Abstract
Title: Memorializing Top Location as part of Sharpeville’s history
This Major Design Project (MDP) will investigate the history of Sharpeville, its recent increase in the Islamic religion and the first masjid to be built in Sharpeville. This MDP will explore new cultural spaces around the masjid in Sharpeville with a view to reinterpret historical justice in public spaces.
The history of Sharpeville begins from Top Location. Top Location came about in 1914, in Vereeniging. A predominantly black and Indian community. Top location was a community for multiple religions and cultures. It was a diverse and vibrant. There was a vast amount of people that settled there, due to work opportunities and growing industry, this resulted in Top Location becoming over populated. (Leigh, 1968)
As a result, the council of Vereeniging sanctioned a new black settlement – this settlement was named Sharpeville which was named after the mayor of Vereeniging John Lillie Sharpeville. The project intended to relocate black residents of Top Location into Sharpeville. Act 21 of 1950 apartheid Legislation later caused all residents of Top Location to be forcefully removed. Blacks were moved into Sharpeville, Coloured’s to Rustervaal and Indians to Roshnee. (Leigh, 1968)
This MDP will explore ways to tell the missing story of the Indian community from Top Location who were forcefully removed to Roshnee under the act of apartheid. This will be done through researching the history of Top Location and the removal acts of apartheid, breaking down the hierarchy of placement. The history of Top Location can be used to explore the current relationship between the Indian community (Roshnee) and the black community (Sharpeville) through the establishment on the first masjid built in Sharpeville.
Methodology
I will explore Catherine Dee’s ‘Critical visual studies’ (2004) as visual methodology in my research. Art as Enquiry, mapping and visual narratives as research methodologies will be explored. Art as Enquiry will be used to develop Henna and patterns as part of cultural aspects by questioning and contesting cultural practices. Henna is a cultural practice that has been used for centuries in the Indian community. It is associated with rituals, religious events or ceremonies that mark calendrical and life cycle transitions. These events usually happening at people’s home or community spaces such as halls. The types of henna patterns are also important because they have spiritual and symbolic meanings attached to them. (Shrivastava, 2014). Henna and the concept of patterns will be used as tools to represent my findings of religious and cultural activities present in Sharpeville. I will use mapping as visual studies to further my research in studying Top Locations and the removal of multiple cultures. Visual narratives will be used to explore time, process and human dramatics: it will be used as a methodology to tell the stories of the communities who were forcibly removed from their homes. Visual narratives will also be used to trace back the people’s history within the landscape. (Dee, 2004)
The design aim of this MDP is to create a multi-culture memorial landscape that incorporates all marginalized communities and the untold stories of their force removals. Force removals of Top Location can also be looked at as the starting point or first act of injustice that ultimately led to the series of events of the Sharpeville massacre.
These questions will be used to explore my research topic further:
How can the Indian community from Top Locations can be part of the memory of Sharpeville?
How can the cultural practice of henna and spiritual use of patterns be used to explore and celebrate the multi-cultural practices in Sharpeville?
How can henna be used to tell the story of force removals?
How can henna and pattern making be used to map and portray the untold stories of the force removals of the Indian community?
How does the masjid bring people together?