According to author Jacob Dlamini, there is another side to the park, a social history neglected by scholars and popular writers alike in which blacks (meaning Africans, Coloureds, and Indians) occupy center stage. The Kruger National Park is South Africa’s most iconic nature reserve, renowned for its rich flora and fauna. Safari Nation opens new lines of inquiry in the study of national parks in Africa and the rest of the world. Nancy Jacobs, author of Birders of Africa: History of a Network Following its own eclectic route through rural reserves, cities, and mines, from Table Mountain to the lowveld, Safari Nation offers a bold argument that by making claim on the more-than-human world, black South Africans created an inclusive nation.” On their way, they made a space of belonging through political effort, not nativism. Rather, Jacob Dlamini describes people on the move towards Kruger National Park, a place where conservation meant racial exclusion. “This book is about nature and black South Africans, but not as daughters and sons of the soil. William Beinart, author of Rise of Conservation in South Africa Dlamini does not pursue a polarized interpretation of the park and conservation as simply white/colonial constructs but instead develops a growing literature that presents African people as engaged in many different facets of park history, as agents, and conservationists.” “ Safari Nation is a highly original treatment of the history of Kruger National Park from a black perspective. Heidi Gengenbach, author of Binding Memories: Women as Makers and Tellers of History in Magude, Mozambique Dlamini’s skillful storytelling throughout the book manages to balance compassion and concern for justice with careful empirical detail in a direct, graceful prose that makes Safari Nation an enjoyable read from start to finish.” “An innovative work of intellectual, political, and social history, Safari Nation advances a compelling new explanation for why the ANC government has chosen not to dismantle colonial-era conservation projects whose origins lie in the dispossession of countless black families. Saul Dubow, author of South Africa's Struggle for Human Rights Jacob Dlamini captures South African experiences of nature and leisure that have largely escaped the historical profession, focusing his sharp eye on the significant minority of black South Africans who managed to live ’with-as opposed to under-colonialism and apartheid.’ An enjoyable book, full of surprises.” “In Safari Nation, the Kruger Park and South African ideas of nature and nationality are revealed in profoundly new and insightful ways. Winner of the American Historical Association's 2021 Martin A.
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