The nineteenth century deserves to be called a turning point because of the significant events and the revolutionary changes that took place in the region now called South Africa. Although the sources of African history became relatively more abundant in the nineteenth century, its history has been the subject of much debate. Ajayi, a prominent Nigerian historian, once argued that colonialism was an episode in Africa's quest for freedom and independence. Looking at South African history from the vantage point of 2003, nineteenth-century history is an episode in the construction of South African identities that continues to compete for dominance in the present. The history of state building is the history of forging national identities over the years. The history of state building in South Africa is also the history of competing nationalisms. In Chapter 1, Yonah Seleti examines the nature of statehood at the beginning of the century, and traces how nation building proceeded in the nineteenth century. In Chapter 2, Tim Keegan examines the role of imperialism and the birth of a colonial society.
In Chapter 3, Drusela Yekela examines how the discovery of minerals in South Africa initiated processes that restructured settlement patterns, as well as social, political and economic relations in the country.