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Katja Bendels

 

Anglistics, German language and literature Studies
Duisburg-Essen University

White Africans? Negotiating Identity in White South African Writing

Katja Bendels finished her studies of English and German Literature at the University of Duisburg-Essen (MA) and the University of Stellenbosch, South Africa with a thesis on the South African farm novel. After the completion of her studies she worked as research assistant at the Department of Anglophone Studies at the University of Duisburg-Essen (2004-2007) and as Teaching Assistant at the German Department at Rhodes University, South Africa (2005). She has been a scholarship holder of the Graduate School of the Humanism Project since July 2007.

Dissertation    Publikationen   

Dissertation

White Africans? Negotiating Identity in White South African Writing 

This doctoral research project deals with the contribution of literature to the current debate about white South Africans' renegotiation of their identities and their prospective future within a rapidly Africanising country. Its attention is thereby directed at the aesthetic development and presentation of a common topic within different genres of white South African prose writing, among them historical novels, autobiographical writing, childhood memoirs and pastoral novels. The following texts will be subject of analysis:
André Brink, Devil's Valley (1998)
Pamela Jooste, People Like Ourselves (2003)
Antjie Krog, Country of My Skull (1998)
Anne Landsman, The Devil's Chimney (1997)
Sarah Penny, The Beneficiaries (2002)
Jo-Anne Richards, The Innocence of Roast Chicken (1996)
Marlene van Niekerk, Agaat (2004)
Wilhelm Verwoerd, My Winds of Change (1997)