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South African Literary Archives after the ‘Archival Turn’: a Case Study of the Guy Butler collection at the National English Literary Museum

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 April 2022

Beth Wyrill
Beth Wyrill*
Affiliation:
National English Literary Museum, South Africa
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Extract

This article seeks to investigate the largest collection of literary artefacts in South Africa, housed at the National English Literary Museum, and particularly the relationship between the founder of the museum and archive, Guy Butler, and how NELM has come to operate in the South African literary landscape in a post-colonial and post-apartheid moment. It is necessary to invoke the post-colonial moment from the outset in order to explore the question of post-colonial archives from a critical perspective.

This research is informed by what has come to be known as the ‘archival turn,’ which considers the ‘meta-text’ of archival formation. The work investigates the locations of power and regularities of logic that have informed the collection of certain items and histories, and the neglect of others.

Type
Research Article
Information
African Research and Documentation , Volume 133: Papers from SCOLMA Conference 2018: Things come together? Literary archives from, in and for Africa, University of Birmingham, 10 September, 2018 , 2018 , pp. 33 - 41
Copyright
Copyright © International African Institute 2018

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References

Works Cited

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