Black is a racialized classification of people, usually a political and skin color-based category for specific populations with a mid- to dark brown complexion. Not all people considered "black" have dark skin; in certain countries, often in socially based systems of racial classification in the Western world, the term "black" is used to describe persons who are perceived as dark-skinned compared to other populations. It is most commonly used for people of sub-Saharan African ancestry, Indigenous Australians and Melanesians, though it has been applied in many contexts to other groups, and is no indicator of any close ancestral relationship whatsoever. Indigenous African societies do not use the term black as a racial identity outside of influences brought by Western cultures.
According to the 2022 census, the population of South Africa is about 62 million people of diverse origins, cultures, languages, and religions. With a majority being Black Africans. The South African National Census of 2022 was the most recent census held; the next will be in 2032.
Miscegenation is marriage or admixture between people who are members of different races. The word, now usually considered pejorative, is derived from a combination of the Latin terms miscere and genus. The word first appeared in Miscegenation: The Theory of the Blending of the Races, Applied to the American White Man and Negro, an anti-abolitionist pamphlet David Goodman Croly and others published anonymously in advance of the 1864 presidential election in the United States. The term came to be associated with laws that banned interracial marriage and sex, which were known as anti-miscegenation laws. These laws were overruled federally in 1967, and by the year 2000, all states had removed them from their laws, with Alabama being the last to do so on November 7, 2000. In the 21st century, newer scientific data shows that human populations are actually genetically quite similar. Studies show that races are more of an arbitrary social construct, and do not actually have a major genetic delineation.
Cape Coloureds are a South African ethnic classification consisting primarily of persons of mixed race African, Asian and European descent.
Coloureds are a group of multiracial people in South Africa, Namibia and to a lesser extent, Zimbabwe and Zambia. They descend from the interracial mixing/miscegenation in Southern Africa between the White and the Black: and to a certain extent, the Asians as well. Interracial mixing began in the Dutch Cape Colony during the 17th and 18th century with Dutch men marrying Khoi Khoi women, Bantu women and Asian women, with mixed race children being conceived in the process. Eventually, interracial mixing occurred throughout the rest of Southern Africa through different phases of history with various other European nationals that also contributed to the growing mixed-race people, who would later be officially classified as 'Coloured' by the apartheid government in the 1950s.
South Africa is known for its ethnic and cultural diversity. Almost all South Africans speak English to some degree of proficiency, in addition to their native language, with English acting as a lingua franca in commerce, education, and government. South Africa has eleven official languages, but other indigenous languages are spoken by smaller groups, chiefly Khoisan languages.
Colored is a racial descriptor historically used in the United States during the Jim Crow era to refer to an African American. In many places, it may be considered a slur. It has taken on a special meaning in Southern Africa referring to a person of mixed or Cape Coloured heritage.
Chinese South Africans are Overseas Chinese who reside in South Africa, including those whose ancestors came to South Africa in the early 20th century until Chinese immigration was banned under the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1904. Chinese industrialists from the Republic of China (Taiwan) who arrived in the 1970s, 1980s and early 1990s, and post-apartheid immigrants to South Africa now outnumber locally-born Chinese South Africans.
In South Africa under apartheid, and South West Africa, pass laws served as an internal passport system designed to racially segregate the population, restrict movement of individuals, and allocate low-wage migrant labor. Also known as the natives' law, these laws severely restricted the movements of Black South African and other racial groups by confining them to designated areas. Initially applied to African men, attempts to enforce pass laws on women in the 1910s and 1950s sparked significant protests. Pass laws remained a key aspect of the country's apartheid system until their effective termination in 1986. The pass document used to enforce these laws was derogatorily referred to as the dompas.
Apartheid was a system of institutionalised racial segregation that existed in South Africa and South West Africa from 1948 to the early 1990s. It was characterised by an authoritarian political culture based on baasskap, which ensured that South Africa was dominated politically, socially, and economically by the nation's minority white population. Under this minoritarian system, White citizens held the highest status, followed by Indians, Coloureds and Blacks, in that order. The economic legacy and social effects of apartheid continue to the present day, particularly inequality.
Goffals or Coloured Zimbabweans are persons of mixed race, predominately those claiming both European and African descent, in Malawi, Zambia, and, particularly Zimbabwe. They are generally known as Coloureds, though the term Goffal is used by some in the Coloured community to refer to themselves, though this does not refer to the mixed-race community in nearby South Africa. The community includes many diverse constituents of Shona, Northern Ndebele, Bemba, Fengu, British, Afrikaner, Cape Coloured, Cape Malay and less commonly Portuguese, Greek, Goan, and Indian descent. Similar mixed-race communities exist throughout Southern Africa, notably the Cape Coloureds of South Africa.
A referendum on a new constitution was held in South Africa on 2 November 1983 in which the white population was given the opportunity to approve or reject the Constitution of 1983. This constitution introduced the Tricameral Parliament, in which Coloured and Indian South Africans would be represented in separate parliamentary chambers, while black Africans, who were the majority of South Africa's population, would remain unrepresented. The referendum passed with 66.3% of voters voting "Yes"; consequently the new constitution came into force on 3 September 1984.
White South Africans are South Africans of European descent. In linguistic, cultural, and historical terms, they are generally divided into the Afrikaans-speaking descendants of the Dutch East India Company's original colonists, known as Afrikaners, and the Anglophone descendants of predominantly British colonists of South Africa. In 2016, 57.9% were native Afrikaans speakers, 40.2% were native English speakers, and 1.9% spoke another language as their mother tongue, such as Portuguese, Greek, or German. White South Africans are by far the largest population of White Africans. White was a legally defined racial classification during apartheid.
The system of racial segregation and oppression in South Africa known as apartheid was implemented and enforced by many acts and other laws. This legislation served to institutionalize racial discrimination and the dominance by white people over people of other races. While the bulk of this legislation was enacted after the election of the National Party government in 1948, it was preceded by discriminatory legislation enacted under earlier British and Afrikaner governments. Apartheid is distinguished from segregation in other countries by the systematic way in which it was formalized in law.
Brown is a racialized classification of people, usually a political and skin color-based category for specific populations with a light to moderate brown complexion.
Indian South Africans are South Africans who descend from indentured labourers and free migrants who arrived from British India during the late 1800s and early 1900s. The majority live in and around the city of Durban, making it one of the largest ethnically Indian-populated cities outside of India.
The Population Registration Act Repeal Act, 1991 is an act of the Parliament of South Africa which repealed the Population Registration Act, 1950, ending the legal racial classification of South Africans which formed the basis of apartheid.
The pencil test is a method of assessing whether a person has Afro-textured hair. In the pencil test, a pencil is pushed through the person's hair. How easily it comes out determines whether the person has "passed" or "failed" the test.
Ethnic groups in South Africa have a variety of origins. The racial categories introduced by the colonial apartheid regime remain ingrained in South African society with the governing party of South Africa, the African National Congress (ANC) continuing to classify the population as belonging to one of the three colonial-era constructed racial groups: Whites, Indians, Coloureds and Blacks.
Deborah Posel is a South African sociologist who is professor emeritus at the University of Cape Town (UCT). She was the founding director of two prominent interdisciplinary research institutes, UCT's Institute for Humanities in Africa and the Wits Institute for Social and Economic Research. Her academic interests are primarily in the historical sociology of apartheid and the sociology of post-apartheid South Africa.
