Smuts : Lost in Transmission?

Abstract

This dissertation examines the transmission of the past and how it is affected by context, source materials, and the individual with regards to opinion and inherent bias. The subject of this analysis is Jan Christiaan Smuts and how he has been portrayed over the last century. Various authors are analysed with W. K. Hancock forming a kind of watershed given the access to primary material. The dissertation includes a brief discussion of South African historiography as well as a brief biographical outline of Smuts's life. The main concern is however a literature analysis of selected material which will set out to illustrate how information is often "lost in transmission."