The “Colored” People of South Africa

By Nick Gier, Unfiltered 2-05-10

When the Dutch settled on the Cape of Southern Africa in 1652, they found that the native Africans were very reluctant slaves. The Dutch looked to their East Asian possessions for more reliable servants.

Today the 200,000 descendants of these people are called Cape Malays. Under apartheid system Cape Malays were classified as “colored,” a racial term used to identify all people of mixed race.

In addition to the Cape Malays, there are colored people who are a mixture of British and Zulu. There are also those from the sexual encounters between the British and the native women of present day Zimbabwe.

Proudly white Afrikaner pioneers also seduced the wives of the Bushmen of Botswana and present day Namibia. The colored people of Southern Africa are the most genetically diverse people in the world.

Today the coloreds make up 10 percent of South Africa’s population, about 4 million people. Because of the influence of British and Dutch missionaries, 80 percent of the coloreds are Christian while 5 percent are Muslim.

During my trip to South Africa last September, our tour group enjoyed a delicious meal at the home of a colored family. They had a Spanish surname and, incredibly enough, their ancestors were brought to South Africa as slaves from the Philippines.

My guide was colored and he freely shared his family history. His father was German and his mother was black African. He and his sister were registered as colored when they were born, but his father managed to get his younger twin brothers registered as white. Under apartheid the rights of these two sets of siblings were dramatically different.

Under British rule the coloreds enjoyed the right to vote in the Western Cape until 1930. After that they could only elect white candidates who would represent their interests. When the Nationalist Party took over in 1948 the rights of coloreds were further restricted.

At least the coloreds did not have to carry the identity cards that blacks did. Fortunately for them, the coloreds were still considered South African citizens, but blacks were citizens only in their artificial “homelands,” sometimes hundreds of miles from where the black males could find work.

In 1966 District Six in central Cape Town was declared a white's only area and all non-white people--mostly colored--were forced to move to segregated townships 20 miles outside the city.

During my stay in Cape Town, I visited the museum for District Six, which has been compared to the French Quarter of New Orleans. Muslims, Jews, Christians, and Hindus of all races enjoyed jazz together and celebrated each other's holidays.

At the museum I met a colored Muslim man who had written a poignant account of his life there and the agony of his family's removal. There were pictures in the book from Carnival, the district’s favorite holiday just as it is in New Orleans.

Some of the musicians looked as if they were made up in “black face.” “Were the coloreds of District Six making fun of blacks?” I asked. The author quickly explained that the colors of the face paint varied from group to group, and it was not an attempt to look like a black person.

Protests and technicalities slowed the exodus from District Six, but in the end 60,000 people were forced out. Except for the original churches and mosques, District Six now lies empty except for a new technical university on its edge.

As we celebrate Black History Month, let us honor the brave South African freedom fighters, catalyzed by American activists but who also served as an inspiration in return.

We remember especially the Rev. Allan Boesak, the famous colored theologian who refused to give up his Dutch Reformed faith even though its leaders had discriminated against him.

Nick Gier taught philosophy at the University of Idaho for 31 years. Listen to or read all of his columns at www.NickGier.com

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