SAHA publication: ‘Entering Tembisa: an oral and photographic exploration of the community'

This publication and accompanying virtual exhibition draw on an oral and photographic community history project undertaken by SAHA in 2010 and 2011 to document the history of the East Rand township of Tembisa - purported to be one of the largest townships in the Southern hemisphere.

In keeping with the South African History Archive's commitment to capturing lost or neglected histories, SAHA worked with three community interns from Tembisa to conduct oral history interviews with residents about the history of the community.

Materials gathered in the course of this project are archived at SAHA and include the audio interviews, transcripts, photographs of present day Tembisa taken by the interns and scans of artefacts gathered from interviewees.

The project report, launched in 2012, and the virtual exhibition draw on these materials, as well as images of the township in the 1980s taken by activist and former Afrapix photographer Gille de Vlieg, to tell a brief, yet fascinating history of Tembisa.

Materials used for the virtual exhibition and report are from the following SAHA collections:

AL3274 The Gille de Vlieg Photographic Collection
AL3288 ‘Voices from Below': An Oral and Photographic Community History of Tembisa Project Collection

Visit the virtual exhibition

Copies of the report can be obtained from the SAHA office or can be downloaded free of charge. For more information, call us on 011 718 2560 - email: info@saha.org.za