members, as well as the banning of these two organizations themselves, resistance took a new route. The Black Consciousness Movement sprung up and moved to instill in non-white people a sense of political consciousness and a restoration of their human dignity.

Ideology of the Black Consciousness Movement

black consciousness movement umkhonto wesizwe

For many black people, the early apartheid years were a time of frustration regarding feeling represented on any meaningful level. The African National Congress and Pan-Africanist Congress, movements that represented the hopes of black people, were banned and had difficulty making themselves present in South African society. Although the armed wing of the ANC, uMkhonto we Sizwe (founded by Nelson Mandela ), was active, it was a small guerilla army that couldn’t occupy South African land and did not have diplomatic power to win concessions from the apartheid government. In the perceived vacuum of black leadership, various organizations sprang up to address various issues relevant to the struggle for liberation and human rights for black South Africans.

The theoretical underpinning of the Black Consciousness Movement was one of re-shaping the dignity of black people by focusing on the fact that they were black. In this context, the term “black” was used to describe all non-white people. The existence of black culture and history were championed as sources of pride that formed a foundation for black people not feeling as if they had to be judged by white norms and standards. Through these circumstances, black people were offered the chance to be psychologically liberated, even under conditions where this freedom was suppressed.

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Many of these ideas were spread via the words of activist Stephen Biko . He became a symbol of the struggle for liberation, especially after his death at the hands of apartheid police in 1977. His ideas were influenced from many sources, such as WEB Du Bois , Marcus Garvey, Aimé Césaire, Frantz Fanon, and Léopold Senghor. The Black Consciousness Movement also drew much influence from political ideologies such as Marxism, Leninism, Pan-Africanism, African Socialism, and even included black theology, which became integral as it provided an alternative for spiritual expression.

The Early Years of the Black Consciousness Movement

The BCM was kickstarted by black students who wanted distinct black power separate from the supposedly “non-racial” student groups in which white students were the majority. They fought for an identity that unified all oppressed people in South Africa. The movement spread rapidly as black people found a new sense of pride. Many took part in leadership seminars, and Black Community Programs were established and served as avenues for self-sufficiency in black communities. Through the BCP, buildings were constructed all over the country to serve the needs of black people and the BCM. Many journals were also published and disseminated within black communities, including Black Voice, Black Review , Black Perspective , and Creativity in Development .

black consciousness movement frelimo rally

The BCP also organized mass protests and strikes, severely impacting the country in the early 1970s. In 1973, the government began to respond forcefully to these movements and banned them under the pretext that these movements were treasonous to black development. Widespread arrests were made, including the leadership of the BCP and the South African Students Organization (SASO). The following year, many top members of the BCM were arrested after holding a protest in support of the socialist FRELIMO government in neighboring Mozambique (there was a civil war between FRELIMO and the capitalist RENAMO. The apartheid government supported the latter). These leaders used the arrests as an opportunity to explain their ideology. Instead of the movement being crushed, it grew even further in popularity.

From 1976 Onwards

The BCM was deeply involved in the protests which shook the country in 1976. Thousands of students took to the streets to protest the new laws, which demanded that black people be taught in Afrikaans. These protests led to a riot on June 16, where South African police opened fire with live ammunition, leading to the deaths of 176 people (some estimates put the toll at over 700).

In the wake of the protests, the government tried to quell the growing unrest. This led to the arrest of Steve Biko. On September 12, 1977, Biko was beaten to death while in custody. A month after his death, the government declared 19 organizations linked to the BCM to be illegal. This further motivated black people to resist, and a new generation of activists swelled the ranks of the ANC and joined more established organizations such as the ANC, even though they were banned. Meetings were held to discuss new ways to resist, and out of these meetings, the Azanian People’s Organization was created: a political party that, along with the ANC and the PAC, still exists in South Africa’s political sphere. The movement also was helped in the form of one of South Africa’s most prominent voices, that of Nobel Peace Prize recipient Archbishop Desmond Tutu , who garnered support from all over the world.

The success of the BCM was also the reason for its decline. It instilled in many a sense of resistance and encouraged the growth of resistance nationwide. Many BCM members formed their own organizations, which evolved away from the tenets of the BCM movement. Nevertheless, the BCM had clearly been a success, as the black population had found a renewed sense of self-worth and the will to resist the injustices pressed upon them.

Meanwhile, the ANC came back to prominence as its plight was recognized internationally, and its support allowed it to be a presence within the lives of black South Africans who swelled its ranks.

The Legacy of the Black Consciousness Movement

While the heyday of the BCM is certainly over, it is because it is no longer needed on such a large scale. In that, it is clear that the BCM accomplished what it set out to do. The Black Consciousness Movement exists as an ideology and a theoretical viewpoint from which to conduct other activities. After the fall of apartheid, it was no longer necessary to conduct resistance movements, but nevertheless, the tenets of black consciousness are prominent in South African politics today. Chief among them is the restoration and preservation of dignity. Although technically aimed across the racial divide, it is clear that the theory is enacted where it is most needed.

Despite its success, however, the BCM was not without criticism. Donald Woods, a white liberal and close friend of Steve Biko, remarked on “the unavoidably racist aspects of Black Consciousness.” Its focus on “blackness” did not attract widespread appeal from other non-white groups. While it received much support from many who came to power after the fall of apartheid (and many who subsequently reside in government today), the emphasis of a movement solely for non-white people is very much downplayed by many South African politicians including Nelson Mandela . This attitude shows that the focus on “blackness” is at odds with the ANC government’s ideal of multi-racialism. In this, critics argue that the BCM’s ideas are obsolete and act as a hindrance to the ideals of New South Africa.

Other critics argue that the movement was ineffective in roles other than providing a theoretical framework for other organizations. They also argue that the community programs enacted by the BCM were too small to make significant differences. In addition, it has been pointed out that the BCM failed to bridge tribal divides among black South Africans–divides that still exist today.

Nevertheless, the BCM is still celebrated today as a significant part of the struggle for freedom. For many black people, the theories are just as important today as they were when they were founded.

Two Colonizers in South Africa: The British vs. The Dutch

By Greg Beyer BA History & Linguistics, Journalism Diploma Greg specializes in African History. He holds a BA in History & Linguistics and a Journalism Diploma from the University of Cape Town. A former English teacher, he now excels in academic writing and pursues his passion for art through drawing and painting in his free time.

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Black Consciousness Movement vs. Apartheid in South Africa Essay

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Introduction

The system of apartheid, the movement, the influence.

