Broadcasting the Rainbow Nation: Media, Democracy, and Nation-Building in South Africa

This paper examines the politics and economics of media reform in South Africa during the 1990s. This process has involved the transformation of the South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) from a state broadcaster into an independent public service broadcaster, as well as the opening of the airwaves to new entrants in order to extend the diversity of media ownership and programming. The formulation of media policies before and after the elections of 1994 is discussed, with reference to the different interests involved in this process and their differing positions on how broadcasting should be restructured in accordance with new constitutional principles of language equity. The implementation of policies from 1996 to 1998 is critically examined, revealing the contradictory political and economic factors that have shaped the transformation of broadcasting institutions and the performance of independent regulatory bodies.     

Testing Significance or Testing Credulity?

The paper examines two recent attempts to analyse a set of data relating to Icenian coin hoards. The methodology of the second attempt, which is based on significance tests made on 'permillia' data (i.e. coins per thousand), is shown to be fatally flawed, and its conclusions unfounded. The danger of using analytical statistical techniques without consideration of the assumptions on which they are based, is stressed. Alternative approaches, one analytical and one graphical, are presented: they suggest an interpretation which differs from those of both the original analyses.     

From confusion to confusion: The 1981 general election in New Zealand

The 1981 New Zealand general election was fought against a background of electoral upheaval and uncertainty that had characterized New Zealand politics during the 1970s. The preceding three years had also witnessed the rise in popularity of the country's leading minor party, the Social Credit Political League. It was difficult to predict how the League would fare in terms of capturing seats in the election. The election was held in the wake of the socially divisive rugby tour by the South African Springboks and in the midst of debate over the National government's new growth strategy. It was not entirely surprising, then, when the election produced a very close and curious result. The National Party won the election narrowly, but both major parties made substantial gains in some areas and substantial losses in others. Social Credit made major gains of votes from both National and Labour but failed to win further seats. The electorate was seemingly still in deep confusion.     

Impure and Worldly Geography:1 The Africanist Discourse of the Royal Geographical Society, 1831–73

The written networks through which knowledge is produced and circulated offer a focus for a theoretically informed critique of the formation of modern geographical knowledge. Drawing on deconstruction and colonial discourse theory, this paper presents a reading of the Royal Geographical Society's (RGS) published record of nineteenth-century African exploration. This discourse posits a racially unmarked subject-position as the condition of scientific discussion. The Society's geographical knowledge is shown to have been formed through the effacement of alternative subject-positions and the appropriation of other ways of knowing. It is suggested that closer attention to the discursive structures of written networks of knowledge might inform a more nuanced understanding of the reproduction of disciplined knowledge.     

The Cultural Turn: Fashion or Progress in Human Geography?

The cultural turn marks a reorientation of human geography's interdisciplinary concerns toward the wide field of cultural studies. It is argued that this reorientation has been mediated by distinctive forms of commercial academic book publishing. These have been the medium for the internationalisation of cultural studies upon which human geography'sserious engagement with the field has depended. It is argued that the combination of a greater reliance upon work drawn from the humanities and the imperatives of publishing have led to the contemporary proliferation of cultural theory being associated with new forms of academic celebrity. The critical questioning of the cultural turn is therefore located in relation to the formsof authority and evaluation that it has the potential to promote.     

A Feasibility Study for the Investigation of Submerged Sites along the Coast of Slovenia

Maritime investigations along the Northern Adriatic coast have traditionally focused on the Roman and later archaeology. However, studies of post-glacial sea-level change and shoreline displacement suggest there is significant potential for the discovery of sites close inshore dating back to the early- to mid-Holocene, c .9000 BC onwards. A feasibility study for the investigation of submerged sites along the coast of Slovenia was undertaken in 2005. Here we describe the project rationale and research design, the survey and recording methods used, the logistical problems encountered, the results obtained (regardless of age), and the prospects for future research in the region.
© 2009 The Authors