Wits University Press

19/12/2025

The Latest issue of The Johannesburg Review of Books has just been published. With literary commentary and reviews, short fiction and excerpts from new books, including non-fiction, it has something to read for everyone.
This issue features from Wits University Press 's latest publishing
the winning short story, 'Mr Duiker Sings the Blues' from a new anthology, When Water Wants To; an excerpt from Deborah Posel's memoir, Darker Shade of Pale; and a review of Mahmood Mamdani's new book, Slow Poison.

Wamuwi Mbao • Makhosazana Xaba • Simon van Schalkwyk • Khadija Tracey Heeger • Sean Jacobs • Barbara Boswell • Kevin Goddard • Muthi Nhlema • Ivor W Hartmann • Sanya Osha • Khumisho Moguerane • Victor Dlamini • Tymon Smith • Sandile Ngidi • Dawn Garisch • Deborah Seddon...

12/12/2025

09/12/2025

READING LIST - Here's a fascinating list of 21 books about Africa. Afrologi’s definitive nonfiction list to illuminate the continent.

It also includes a book on the Namib desert, co-published by Wits University Press.

Namib: The Archeology of an African Desert, by John Kinahan (University of Namibia Press, 2020). https://witspress.co.za/page/detail/Namib/?K=9781776147601
Not a conventional travel guide, this exceptional book is one you’ll want to tote around on trips to southwestern Africa or simply enjoy from your comfy chair. Kinahan deftly mixes science with scenery, painting a vivid picture of a million years of human endurance and connection in this desert domain. In this sense, Kinahan tells a universal story of resilience – one he knows well from decades of field research across this vast terrain. With stunning drawings of ancient rock art that complement his graceful though never confounding narrative, Kinahan has created a classic account of deep-time Africa.

Why Buy: Humans are incredible and here’s why.

https://afrologi.com/2025/08/09/africa-best-books/

These 21 essential nonfiction books on Africa will help you gain a deeper understanding of African societies and economies, crucial history and key heroes and villains. Curated for travelers, investors and entrepreneurs, these are the great reads on Africa.

08/12/2025

We were delighted to recently welcome Nwachukwu Egbunike, Head of Pan-Atlantic University Press (Lagos), to Wits University Press at the Press's offices in Braamfontein. He met with Publisher, Veronica Klipp, for a lively discussion on strengthening collaboration among African scholarly publishers.

04/12/2025

INVITATION!
Join us at the Origins Centre Museumwith Lyn Wadley for be book launch of 'Rock Art of the Waterberg: Rites and Transformation by Lyn Wadley and Ghilraen Laue.
Details:
Date 9 December 2025
Time: 10:30 AM for 11:00 AM
RSVP: [email protected] by 5 December 2025
Where: Origins Centre Museum

03/12/2025

The recent launch at Wordsworth Books Seapoint of a new book on legendary South African musician and cultural changemaker, Johnny Clegg, gave new insights into Clegg’s legacy not only from archival and academic work (in the book) but from the memories of people who encountered him in formative ways.
One audience member at the Cape Town book launch recalled watching Clegg on television during apartheid after her mother called her into the room saying, “Come and see what I am seeing.” She remembered the impact of witnessing a white musician visibly crossing boundaries. She said she drew strength from seeing someone act without regard for what “could or would have or might have been”.

Another person reflected on how limited the written record about Clegg has been until recently. “There’s only one book to date that deals with Johnny, and that’s his autobiography. Now, there are two.”

Contributors to the book, Pakama Ncume and Marguerite de Villiers were in conversation with Michael Drewett, co-editor of the book. Ncume is a sound archivist and librarian at Stellenbosch University and Marguerite Coetzee is an anthropologist, artist, and futurist.
Ncume’s immersion in the 'Hidden Years Music Archive' offered an intimate window into Clegg’s beginnings. As she listened through recordings from the 1970s, she encountered “a white man wearing Zulu regalia and standing so close with a black man while the system had taught us that the two do not mix”. She first saw this as a child on an LP sleeve in her mother’s collection, but the archive gave her access to Clegg’s voice as it developed. “You could feel a man who is still finding himself,” she said. Ncume said the early tapes revealed a shy teenager navigating unfamiliar cultural terrain while forming relationships that would shape his identity. Listening to the recordings made the cultural exchange audible. “He really meant it,” she said. “It wasn’t accidental that he became a white Zulu.”
As reported by Claudia Gross from the South African Jewish Report Newspaper in this article - https://www.sajr.co.za/unheard-aspects-of-johnny-clegg-voiced-in-new-book

03/12/2025

WINNER! Casey Golomski's compelling and inventive ethnography 'God's Waiting Room: Racial Reckoning at Life’s End', has won the 2025 Elliot P. Skinner Book Award. The book is a beautiful exploration of what decline and dilapidation mean for people in a South African old age home whose lives were largely lived in compact with racial separation.
Awarded by the American Anthropological Association, the prize is given to the book that best furthers the global community of Africanist scholars and the broader interests of the African continent.
Congratulations to this well-deserved award, Casey Golomski!
Wits University Press is the Southern African publisher of this award-winning book.
Get your copy from online retailers (such as Takealot and Loot.co.za) and good bookshops.

For more info: https://witspress.co.za/page/detail/God/?K=9781776149490

03/12/2025

New research into the life and work of Johnny Clegg reveals aspects of his musical and cultural journey that have seldom been documented, drawing on previously unheard recordings, archival material, and fresh anthropological perspectives.

02/12/2025

In many ways Zandspruit typifies the precariousness of life within South Africa, where two-thirds of young people lack waged employment. However, rather than seeing Zandspruit as dumping ground, Hannah J. Dawson calls for an integrated understanding of the complex linkages between people’s lives and livelihoods. ‘Making a Life: Young men on Johannesburg’s urban margins’ https://witspress.co.za/page/detail/?K=9781776149551

Figure 1.6: View of Jackal Creek Golf Estate seen in the distance from a shack in Extension 9. © Hannah J. Dawson, 2015

01/12/2025

Book Launch @ Bookdealers of BluBird. Here's another chance to hear Deborah Posel, the author of 'Darker shade of Pale', speak about her family memoir and the immigration of Eastern European Jews to South Africa during the early 1900s.
When: Tuesday 2 December at 18:00 for 18:30
Detail below.
Bookdealers

01/12/2025

BOOK REVIEW: Darker Shade of Pale by Deborah Posel
Review by Nigel Willis, Retired Judge of the Supreme Court of Appeal, South Africa

"Writing beautifully, Deboral Posel has given us a riveting social, political, economic history of the Jews in South Africa. ... In writing this book, Posel has skilfully reminded us of the complex admixture of forces that has shaped South Africa as it is today."

Get your copy of 'Darker Shade of Pale' today from online retailers and leading bookshops.

Judge Nigel Willis has written many Book Reviews throughout the years for a variety of publications and online platforms.

26/11/2025

Author of ‘Magema Fuze: The Making of a Kholwa Intellectual’, Hlonipha Mokoena returns with a powerful new book: ‘The Nightwatchman: Representing Black Men in Colonial South Africa' (Wits University Press 2025) https://witspress.co.za/page/detail/?K=9781776149384

In this compelling work, Mokoena explores the often-overlooked lives of African men in military and police service during the colonial era through images. Mokoena also briefly revisits Magema Fuze, weaving his story into a broader narrative of Black representation.