31 years ago, in September 1977, Bantu Stephen Biko, a young black activist, and a fighter against apartheid in South Africa have been killed in police torture chambers. Although he was only one of many young black figures of resistance who have become victims of the special forces of the police in South Africa, he, undoubtedly, was one of the great prophets of his generation. More than 20 000 people from all of the country have gathered to honor his memory at the funeral – having collected, thus, one of the most mass demonstrations in South Africa in the seventies.

Outside of South Africa, the news about his death has stirred up a wave of criticism against the policy of apartheid. Biko called for consciousness awakening, considering it as a means of resistance to oppression, against reconciliation with existence within a system that was based on inequality. He has gone through the way from an activist of one of the student’s organizations, which united black and white students, to the leader and the ideologist of one of the largest protest movements in South Africa which struggled and fought for blacks’ rights. The short life – 30 years which has been taken away – Biko has devoted to the dethronement of apartheid’s defects, the system of a social organization that brought sufferings to the black population of South Africa.

In his representation, the black consciousness is a way to resist racism not only by the rallying of the oppressed black majority, but also by the realized formation of the fundamentally excellent system of social relations: “Black Consciousness is, in essence, the realization by the black man of the need to rally together with his brothers around the cause of their operation – the blackness of their skin – and to operate as a group in order to rid themselves of the shackles that bind them to perpetual servitude.” 1

This essay despite its introduction is not about one man, it is about the movement that was influenced by a man and played a major role in the revival of resistance to apartheid in South Africa with the main idea that the ideology of Black Consciousness was the basis of African resistances towards white domination.

The system of apartheid has its roots in the 350-year-old history of religious, land, and labor conflicts. In 1652 a group of Dutch immigrants has landed on the Cape of Good Hope and has gradually based a colony with rigid social division, living at the expense of the cultivation of the fertile earth by using the labor of slaves from Africa and Asia. In 1795 the control over territory was grasped by Great Britain, and Dutch-Afrikaners have moved in the depth of the continent and have based their new colonies. In 1899-1902 the British have suppressed a revolt in what is called the Second Boer War. “The war lasted three years and resulted mainly from a combination of personal ambition, conflict over a sea route to India, and most importantly, competition for control of the gold-mining developing in Witwatersrand.” 2

After the declaration in 1910 of the Union of South Africa in which the former territories of British and the Boers have entered, the Afrikaners united under the power of the British monarch, who appeared in the majority had accepted the constitution in which basis laid the principle of the superiority of the white race. This was followed by the legislation that set the racial segregation by which almost all the land has been assigned to white owners, and the African, Asian, and “colored” population has been gradually superseded from the political life.

Following the declaration of the Union of South Africa, South African Native National Congress has been formed, and renamed in 1923 into the African National Congress, for racial discrimination counteraction, the fight for suffrage and equality while the shifting governments of the country steadily rejected its demands. Over half a century the rights of the black population were continuously denied through various acts that put further restrictions with each one released.

For example in 1913 an act called the Natives Land Act “prohibited African purchase or lease of land outside certain areas known as “reserves” 3 The Natives (Urban Areas) Act of 1923 stated that “Africans were denied freehold property rights and were only allowed in South African cities “For so long as their presence is demanded by the wants of the white population.” 4 After the power was captured in 1948 by the extremist Nationalist party which called itself the Gesuiwerde (purified) National Party formed by D.F. Malan, the system of apartheid became rooted in South Africa until 1994. The politics and policies of apartheid separated South Africa from the rest of the world through systematic and legal segregation upheld and defined by a small but powerful white bureaucracy. 5

During the apartheid regime the culture, not only youth but also public, was frequently imposed from above, instead of being developed naturally on the basis of consciousness and historical continuity. The concept of consciousness imposed from above has been multiplied by the concept of an ethnic accessory which was defined by ideology and was supported by group interests. The policy that was born from the philosophy of the iridescent nation considers the many-sided nature and dynamism of various groups and does not accept the concepts of “natural”, static and invariable group or groups as it was treated by the apartheid’s regime.

This fact allowed the black population to start positioning themselves as the others in the cultural environment that was dominated by the white population. In South Africa, this tendency was shown in the creation of the organization under the name the “Black Consciousness Movement”. Helping black people in clearing the psychological inferiority complex which prevailed centuries over them in their political thinking and activity, and, especially, in their struggle against the domination of the white is mostly attributed to Steve Biko and the Black Consciousness Movement.

The strategy of clearing of white domination and inequality, offered to the black population by Steve Biko and the Black Consciousness Movement, was focused on the principle that carrying out any changes is possible only within the limits of the program developed by the black population. For this purpose, the black population should overcome the feeling of inferiority that was intentionally cultivated by the apartheid regime with the purpose of preserving the white domination in South Africa. “The racism we meet does not only exist on an individual basis; it is also institutionalized to make it look like the South African way of life” 6

It was in this climate that Steve Biko founded the SASO as an alternate to the existing student organizations NUSAS that was not very effective recently. The white leaders of NUSAS (National Union of South African Students) acknowledged that they faced limitations in resisting apartheid and trying to represent blacks as equals 7 . Thus, the black consciousness movement began with the formation of the SASO.

The SASO Manifesto adopted in July 1971, declared that Black Consciousness was “an attitude of mind, a way of life, in which the black man saw himself as self-defined and not as defined by others”. It required “group cohesion and solidarity” so that blacks could become increasingly aware of their collective economic and political power 8 .

Black Consciousness aimed at creating a social order dominated by a black way of life and thought, permeating a certain cultural blackness in all customs, tastes, values, religious and political principles, and all social relationships in their intellectual and moral connotation 9 . The black consciousness movement also brought to light the writings of African leaders that had been so far neglected, some of which included the works of Cheikh Anta Diop, Leopold Senghor on Negritude, Kenneth Kaunda on African humanism, and most importantly, Julius Nyerere on self-reliance and ujamaa or African socialism.

The evolving nature of the Black Consciousness Movement gave the struggle against apartheid a very dynamic front – by providing a conciliatory or revolutionary, a peaceful or violent, a bourgeois or socialist dimension to the confrontation between blacks and whites. By eschewing violence and emphasizing black cultural and psychological emancipation from white domination, the Black Consciousness Movement was initially the vehicle of a black philosophy of pride and self-affirmation invigorated by an ethic of “Christian Liberation”.

