Soweto

Title: Soweto
Authors: Peter Magubane; Charlene Smith
Struik Publishers
Cape Town. South Africa, 2001
ISBN 1868725847
Softcover, 21 x 28 cm, 160 pages, throughout bw- and colour photos

About: Soweto

Soweto, a name known internationally, is synonymous with the struggle against apartheid. During the forced removals of the 1950s, countless black people were relocated to areas surrounding Johannesburg, that eventually came to be known as Soweto. It was in Soweto that the uprising took place in 1976, signalling the beginning of the end of apartheid. This text showcases some of Peter Magubane's finest photographs, taken over almost 50 years. The book covers the town's development and continues to today, showing its poverty, colour and art. The reader is taken through the creation of Soweto in the 50's and it's bloody uprising in the 70's. The main body illustrates the people of Soweto going about their daily lives: working and playing, celebrating and grieving.

Charlene Smith has over 20 years' experience as a political writer and documentary maker for CBC, CBS and ABC. She is the author of Robben Island, published in 1997 by Struik and reprinted many times. She lives in Greenside, Johannesburg.

Peter Magubane is an internationally acclaimed photographer, whose long and distinguished career spans over 45 years. As one of South Africa's most distinguished photographers, he began his illustrious career with the Brownie camera his father gave him when he was a boy. The young Peter took photographs of his classmates and set himself on a path to becoming a photographer of world renown. Working first with the illustrious Drum Magazine during the fifties and later for the Rand Daily Mail, Magubane routinely covered political assignments. As a result he was detained, kept in solitary confinement and later banned by the nationalist government of the time.

Despite the harassment, his photographs recorded much of the violence and pathos of the apartheid era and his pictures of the 1976 Soweto riots defined his reputation as a first-class social and political photographer. Peter Magubane boasts an impressive career that spans nearly half a century and he has received numerous accolades for his contribution to the world of photography. He has received a number of prestigious accolades for his courageous and outstanding contribution to the world of photography. He is based in Johannesburg.