Revision Study!!

Film:  The Power of One

Revision for Yr 9 Social Justice Test, Term 2

The Power of One is set in South Africa during the 1930s and 1940s.  It is the story of PK who at the age of five is sent to an Afrikaans boarding school. He is severely bullied and teased for being English (anti-English feelings were widespread amongst the originally Dutch Afrikaners following their loss in the Boer war).  PK is especially bullied by "the Judge", a cruel, avid Nazi supporter and the oldest student.

After a traumatising time in boarding school, PK is placed in the care of a German friend of his Grandfather’s named Doc.  It is not long after WWII begins that Doc is imprisoned for failure to register with the English government as a foreigner. PK becomes "assistant gardener" in Doc's cactus garden in the prison. PK makes frequent visits and meets Gel Piet, a black South African inmate, who teaches him to box. Piet spreads the myth of the ‘Rainmaker’, the one who brings peace to all of the tribes. PK is cast in the light of this myth.  Gael Piet is viciously murdered one night when the different imprisoned tribes are singing at a concert and are symbolically ‘one’.  PK’s victory over a distinguished black boxer, Gideon Duma helps him to maintain the legend image among black South Africans (an image he never wanted). 

After the war PK attends an English private school where he continues to box. He meets a young girl, Maria, with whom he falls in love. Her father, Professor Daniel Marais, is a leader of the Nationalist Party of South Africa. The two fight to teach the natives English as PK’s popularity grows via the myth. PK is hunted by ‘The Judge” who is seeking revenge for his humiliation of being expelled from school - violence and many deaths are the result (including Maria’s death). 

The film ends with PK and Gideon Duma continuing the teaching of language to black South Africans in hopes of building a better future for Africa.  PK believes that all humans have equal rights; that racism is the primary force of evil and he tries to build compassion (caring) and empathy (understanding) for the mistreated blacks of apartheid South Africa.

QUESTIONS:

1.    Describe 2 scenes which illustrate prejudice and racial hatred.

Two scenes that present prejudice and racial hatred are the revolting scene near the begging of the moment when the little boy named P-K is peed on by the elder boys because he is the only English boy that attends the German school and is the instrument f all their hatred. The other scene is when P-K is a bit older and is gathering all of the tribes together to bring them in unity and the guard are prejudice as he doesn’t know them but hates them and murders an African who is late to the show. This is prejudice as he doesn’t know this man.

2.    Explain how PK makes a difference to the many different imprisoned south African tribes.

P-K makes them happy by singing expressing their feelings and uniting the difference tribes so that they can work together to fight the racism and mistreatment of the Africans together.

3.    Why does PK want to teach South Africans to read?

P-K would like to teach the south Africans too read because amongst our developing society most good money making jobs require an education and the ability to read and write. It was also important for them to be able to communicate without the help of scribes so that they could keep their business personal and too themselves if need be.

Apartheid in South Africa

Apartheid, which in the Afrikaans language means “apart-nests” or “separateness,” was the system of racial discrimination and white political domination in South Africa.  Historically, apartheid had emerged from policies of racial segregation which had been practiced since the first Europeans—the Dutch, followed by the British—settled in South Africa in the seventeenth century. The official justification (reason) underlying apartheid was that each race—strictly divided into “Whites” (all Europeans), Bantus or “Blacks,” “Coloureds” (people of mixed race), and “Asians” (Indians and Pakistanis who had been brought to South Africa as labourers)—would prosper and live in harmony with one another if allowed to develop separately, while tension would result from the races living together and competing for the same resources. What the apartheid system did, of course, was to give political and economic supremacy (power) to the white minority. White people made up less than twenty percent of South Africa's total population in the 1940s and less than thirteen percent of the population in 1994, the year that Nelson Mandela was elected president of South Africa and apartheid was finally abolished (stopped).

The apartheid system created a series of laws to keep nonwhites people poor, uneducated, separate and unable to vote.  Nonwhites had to carry a pass to identify their racial group and to authorize their presence in restricted white areas.  Black South Africans were required to live in certain areas (the homelands) so that they would not intrude on white neighbourhoods.  This meant that more than 80% of South African land was reserved for less than 20% of the population (the whites).  Black South Africans were not allowed to vote or hold government positions, they had to use different hospitals, schools, theatres, public toilets and public drinking fountains. 

In 1976 police in the Soweto township opened fire on 15,000 secondary school students who were marching to protest a ruling that they be taught in Afrikaans, a language that neither they nor their teachers knew. A time of massive violent protest and increasingly repressive government response followed. Confronted with economic sanctions and international pressure, in the late 1980s and early 1990s South Africans began to take steps to end apartheid, culminating in the 1994 election of Nelson Mandela as president.

QUESTIONS:

4.    Explain apartheid.  How did the government justify the introduction of apartheid?

The government attempted to tell people that they would prosper in their separate racial groups without the tension and competition for goods and resources.

5.    Name at least 3 ways apartheid affected black South Africans.

The apartheid system created a series of laws to keep nonwhites people poor, uneducated, separate and unable to vote. Black South Africans were not allowed to vote or hold government positions; they had to use different hospitals, schools, theatres, public toilets and public drinking fountains. 

6.    Describe how black South Africans might feel about apartheid.

Black south Africans probably felt resentment towards the thought of having to be separated and that they were being treated like dirt in their own home by people that should be respecting them as the rightful owners of the land; not their salves!

7.    When did apartheid officially end?

in 1994, the year that Nelson Mandela was elected president of South Africa the apartheid was finally abolished (stopped).