As the movement gradually came to recognize that it can be truly effective only if it addresses the real issues of class struggle and the fundamental role that the individual has in abolishing oppressive social structures, the Movement started focusing on the problem of the superstructure. As the most radical impact the black consciousness movement had on the resistance to Apartheid, the movement underlined that the black revolution which was made ineffective by the material structure can be rejuvenated only by the transformation of the black intellect. Thus, the revolution would occur only if the black mind stripped itself from submission to white hegemony and erected on its own foundations the principles of the new moral order.

While the intellectual elite stuck to the subtle points of BC ideology the common masses embraced the movement’s rhetoric in its emotional form, as a form of angry self-assertion 10 . Although the ideology was interpreted by angry youngsters as Black Consciousness and did not exactly resemble the set of complex ideas that had been elaborated by the movement’s leaders, the leaders felt that the expression of anger among the youth was a testimony to their success in inspiring blacks to assert themselves more openly 11 .

However, this anger soon led to the uprising in 1976 at Soweto, in a way that despite being a direct outcome of the movement, it marked the beginning of a decline in its mass influence.

After the 1976 unrest, there was considerable debate as to the ideology of the Black Consciousness Movement and whether the white should be included in the struggle of the black population. Some Black Consciousness leaders continued to advocate excluding whites from the pre-liberation struggle, until 1977, when Biko himself advocated greater cooperation with supportive white organizations. He stated: “We don’t have sufficient groups who can form coalitions with blacks — that is groups of whites — at the present moment. The more such groups will come up, the better to minimize the conflict”. 12 With this statement, Biko moved towards the concept of closer cooperation between white and black groups, which would later be the foundation of the UDF.

Biko, I Write What I Like, p. 49.
Lindsay Michie Eades, The End of Apartheid in South Africa (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1999) p. 6.
Lindsay Michie Eades, The End of Apartheid in South Africa (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1999) p. 8.
Lindsay Michie Eades, The End of Apartheid in South Africa (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1999) p. 12.
Biko, I Write What I Like, p. 88.
Marx, Lessons of Struggle: South African Internal Opposition, 1960-1990. p. 52.
Gerhart, Black Power in South Africa: The Evolution of an Ideology. p. 270.
Fatton, Black Consciousness in South Africa: The Dialectics of Ideological Resistance to White Supremacy. p. 60.
Marx, Lessons of Struggle: South African Internal Opposition, 1960-1990. p.65.
Marx, Lessons of Struggle: South African Internal Opposition, 1960-1990. p. 65.
Biko, I Write What I Like, p. 151.
Impact of Apartheid on Education in South Africa
Apartheid in South: Historical Lenses
Post-Apartheid Restorative Justice Reconciliation
Protest, Compliance, Institution, and Individual in Society
Equality Within the Workforce Issues
Gangsters in the 50s and Modern
Women Against Globalization and Anti-Nuke Movement
Langston Hughes: Artist Impact Analysis
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Chicago (N-B)

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Black Consciousness Movement Grade 12 Essay

Black Consciousness Movement Grade 12 Essay:

Quick Facts to Consider Before Writing an Essay on Black Consciousness Movement:

Founded by Steve Biko : The Black Consciousness Movement (BCM) was founded by Steve Biko in the late 1960s to promote black pride and unity in South Africa.
Response to Apartheid : The BCM emerged as a response to the apartheid regime’s policies of racial segregation and the suppression of black political activism.
Philosophy of Self-Emancipation : Central to the BCM’s philosophy was the idea that black South Africans needed to emancipate themselves psychologically before seeking physical liberation from apartheid.
SASO : The movement started with the formation of the South African Students’ Organization (SASO) in 1968, focusing initially on black universities and colleges.
Black Community Programs : BCM activists initiated community programs aimed at improving education, health, and economic conditions in black communities.
Banned in 1977 : The South African government banned the BCM and related organizations in 1977, following the Soweto Uprising .
Soweto Uprising 1976 : The BCM played a significant role in inspiring the Soweto Uprising, where thousands of black students protested against the apartheid education system.
Death of Steve Biko : Steve Biko died in police custody in 1977, becoming a martyr for the anti-apartheid movement and bringing international attention to the cause.
Focus on Black Identity : The BCM promoted a strong sense of black identity, encouraging self-reliance and pride among black South Africans.
Opposition to White Liberalism : Biko and the BCM were critical of white liberalism, arguing that it perpetuated black dependency and hindered genuine liberation.
Influence on Music and Art : The movement influenced South African music and art, fostering a culture of resistance that expressed the struggles and aspirations of black South Africans.
Global Impact : The ideas and activism of the BCM influenced anti-racism movements worldwide, including the civil rights movement in the United States.
Revival of Black Activism : The BCM revitalized black political activism in South Africa during a period when other anti-apartheid organizations were banned and suppressed.
Continued Relevance : The principles and ideals of the BCM continue to influence South African society and politics in the post-apartheid era.
Legacy of Empowerment : The BCM left a lasting legacy of empowerment, teaching future generations the importance of self-awareness, identity, and unity in the struggle for justice and equality.

The Black Consciousness Movement (BCM) represents a pivotal chapter in South Africa’s history, particularly in the struggle against apartheid. Spearheaded by Steve Biko in the late 1960s and early 1970s, the BCM sought to empower black South Africans and dismantle the psychological chains of apartheid. This essay delves into the origins, key philosophies, and impacts of the BCM, shedding light on its enduring legacy in South Africa’s journey towards freedom and equality.

Origins of the Black Consciousness Movement

The BCM emerged in a period of intense political repression in South Africa. Following the Sharpeville Massacre in 1960 and the subsequent banning of major anti-apartheid organizations like the African National Congress (ANC) and the Pan Africanist Congress (PAC) , the anti-apartheid struggle faced a significant vacuum. It was within this context that the BCM arose, initially as a movement focusing on the liberation of the black psyche from the shackles of racial inferiority imposed by apartheid ideology.

Key Philosophies of the BCM

Central to the BCM was the belief that before physical liberation, black South Africans needed to be liberated from the inferiority complex instilled by apartheid . Steve Biko, the most prominent figure of the BCM, advocated for a strong sense of black identity and self-reliance. According to Biko, “Black Consciousness is an attitude of the mind and a way of life , the most positive call to emanate from the black world for a long time.”

The BCM emphasized the importance of black people defining their own identity and destiny, free from the perceptions and constraints imposed by a white-dominated society. It aimed to foster a sense of pride, self-worth, and unity among black South Africans, encouraging them to become their own liberators.

