Research

South African literature; nineteenth-century, twentieth-century and contemporary American fiction; short stories; Joseph Conrad; aesthetic and affective aspects of literary studies.

Publications

Selected Publications:

2011 Forthcoming in English in Africa: "'A Teaspoon of Milk in a Bucketful of Coffee:' The Discourse of Race
Relations in Early Twentieth-Century South Africa."

Forthcoming in Critique (USA): "J.M. Coetzee, Elizabeth Costello, and the Inevitability of 'Realism.'"

Forthcoming in English Studies in Africa: "'Style Is the Great Betrayer:' Socialist Realism in Alex La Guma's A
Walk in the Night."

Published:

(with Dirk Klopper and Craig Mackenzie) The Columbia Guide to South African Literature in English since 1945. Columbia University Press, 2009.

“An Image of Animals: Speciesism in Coetzee’s Disgrace.” English Academy Review 25.1 (2008): 133-38.

“‘He and His Man’: Allegory and Catachresis in J.M. Coetzee’s Nobel Lecture.” English in Africa 34.1 (2007): 97-114.

“On the ‘Africanization’ of English Studies in South Africa.” Arts and Humanities in Higher Education 5.2 (2006): 117-26.

“The Fairground Scene in Turbott Wolfe.” English Studies in Africa 49.2 (2006): 1-12.

“Mediated Desire and American Disappointment in the Stories of Raymond Carver.” Critique 46.4 (2005): 344-56.

“Return to Humanism: The Future of English Studies in South Africa.” Scrutiny2 10.1 (2005): 45-55.

“Disgraceland: History and the Humanities in ‘Frontier Country’.” English in Africa 30.2 (2004): 43-68.

“Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe.” British Writers Classics. Ed. Jay Parini. Volume II. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 2004. 289-305.

“Chinua Achebe.” World Writers in English. Ed. Jay Parini. Volume I. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 2004. 1-19.

“Turbott Wolfe and ‘the emotional aspects of the colour-situation’.” Journal of Commonwealth Literature 38.2 (2003): 41-57.

“Realism, Rape and J.M. Coetzee’s Disgrace.” Critique 43.4 (2002): 307-22.

“And a Threefold Cord: Alex La Guma’s Neglected Masterpiece?” Literator 23.3 (2002): 1-18.

“J.P. FitzPatrick’s ‘The Outspan’: A Textual Source for Heart of Darkness?” Conradiana 30.3 (1998): 203-12.

“Francis Bancroft’s Of Like Passions and the Politics of Sex in Early Twentieth-Century South Africa.” English in Africa, 25.2 (1998): 1-30.

“The Moral Economy of Race in Early Twentieth-Century South African English Literature.” South African Literary History: Totality and/or Fragment. Ed. Erhard Reckwitz, Karin Reitner and Lucia Vennarini. Essen: Blaue Eule, 1997: 163-93.

“George Webb Hardy’s The Black Peril and the Social Meaning of ‘Black Peril’ in Early Twentieth-Century South Africa.” Journal of Southern African Studies 22.3 (1996): 441-53.

“Colonial Discourse and Culture in South Africa.” The African Past and Contemporary Culture. Papers on Africa delivered at the Annual Conference of the Association for the Study of the New Literatures in English, Essen, 12-15 June 1991. Ed. Erhard Reckwitz, Lucia Vennarini and Cornelia Wegener. Essen: Die Blaue Eule, 1993. 43-52.

“The Early South African Novel of Race.” Perspectives on South African English Literature. Ed. Michael Chapman, Colin Gardner and Es'kia Mphahlele. Johannesburg: Ad Donker, 1992. 75-93.

“Race and Class in a Nineteenth-Century South African Novel.” Mfecane to Boer War: Versions of South African History. Papers Presented at a Symposium at the University of Essen, 25-27 April 1990. Ed. Elmar Lehmann and Erhard Reckwitz.

“History and Value.” New Contrast 18.1 (69) (1990): 22-30.

“Race as Science, Race as Language: A Preliminary Enquiry into Origins.” Pretexts. 1.1 (1989): 317.

“Kipling’s ‘Beyond the Pale’: A Preface.” English Studies in Africa 27.2 (1984): 123-32.

“FitzPatrick’s ‘The Outspan’: Deconstructing the Fiction of Race.” English in Africa 10.1 (1983): 15-28.

“James Matthews’ ‘Protest Songs’: The Problem of Evaluation.” Soweto Poetry. Ed. Michael Chapman. Johannesburg: McGrawHill, 1980: 184-90.

“Evaluating Protest Fiction.” English in Africa 7.1 (1980): 51-70.