The gendered South African archivist : invisible voices through the twentieth century

Abstract

This study explores the history and development of what would become the South African public archive through the twentieth century. The “invisible voices” in the title refer to women archivists in the South African public archive and the fact that they are for the most part invisible in the historical and archival record. The study endeavours to illuminate these key women and locate their voices, roles and contribution to the archive. The study firstly sketches the broad background of the origin and development of archives and then considers the history of archival development in the so-called “mother countries” of the South African archive, the Netherlands and Britain. The factors and circumstances which gave rise to the establishment of the archive in South Africa (SA) and its specific characteristics are also considered. Secondly, the study analyses the four pieces of archival legislation that were promulgated in the twentieth century as they provide a framework to establish the historical development of the public archive in SA. Finally, it concludes with an analysis of language used in the pieces of legislation as well as writings of prominent male archivists during this period to establish the use of gendered language. The objective was to establish if and how gendered language perpetuated women’s relegation and exclusion with specific reference to the archival profession. The findings of the study confirmed that the functionaries or role players in the archival domain since ancient times were predominantly male. The South African archival domain up to the latter part of the twentieth century reflects the same characteristic. The gendered language used in the pieces of archival legislation and writings displayed and established the male-structured and male-dominated nature of language as well as the archival profession. Although the space created by the language used in the legislation was predominantly “male only” and meant to exclude and relegate women to secondary spaces, the contribution of these three key women were pivotal to the development of the South African archive.