Impact and Legacy

The BCM had a profound impact on South Africa’s socio-political landscape. Its emphasis on black pride and unity inspired a new generation of activists and played a crucial role in revitalizing the anti-apartheid struggle during the 1970s. The movement’s influence was notably evident in the Soweto Uprising of 1976, where thousands of black students, motivated by the principles of the BCM, protested against the compulsory use of Afrikaans in schools. This event marked a significant turning point in the struggle against apartheid, highlighting the power and resilience of South Africa’s youth.

Tragically, the apartheid regime brutally suppressed the BCM, and in 1977, Steve Biko died in police custody, becoming a martyr for the cause. Despite this, the ideas of the BCM continued to inspire resistance against apartheid, both within South Africa and internationally.

The legacy of the BCM extends beyond the apartheid era. It contributed significantly to the development of black South African identity and has continued to influence post-apartheid South Africa in the realms of politics, culture, and education. The movement’s emphasis on pride, unity, and self-determination remains relevant as the country continues to navigate the challenges of inequality and national reconciliation.

The Black Consciousness Movement stands as a testament to the power of self-awareness and unity in the face of systemic oppression. By empowering black South Africans to reclaim their identity and dignity, the BCM played a crucial role in the broader struggle against apartheid. Its legacy, epitomized by the life and work of Steve Biko, continues to inspire future generations to strive for a society characterized by equality, justice, and mutual respect. As South Africa moves forward, the principles of the BCM serve as a reminder of the importance of consciousness, identity, and the indomitable spirit of resistance in the pursuit of true liberation.

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South Africa's Black Consciousness Movement in the 1970s

Voice of Anti-Apartheid Movement in South Africa

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The Black Consciousness Movement (BCM) was an influential student movement in the 1970s in Apartheid South Africa. The Black Consciousness Movement promoted a new identity and politics of racial solidarity and became the voice and spirit of the anti-apartheid movement at a time when both the African National Congress and the Pan-Africanist Congress had been banned in the wake of the Sharpeville Massacre . The BCM reached its zenith in the Soweto Student Uprising of 1976 but declined quickly afterward.

Rise of the Black Consciousness Movement

The Black Consciousness Movement began in 1969 when African students walked out of the National Union of South African Students, which was multiracial but white-dominated, and founded the South African Students Organization (SASO). The SASO was an explicitly non-white organization open to students classified as African, Indian, or Coloured under Apartheid Law.

It was to unify non-white students and provide a voice for their grievances, but the SASO spearheaded a movement that reached far beyond students. Three years later, in 1972, the leaders of this Black Consciousness Movement formed the Black People’s Convention (BPC) to reach out to and galvanize adults and non-students.

Aims and Forerunners of the BCM

Loosely speaking, the BCM aimed to unify and uplift non-white populations, but this meant excluding a previous ally, liberal anti-apartheid whites. As Steve Biko , the most prominent Black Consciousness leader, explained, when militant nationalists said that white people did not belong in South Africa, they meant that “we wanted to remove [the white man] from our table, strip the table of all trappings put on it by him, decorate it in true African style, settle down and then ask him to join us on our own terms if he liked.”

The elements of Black pride and celebration of Black culture linked the Black Consciousness Movement back to the writings of W. E. B. Du Bois, as well as the ideas of pan-Africanism and La Negritude movement. It also arose at the same time as the Black Power movement in the United States, and these movements inspired each other; Black Consciousness was both militant and avowedly non-violent. The Black Consciousness movement was also inspired by the success of the FRELIMO in Mozambique.

Soweto and the Afterlives of the BCM

The exact connections between the Black Consciousness Movement and the Soweto Student Uprising are debated, but for the Apartheid government, the connections were clear enough. In the aftermath of Soweto, the Black People’s Convention and several other Black Consciousness movements were banned and their leadership arrested, many after being beaten and tortured, including Steve Biko who died in police custody.

The BPC was partially resurrected in the Azania People’s Organization, which is still active in South African politics.

Steve, Biko, I Write What I like: Steve Biko. A Selection of his Writings, ed. by Aelred Stubbs, African Writers Series . (Cambridge: Proquest, 2005), 69.
Desai, Ashwin, “Indian South Africans and the Black Consciousness Movement under Apartheid.” Diaspora Studies 8.1 (2015): 37-50.
Hirschmann, David. “The Black Consciousness Movement in South Africa.” The Journal of Modern African Studies . 28.1 (Mar., 1990): 1-22.
Biography of Stephen Bantu (Steve) Biko, Anti-Apartheid Activist
Biography of Nontsikelelo Albertina Sisulu, South African Activist
What Was Apartheid in South Africa?
16 June 1976 Student Uprising in Soweto
The End of South African Apartheid
Understanding South Africa's Apartheid Era
Biography of Donald Woods, South African Journalist
A Brief History of South African Apartheid
Apartheid 101
Grand Apartheid in South Africa
Pass Laws During Apartheid
Memorable Quotes by Steve Biko
The Origins of Apartheid in South Africa
South Africa's Extension of University Education Act of 1959
The Prohibition of Mixed Marriages Act
Apartheid Quotes About Bantu Education

The New York Public Library

Archives & manuscripts, south africa black consciousness movement collection 1983-1993.

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South Africa Black Consciousness Movement collection, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, The New York Public Library

The Black Consciousness Movement emerged as a political trend in South Africa in the late 1960s, in the decade after the banning of the African National Congress and the Pan Africanist Congress by the South African regime. The collection documents a primarily youth-based radical critique of the apartheid system, of the ANC's Freedom Charter and its moderate leadership in negotiating a transition to white rule in South Africa. The South Africa Black Consciousness Movement Collection consists primarily of interviews, speeches, organizational materials and printed matter documenting the politics and activities of Black Consciousness organizations in and outside of South Africa from 1983 to 1991. It comprises interviews and speeches by BCM leaders Itumeleng J. Mosala, Ishmael Mkhabela and Lybon Mabasa; interviews with black South African exiles, and anti-apartheid activists within South Africa; leaflets, declarations and factsheets of the Azanian People's Organization and the Black Consciousness Movement of Azania (BCM (A)); miscellaneous files on the New Unity Movement, the Pan Africanist Congress and other non BCM organizations; and subject files on churches, trade-unions, white organizations inside South Africa, and the State of Emergency declared by the South African government in 1985. An organization file for Indaba, a Durban-based experiment in power-sharing, and a collection of essays entitled "War Stories" by an independent American journalist, Michael Slate, are also included.

