Book review: Derek Barker: English Academic Literary Discourse in South Africa 1958-2004: A Review of 11 Academic Journals. Ed. Norbert H. Platz. Trier, Germany: OPUS Online Server, University of Trier, 2007. pp. 281 plus Appendix

Abstract

Barker’s book concerns the evolution and publishing trajectories of South African journals devoted to English literary studies between the years 1958 (when the first such journal, English Studies in Africa, came into being) and 2004, the end-date of the survey. In other words, his work coincides with the period in South African history when apartheid’s protagonists were pushing for total political and social ascendancy through to the nation’s emergence into the arena of democratic possibility.