Journal of Southern African Studies

News and resources page

Logo by Chaz Maviyane-Davies • Photo by Kristina Pikovskaia

Journal of Southern African Studies (JSAS) is an international publication for work of high academic quality on issues of interest and concern in the region of Southern Africa. It aims to generate fresh scholarly research in the fields of history, economics, sociology, demography, social anthropology, geography, development studies, administration, law, political science, political economy, international relations, literature, cultural studies, and the natural sciences in so far as they relate to the human condition. It periodically organises and supports conferences to this end, sometimes in the region. It seeks to encourage inter-disciplinary analysis, strong comparative perspectives and original research that reflects new theoretical or methodological approaches.

Read the Journal
Follow JSAS on X
Follow JSAS on Facebook
Publish with Us
Submit an Article

This webpage includes resources for prospective authors and news about awards, prizes and other events. Use the buttons below to jump to:

Terence Ranger Prize & Colin Murray Award
Videos from JSAS Writing Workshops
About JSAS Writing Workshops
History of JSAS

The Terence Ranger Prize

Congratulations to the winner of the 2025 Terence Ranger Prize, awarded to an article published in Volume 50: Sam Farrell for the article ‘Malawian Democracy Beyond Patrons and Clients: Distribution in Parliamentary Elections and the Moral Grounds of Democratic Relationships,’ Journal of Southern African Studies 50.5 pp. 801–20. 

The article was part of the JSAS Special Issue on ‘Beyond Failure: Exploring the Heart of the Malawian State’ edited by Tanja D. Hendriks, Sam Farrell, and Zoë Groves. 

The panel of judges made the following comments on the article:

‘This paper marshals interesting and original ethnographic material, to create a  sophisticated argument about ‘virtuous capacity’. And in so doing, it contributes both to Malawi specific and regional debates, but also offers tools which might be useful for thinking through questions around morality, virtue, and elections in much broader contexts.’

‘Farrell’s article takes on what seems like familiar topics, political corruption and specifically the role of monetary handouts during elections, and makes us understand them anew. Instead of lamenting the issue of distribution, Farrell asks us to take it seriously as part of a moral economy in which leaders have to show they are embedded in the community and have the wherewithal to distribute resources in the long term.’ 

‘A persuasive and well-written article [which] combines the strengths of ethnographic fieldwork and observation with a critique of the literature on clientelism and patrimonialism and a nuanced alternative: that the spending by electoral candidates was not merely an attempt to buy votes, but rather a show of generosity conforming to local ethical precepts.’ 

The Terence Ranger Prize is an honour given annually to the best article published the previous year by an early-career scholar publishing in JSAS for the first time. The late Terence Ranger was a distinguished scholar of African history and long-time editor of JSAS.

Learn More

The Colin Murray Award

Congratulations to Dr Garikai Chaunza, a postdoctoral fellow and part-time lecturer at Rhodes University, School of Journalism and Media studies, who has been awarded the 2025 Colin Murray Award for the project ‘Silencing Gukurahundi Victims: State Repression and the Erosion of Peace Journalism in Zimbabwe’.

The panel of judges made the following comments on the application:

The panel praised the application for its originality and innovation – the focus on independent journalists in particular (in addition to activists and survivors) in relation to Gukurahundi is an understudied area, as is the link made with “broader debates on peacebuilding, accountability, and reconciliation in Southern Africa”.

The panel also commended the application for its clarity, weaving together attention to “peace, memory and journalism under repression”. The candidate is well-grounded in the topic and has a clear understanding of what the research requires, including the ethical challenges around safety for research subjects in such a politically charged context.

Finally, the panel commented on the well thought budget and research plans. Overall, the panel felt that the project is of very high quality, and fits well with Colin Murray’s broad scholarship and has clear potential for a strong output in JSAS.

The Colin Murray Award supports post-doctoral researchers (within 2 years from the award of their PhD) with up to £2,500 for the carrying out of original ‘engaged field research’ on a topic relevant to the diverse interests and work of the late Colin Murray. The research should be conducted within, and have potential benefit to, Southern African studies. We interpret ‘field research’ as including ethnography, oral history or other methods involving human interlocutors.

The recipient of the award will eventually be expected to submit to JSAS at least one article resulting from the research that the award has funded.

For more about Colin Murray’s work, follow this link.

To see a list of previous winners, follow this link.

Getting published in JSAS: Video resources from the 2021 JSAS Early Career Writing Workshop.