The Black Consciousness Movement (BCM) emerged as a political trend in South Africa in the decade after the banning of the African National Congress (ANC) and the Pan Africanist Congress (PAC), South Africa's two oldest civil rights organizations, by the South African government. Black students, and black youth in general, revived the anti-apartheid struggle in the late 1960s by emphasizing self-reliance, mass mobilization and cultural awareness. At the time of the Soweto uprising in 1976, the Black Consciousness movement, led by Steve Biko, counted more than twenty mass organizations, eighteen of which were banned the following year by the South African regime.

Forced into exile on several continents, cadres from banned Black Consciousness organizations met in London in 1980 and formed a unified organization, the Black Consciousness Movement of Azania (BCM (A)). Meanwhile, those who had avoided exile launched a second generation of BCM organizations, including the Azanian People's Organization (AZAPO), South Africa's largest Black Consciousness organization founded in 1978.

The State of Emergency imposed by the South African regime in 1985 forced many of these organizations underground. With the release of Nelson Mandela from prison in 1990 and the beginning of negotiations between the two sides, most civil rights organizations, including the BCM (A), were unbanned and able to resume their activities. The Black Consciousness movement took a critical stand toward the ANC and other Freedom Charter organizations that accepted the principle of power-sharing as a basis for negotiations with the South African government. The Black Consciousness movement as a whole insists on the principle of one person, one vote and the redistribution of land and wealth, as the sole basis for negotiations with the apartheid regime.

The SOUTH AFRICA BLACK CONSCIOUSNESS MOVEMENT COLLECTION, 1983-1991, consists primarily of interviews, speeches, organizational materials and printed matter, documenting the politics and activities of Black Consciousness organizations in and outside of South Africa, from 1983 to 1991.

The South Africa Black Consciousness Movement collection is arranged in five series:

This series includes addresses by Itumeleng J. Mosala, Ishmael Mkhabela and Lybon Mabasa, past presidents of AZAPO, critical appraisals of the pan-Africanist and trade-union movements, and policy statements by AZAPO and the BCM (A) on socialism, the 1989 Conference for a Democratic Future (CDF), the De Klerk-ANC negotiations, and the politics of Black Consciousness in general. Other AZAPO related materials include leaflets and factsheets, conference proceedings and a copy of AZAPO's Constitution. There are also two AZAPO related files for the Azanian Student Movement (AZASM) and the Revolutionary People's Movement, AZAPO's Durban Branch which broke from the organization in 1990. BCM (A) materials in the collection consist of printed matter, published and unpublished documents, and declarations on various issues including the distancing of Winnie Mandela by the ANC and the related Congress Movement.

Represented in the collection are the ANC-United Democratic Front, Black Sash (a women's watch group), the Pan Africanist Congress and the New Unity Movement. The ANC-UDF file includes Nelson Mandela's statement from prison "I am Not Prepared to Sell the Birthright of the People to Be Free", and an open letter to AZAPO on the escalation of conflict between supporters and members of the two organizations (1985). The Black Sash file consists of a 26 p. memorandum on political repression during the State of Emergency, including 36 affidavits relating to the 1985 Uitenhage massacre. The PAC folder includes a 1987 address by the chairman of the Central Committee, Johnson P. Mlambo, a memorial tribute to Robert Sobukwe by Ishmael Mkhabela, chairman of the Soweto Action Committee in 1978 and subsequently president of AZAPO, and a Judgment by the Supreme Court of South Africa in the case of fourteen PAC members accused of sabotage for their participation in the 1963 Poqo uprisings. The failed 1988 tricameral elections and the underlying principle of a white minority veto can be traced to the 1986 Constitutional Proposals and other campaign materials of the Kwazulu Natal Indaba, a Durban-based multiracial experiment in power-sharing associated with Chief Gatsha Buthelezi. Other promotional materials in the Indaba folder include sample issues of Indaba News , Indaba information sheets and the Indaba "Bill of Rights".

Include "War Stories", a series of articles and speeches written by independent journalist Michael Slate on the grassroots movement in South Africa, and published mostly in the pages of the Revolutionary Worker . Conducted by Slate, the interviews include a partial transcript of a discussion with black activists in Uitenhage and Durban in 1990, and interviews with a youth leader and AZASM member in the Port Elizabeth area in 1987, with AZAPO president Lybon Mabasa, in 1984, with a group of exiles in Botswana who had left the country for military training, with two Harare (Zimbabwe)-based exiles who had fled South Africa for fear of police persecution and other forms of harassment due to an ANC-AZAPO feud in 1985, with the head of the Allied Miners and Construction Union in 1987, and an 87 p. interview with five BCM activists on the 1976 and the 1980 uprisings in Soweto and the reality of living and fighting under the apartheid regime.

Deals primarily with issues of detention and workers' rights under the State of Emergency. The White Organizations file contains both pro- and anti-apartheid materials. The anti-apartheid documents relate mostly to white resistance to the draft. Government documents in the collection include a copy of the Internal Security Act of 1982 and publicity brochures for the so-called Democratic Reform and the new South African constitution.

The item(s) listed below have been sent to the division indicated, either to be retained or disposed of there. Any items that should receive special disposition are clearly marked.

Schomburg Library:

Books and pamphlets (South Africa imprints):

Biko, Steve. No Fears Expressed, edited by Millard W. Arnold, 1987. (Selected quotations from Steve Biko.).

Letsoalo, Essy M. Land Reform in South Africa, 1987.

Meer, Fatima, ed. Resistance in the Townships, 1987.

McCaul, Colleen. No Easy Ride: the Rise and Future of the Black Taxi Industry, 1990.

Webster, David and Maggie Friedman. Suppressing Apartheid's Opponents: Repression and the State of Emergency, 1987-1989, 1989?.

Mashabela, Harry. Fragile Figures? The 1988 PWV Township Elections, 1989.

Padayachee, Deena. A Voice from the Cauldron, 1986. (Poems).

Lukele, Andrew Mangunte. White South Africa's Outward Adventure: an Appraisal from the Standpoint of National Liberation, 1976.

Slovo, Joe. The South African Working Class and the National Democratic Revolution, undated

South African Communist Party. The Path to Power: Programme of the South African Communist Party adopted at the 7th Congress, 1989, 1989.

