Post-apartheid Afrikaner youth reject Voortrekker narrative as nationalist baggage

Evidence

In a similar way to the image of short pants and long socks, the image of the Voortrekkers locates key aspects of Afrikaner identity in the distant past – so distant that ‘nobody in our generation’ will be able to remember it. The first participant quoted here (Interview extract 4) distances herself by forgetting (‘I learnt it, but I can’t remember it’), but the second participant is more forceful, calling the story of the Voortrekkers ‘shit’. However, it is also subtly suggested that it is not just the Voortrekkers that are being distanced, but ‘all that shit’, which we suspect refers to the baggage of Afrikaner nationalism. Therefore, by jettisoning ‘the Voortrekkers’, they also distance themselves from the Afrikaner nationalist discourses which the Voortrekkers represent. — Cornel Verwey and Michael Quayle, Whiteness, racism, and Afrikaner…, 83

Categorization

• XREF: Directly serves the reading purpose: shows young Afrikaners actively jettisoning the identity circuit’s founding myth rather than transferring it decoupled from power. — connects to: Genocide-invoking identity talk pervades younger Afrikaners who never lived under apartheid — Cornel Verwey and Michael Quayle, Whiteness, racism, and Afrikaner…, 192; Post-apartheid Afrikaner narratives of genocide echo Verwoerd-era ‘last stand’ rhetoric — Cornel Verwey and Michael Quayle, Whiteness, racism, and Afrikaner…, 178

Broader Connections

• Genocide-invoking identity talk pervades younger Afrikaners who never lived under apartheid #complicates (0.85) — Cornel Verwey and Michael Quayle, Whiteness, racism, and Afrikaner…, 192
• Post-apartheid Afrikaner narratives of genocide echo Verwoerd-era ‘last stand’ rhetoric #complicates (0.85) — Cornel Verwey and Michael Quayle, Whiteness, racism, and Afrikaner…, 178