Print culture and imagining the Union of South Africa

Testing Benedict Anderson’s thesis that nations are communities imagined principally
in the medium of the printed word, this chapter surveys a variety of writings on South
Africa from the decade between the South African War (1899-1902) and the moment
of Union (1910) – novels, histories, newspapers, as well as more ephemeral texts.
The question posed is: how did published writings contribute to the constitution
of the postcolonial South African nation? 1 On the basis of this one case study, I
reflect briefly upon the relationship between print culture and postcolonial African
nationalisms.