Makhoba, Mandlenkosi. The Sun Shall Rise for the Workers, 1984. (FOSATU's Ravan Workers Series, #1.).

McQuoid-Mason, David. Street Law, Book 1: Introduction to South African Law and the Legal System, 1987.

Human Rights Commission. Children and Repression, 1987-1989, Special report #4, 1990.

———. The CCB: Origin, Actions and future of the Civil Cooperation Bureau, Special Report #9, 1990.

The Last Affidavits. Published by the Southern African Catholic Bishops' Conference, 1987.

Youth Express. Grassroots Publication, 1987?.

New Nation New History, Vol. 1. Published by the New Nation and the History Workshop, 1989.

South Africa through the Lens. Staffrider Magazine, 1983.

Newspapers and periodicals:

Azania Combat, Official Organ of the Azanian People's Liberation Army (military wing of the PAC). 4 issues (2, 4, 5, 8), 1987-1989.

Frank Talk (published by AZAPO). 7 issues (vol. I-III), 1984-1990.

Ikwezi, a Journal of South African and Southern African Political Analysis (an independent Marxist-Leninist journal of South African revolutionaries in exile). 20 issues, 1975-1982.

Tlhatsi (Incorporating Ikwezi), Oct. 1983. Launched as a continuation of Ikwezi. Only one single issue appeared (No. 22).

Association For Rural Advancement Newsletter, Pietermaritzburg, South Africa. 9 issues, 1988-1990.

South African Journal On Human Rights, 3 issues (vol. I part 3 and vol. 5 part 2-3), 1985, 1989.

Solidarity - Official Organ of the Black Consciousness Movement of Azania, 7 issues, 1980-1986.

The African Communist - Journal of the South African Communist Party. 19 issues (no. 84-116), 1981-1989.

Sechaba - Official Organ of the African National Congress South Africa. 22 issues, 1980-1989.

Letsetse - The Flea (Comment and Mobilisation Pamphlet of the Black Consciousness Movement of Azania), 2 issues, vol. 1 no. 4-5, 1989-1990.

National Forum Committee - "Peace at Nkomati-at what price?", July 1984.

Arise Vukani (Magazine of Action Youth), vol. 1 no. 5, September - October 1985.

Institution for a Democratic Alternative for South Africa -Presented to Conference on "Women in the Struggle for Peace" in Harare in April 1989.

Frontline, 6 issues, 1986-1989.

Work In Progress (Published by Southern African Research Service). 10 issues, 1986-1990.

Learn and Teach, Johannesburg. 3 issues, 1989-1990.

Speak - Women's Journal, Published by SPEAK Collective. 7 issues, 1987-1990.

New Era Published by Grassroots. 2 issues, December 1989 and March 1990.

Upfront 1 issue, vol. 2 no. 2, November 1989.

African Law Review 2 issues, vol. 1 no. 3-4, 1987.

Clarion Call - "The Church and Violence, Who Stands Where?", vol. 3, 1986.

The Azanian Labour Journal - "Solidarity", vo. 2 no. 1, January-March 1989.

Political Monitor - South Africa Indicator vol. 3 no. 1, Winter 1985.

South African Institute of Race Relations - Topical Briefing, 3 issues, 1984-1985, 1987.

CEAPA Journal - "Socio-Economic Change and Political Development in Southern Africa", vol. 1 no. 2, December 1987.

South African Institute of Race Relations - Countdown 1 issue, January 20, 1990.

Umtapo Focus 1 issue, vo. 4 no. 1, June 1990.

JP News - "Welcoming Home Exiles", July 1990.

SASCO - "Azania AFlame!", April 1985.

Strategies for Survival for the Oppressed (Leaflet distributed by Durban branch of the Azanian People's Organization), October 1987.

Towards Democracy (Invitation to a conference called by the Five Freedoms Forum), September 25-27, 1987.

Azania Update-"Tribute to a Comrade", vol. 2 # 6, May 1985.

New Unity Movement Bulletin vol. 3 no. 2, July 1989.

The Objector - Newsletter of the Anti-draft Organization, September 1990.

Ceapa Newsletter vol. 2 no. 1, 1988.

United Democratic Front - "UDF Unites, Apartheid Divides", September 1987.

Umsebenzi - Voice of the South African Communist Party vol. 6 no. 2, 1990.

Reflection - Communist Support Committee Newsletter vol. 1 no. 1, 1986.

Azanian Focus Published by the Frank Talk Editorial Collective. 4 issues, 1985-1987.

Apdusa Views - Pietermaritzburg, 2 issues, August 1985 & October 1989.

Student Bulletin (Western Cape). 2 issues, 1986.

Western Cape Youth League Newsletter vol. 4, July 1984.

Descom Bulletin - Durban, no. 14, August 1987.

Awake Black Students - Publication of Azania Student Movement. 2 issues, March 1985.

Cosatu news - Official Newsletter of the Congress of SA Trade Union. no. 5 1987.

Azanian News - Official Organ of the Pan Africanist Congress. 9 issues, 1982-1990.

Tokoloho - One People One Azania (Azapo Newsletter) vol. 1 no. 1, 1983.

Azanian Review vol. 1 no. 2, August 1988.

Izwilethu - Conference, vol. 4 issue no. 8, October 1986.

Azania Worker - Umsebenzi Mobereki Arbeider Worker, 6 issues, 1983-1988.

Azania Frontline - Newsletter of the Azania (South Africa) Liberation Support Committee. 14 issues, 1983-1988.

Frontline Worker - A Journal for a Socialist Movement in South Africa. 2 issues, no. 1 & 2. 1989.

NEWSPAPERS:

The Star, 2 copies, Friday, October 12, 1990.

City Press, 8 copies, 1987-1990.

South, 3 copies, 1990.

Weekly Mail, 12 copies, 1987-1990.

New Nation, 14 copies, 1987-1990.

Sowetan, 12 copies, 1987-1990.

The New Africa, 54 copies, 1989-1990.

Schomburg Art and Artifacts Division:

14 anti-apartheid posters, marking various trade-union and Black Consciousness Movement campaigns and events (1987, 1990).

Two T-shirts: 1) Black Consciousness Logo on the front, and "It Is Right to Rebel Against Reactionaries" slogan on the back.

2) AZAPO logo on the front, and slogan "Forward to Azania" on the back.

Source of acquisition

Purchased from Michael Slate

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Processed by Andre Elizee, December 1993

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History Grade 12

Black consciousness movement grade 12 essay guide (question and answers).

Black Consciousness Movement Grade 12 Essay Guide (Question and Answers): The Black Consciousness Movement (BCM) was a grassroots anti-Apartheid activist movement that emerged in South Africa in the mid-1960s out of the political vacuum created by the jailing and banning of the African National Congress and Pan Africanist Congress leadership after the Sharpeville Massacre in 1960.

1 How Essays are Assessed in Grade 12
2.1 Question 1: How did the ideas of the black consciousness movement challenge the apartheid regime in the 1970?
2.2 Question 2: How did the truth and reconciliation commision assist South Africa to come in terms with the past?
3 More relevant sources
4 Questions and Answers

How Essays are Assessed in Grade 12

The essay will be assessed holistically (globally). This approach requires the teacher to score the overall product as a whole, without scoring the component parts separately. This approach encourages the learner to offer an individual opinion by using selected factual evidence to support an argument. The learner will not be required to simply regurgitate ‘facts’ in order to achieve a high mark. This approach discourages learners from preparing ‘model’ answers and reproducing them without taking into account the specific requirements of the question. Holistic marking of the essay credits learners’ opinions supported by evidence. Holistic assessment, unlike content-based marking, does not penalise language inadequacies as the emphasis is on the following:

The construction of an argument
The appropriate selection of factual evidence to support such an argument
The learner’s interpretation of the question.

Black Consciousness Movement Grade 12 Questions

Question 1: how did the ideas of the black consciousness movement challenge the apartheid regime in the 1970.

How to answer and get good marks?

Learners must use relevant evidence e.g. Uses relevant evidence that shows a thorough understanding of how the ideas of Black Consciousness challenged the apartheid regime in the 1970s .
Learners must also use evidence very effectively in an organised paragraph that shows an understanding of the topic

When you answer, you should not ignore the following key facts where applicable:

Black Consciousness wanted black South Africans to do things for themselves
Black Consciousness wanted black South Africans to act independently of other races x Self-reliance promoted self-pride among black South Africans

SASO references can also be applicable (if sources are presented)

SASO was formed to propagate the ideas of Black Consciousness
To safeguard and promote the interests of black South Africans students
SASO was based on the philosophy of Black Consciousness
SASO was associated with Steve Biko
SASO encouraged black South Africans students to be self-assertive

Question 2: How did the truth and reconciliation commision assist South Africa to come in terms with the past?

To ensure healing and reconciliation among victims and perpetrators of political violence through confession
The TRC encouraged the truth to be told
Hoped to bring about forgiveness through healing
To bring about ‘Reconciliation and National Unity’ among all South Africans
Any other relevant response.

Download Black Consciousness Movement Grade 12 Essay Guide (Question and Answers) on pdf format

More relevant sources

https://artsandculture.google.com/exhibit/steve-biko-the-black-consciousness-movement-steve-biko-foundation/AQp2i2l5?hl=en

https://www.britannica.com/topic/Black-Consciousness-movement

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Grade 10 history, questions and answers based on bantu education act for revision.

Questions and Answers based on Bantu Education Act for Revision:

1 Why do you think Bantu Education Act or Law is interesting or important to know
2 What are the main disadvantages of Bantu Education Act
3 What were the long-lasting consequences of Bantu Education

Why do you think Bantu Education Act or Law is interesting or important to know

The Bantu Education Act, 1953 (Act No. 47 of 1953; later renamed the Black Education Act, 1953) was a South African segregation law that legislated for several aspects of the apartheid system. Its major provision enforced racially separated educational facilities.

What are the main disadvantages of Bantu Education Act

Below are the main disadvantages of the Bantu Education Act

low funding and expenditures to black schools,
a lack of numbers and training of black school teachers,
impoverished black school conditions and resources,
a poor education curriculum.

What were the long-lasting consequences of Bantu Education

Long-lasting consequences of the Bantu Education Act include unequal access to educational and professional opportunities

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The Black Consciousness History

The Black Consciousness Movement (BCM) was founded by Steve Biko with the aim of helping black people in South Africa to become proud of their own identity and fight against the government’s apartheid policies. Biko believed that the most potent weapon of the oppressor was the mind of the oppressed, and he wanted to free black people mentally and physically. He founded many black student political organizations and community projects in King Williams Town. The BCM aimed not only to achieve equality for all black people in South Africa but also to create a sense of black pride. The 1976 uprising, which fought against the implementation of a law that would force all learners to be taught in Afrikaans, was supported by the BCM. The students protested against this matter because they felt they were losing their identity by being forced to learn in the language of the oppressor. Biko’s ideas helped influence the 1976 uprising and many protests that occurred in South Africa during the 1970s. The BCM gave people the opportunity to fight against the government in South Africa during apartheid without having to join any political party, which influenced the children into protesting against the education system and caused the Soweto uprising.

BCM movements aimed to help black people in South Africa become proud of their own identity. The BCM was formed because many of the countries ANC leaders at the time were either in exile or in prison. The fight against apartheid had slowed down after the banning of the ANC. Steve Biko created the BCM because he wanted to give black people the opportunity to fight against the government without having to leave the country.

Steve Biko was responsible for the founding of many black student political organizations in South Africa. He chose to create his own organization instead of joining the multi racial student organizations that already existed. Biko created the BCM to help free black people mentally and physically. One of his famous quotes was “The most potent weapon of the oppressor is the mind of the oppressed”. Steve Biko was responsible for many community projects, which happened in King Williams Town. The BCM didn’t only aim to achieve equality for all black people in South Africa but it also aimed to create a sense of Black pride.

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The 1976 uprising fought against the implementation of a law that would force all learners to be taught in Afrikaans. The students protested against this matter, the Black consciousness movement supported the students. Many of the student’s home language were Xhosa and Zulu. By making the students learn only in Afrikaans the government was not giving them the chance to learn their home language and the BCM aimed to encourage black pride in South Africa and implementing this law wouldn’t help the cause.

The black consciousness movement gave people living in South Africa the opportunity to fight against the government within the country. These ideas inspired the students to protest against these laws and they felt they were losing their identity if they were being forced to learn in a language of the oppressor. Steve Biko believed that the black people should be independent and be proud of their image. These ideas inspired the students to revolt against the government and fight for what they believed in. They felt that their parents had tried their best to end the struggle but it was now up to them to change things in South Africa.

Steve Biko believed that the black people had to bee freed psychologically Steve Biko’s ideas did help influence the 1976 uprising. Steve Biko founded many black student organizations around the country. The protests were planned by these student organizations. They is a possibility that if Biko hadn’t founded these organizations the uprising could of still occurred. But the start of the BCM was a building block for many protests that occurred in South African during the 1970’s. Organizations such as the Soweto Students’ Representative Council were instrumental In the planning of the uprisings and the idea of starting such organizations came from Steve Biko and the numerous organizations he had started around the country.

Steve Biko gave people the opportunity to fight against the government in South Africa during apartheid without having to join any political party. This idea influenced the children into protesting against the education system and caused the Soweto uprising. The students had the opportunity to protest against the government in huge numbers and they were supported by the BCM and the ANC in exile. The BCM gave them this opportunity.

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Black Consciousness Movement (BCM)
Black Consciousness Movement (BCM) The crowd at Steve Biko's funeral, SAHA Original Photograph Collection. On 12 September 1977, the Black Consciousness leader Steve Biko died while in the custody of security police. The period leading up to his death, beginning with the June 1976 unrest, had seen some of the most turbulent events in South ...
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The Rise of Black Consciousness. The Black Consciousness movement became one of the most influential anti-apartheid movements of the 1970s in South Africa. While many parts of the African continent gained independence, the apartheid state increased its repression of black liberation movements in the 1960s. In the latter part of the decade, the ...
Black Consciousness Movement
Black Consciousness Movement (BCM), South African anti- apartheid movement that began in the late 1960s. Originating on university campuses, it espoused Black cultural pride and political solidarity while firmly denouncing white liberal inactivity. Though the movement began to decline after the Soweto Uprising in 1976, it left an enduring ...
Black Consciousness Movement
The Black Consciousness Movement ( BCM) was a grassroots anti- apartheid activist movement that emerged in South Africa in the mid-1960s out of the political vacuum created by the jailing and banning of the African National Congress and Pan Africanist Congress leadership after the Sharpeville Massacre in 1960. [1] The BCM represented a social movement for political consciousness .
Steve Biko and the Black Consciousness Movement Grade 12 Essay Guide
Black Consciousness Movement Grade 12 Essay Guide (Question and Answers) and Summary: The Black Consciousness Movement (BCM) was a grassroots anti-Apartheid activist movement that emerged in South Africa in the mid-1960s out of the political vacuum created by the jailing and banning of the African National Congress and Pan Africanist Congress leadership after the Sharpeville Massacre in 1960.
PDF Historical Background of The
The above cited objectives are only but a few basic fundamentals of the principles of the Black Consciousness Movement, and hence form the cornerstone of the strategy of all the organizations under the banner of the Black Consciousness Movement.
PDF Steve Biko and the philosophy of Black consciousness
The movement viewed the liberation of the mind as the primary weapon in the ght for freedom in South Africa, de ning Black consciousness as, rst, an inward-looking process, where Black people regain the pride stripped away from them by the Apartheid system. His philosophy casts a positive retelling of African history, which has been heavily distorted and vili ed by European imperialists in an ...
Steve Biko: The Black Consciousness Movement
Stephen Bantu Biko was an anti-apartheid activist in South Africa in the 1960s and 1970s. A student leader, he later founded the Black Consciousness Movement which would empower and mobilize much of the urban black population. Since his death in police custody, he has been called a martyr of the anti-apartheid movement. While living, his writings and activism attempted to empower black people ...
What was the Black Consciousness Movement in South Africa?
The Black Consciousness Movement was a resistance movement during the apartheid era that restored the dignity of black South Africans. Aug 6, 2022 • By Greg Beyer, BA History & Linguistics, Journalism Diploma. A demonstrator holds up a poster tribute to BCM leader Steve Biko, via BBC. As colonialism in South Africa transformed into the ...
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Activist Steve Biko's speech links white racism to the Black Consciousness movement, calling on black South Africans to create their own power to fight oppression.
Black Consciousness Movement vs. Apartheid in South Africa Essay
This paper assesses the significance of the black consciousness movement for the revival of resistance to apartheid in South Africa during the 1970s.
Black Consciousness Movement Grade 12 Essay
The Black Consciousness Movement (BCM) represents a pivotal chapter in South Africa's history, particularly in the struggle against apartheid. Spearheaded by Steve Biko in the late 1960s and early 1970s, the BCM sought to empower black South Africans and dismantle the psychological chains of apartheid. This essay delves into the origins, key ...
South Africa's Black Consciousness Movement in the 1970s
The Black Consciousness Movement began in 1969 when African students walked out of the National Union of South African Students, which was multiracial but white-dominated, and founded the South African Students Organization (SASO). The SASO was an explicitly non-white organization open to students classified as African, Indian, or Coloured under Apartheid Law.
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The Black Consciousness Movement emerged as a political trend in South Africa in the late 1960s, in the decade after the banning of the African National Congress and the Pan Africanist Congress by the South African regime. The collection documents a primarily youth-based radical critique of the apartheid system, of the ANC's Freedom Charter and ...
Black Consciousness Movement Grade 12 Essay Guide (Question and Answers)
1 How Essays are Assessed in Grade 12. 2 Black Consciousness Movement Grade 12 Questions. 2.1 Question 1: How did the ideas of the black consciousness movement challenge the apartheid regime in the 1970? 2.2 Question 2: How did the truth and reconciliation commision assist South Africa to come in terms with the past?
PDF GRADE 12
The essay should focus on the role Steve Biko and the Black Consciousness Movement played in the Soweto Uprising, but should argue that there were many other reasons for the Uprising.
Universal Essay BCM Grade 12 2023
The Black Consciousness Movement successfully used its aims and ideas of self-reliance to challenging the apartheid system in South Africa in the 1970s. Do you agree with this statement? Support your line of argument with relevant historical evidence [50]
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This essay entails of the Black Power Movement it validates the statement that non-
The Black Consciousness History Free Essay Example 560 words
This essay was written by a student. You can get a custom paper by one of our expert writers. Order custom paper Without paying upfront. The Black Consciousness Movement (BCM) was a political movement that emerged in South Africa in the late 1960s. The movement was founded by Steve Biko and aimed to empower black people and promote black pride.
Black Consciousness Movement grade 12
Black Consciousness Movement grade 12. This document covers all the content required to get a guaranteed A for this Black Consciousness essay. This is a base essay and can be applied through small modifications to any given question phrasing. Good Luck for matric!
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