This resource offers essential advice on getting published in the Journal of Southern African Studies and other scholarly journals. Lecturers at the online Early Career Writing Workshop (Windhoek, Namibia, June–July 2021) give essential hints and tips for writing up your article, and explain what JSAS and other publishers are looking for.

The resource also includes the workshop’s keynote lecture on land reform in southern Africa by Professor William Beinart.

The 2021 Early Career Writing Workshop was a project of the University of Namibia, the Journal of Southern African Studies and the Centre of African Studies, University of Basel. Additional funding for the workshop was provided by the British Academy’s Writing Workshops Programme, supported under the UK Government’s Global Challenges Research Fund.

The Publishers’ View (1): Advice from Taylor & Francis

Madeleine Markey (Routledge, Taylor & Francis)

  • Taylor & Francis are the publishers of the Journal of Southern African Studies. This talk explains how to write effective abstracts and titles, as well as covering copyright, maximising the reach of your research, what is happening with Open Access, and how to identify legitimate venues for publishing your research.

The Publishers’ View (2): Advice from UNAM Press I

Jill Kinahan (UNAM Press)

  • The University of Namibia Press publishes scholarly books of international standard on topics of relevance to Namibia and the Southern African region. UNAM Press encourages Namibian writers and academics to submit their work to build up a body of local Namibian research and literature. This talk presents tips gained from working with a large number of manuscripts from inexperienced Namibian writers and developing these to publication standard.

The Publishers’ View (3): Advice from UNAM Press II

Annapaula Vakuamena (UNAM Press)

  • The University of Namibia Press publishes scholarly books of international standard on topics of relevance to Namibia and the Southern African region. UNAM Press encourages Namibian writers and academics to submit their work to build up a body of local Namibian research and literature. This talk presents ‘dos and don’ts’ for getting published with UNAM Press.

The Publishers’ View (4): Advice from the Journal of Southern African Studies

Dennis Walder (Journal of Southern African Studies)

  • This session explains how the peer review process works, and what the Journal of Southern African Studies is looking for in an article. The speaker is a JSAS Editor.

The Experience of Publishing in the Journal of Southern African Studies

Sishuwa Sishuwa (University of Zambia and University of Cape Town)

  • The speaker was a participant in the Journal of Southern African Studies/University of Malawi Early Career Writing Workshop in 2018. Here, he shares his experience of successfully preparing his paper for publication.

Sourcing and Handling Information (1)

Marja Hinfelaar (Southern African Institute for Policy and Research (SAIPAR))

  • This talk looks at various aspects of information-handling, including data collection; relationships with supervisors and co-investigators/co-authors; plagiarism; and bibliographic referencing.

Sourcing and Handling Information (2)

Werner Hillebrecht (National Archives of Namibia)

  • This talk covers libraries, archives and digital sources of information in Namibia and elsewhere, as well as archival referencing.

Keynote: Approaching Land Reform in South Africa

William Beinart (St Antony’s College, University of Oxford)

  • How should land reform be handled in the post-apartheid era? In this keynote lecture, Professor Beinart discusses what is happening on the ground in South Africa, and suggests how this research should inform policy. He also references the history of land reform in Zimbabwe. This talk offers a pragmatic approach to land reform that prioritises production and rural livelihoods, as well as facilitating deracialisation with gradual redistribution.

Literature and Structure

Sara Rich Dorman (Journal of Southern African Studies)

  • This talk discusses how to handle your literature review and conceptual framework, how to structure your article, and how to write a convincing introduction and conclusion. The speaker is Co-Chair and Senior Editor of JSAS.

Writing Grant Applications

Helena Perez Niño (Institute of Social Studies, The Hague)

  • Translating research interests into compelling applications requires learning to convey your ideas in ways that appeal to research councils and funding bodies. This talk discusses the logic behind transforming research ideas into robust proposals and touches on some key issues, such as operationalization, impact, and yes… budget lines!

JSAS Writing Workshops

Scholars based in southern Africa face a number of challenges when they attempt to publish in internationally recognised journals. Although the field where they do their research is close to home, they find it difficult to access the secondary literature necessary to speak to a global audience. The time they have for writing – and the teaching of writing to others – is severely limited given the heavy course loads and high numbers of undergraduate students whose needs are the priority for early career lecturers. These difficulties translate into fewer submissions from scholars in countries with under-resourced, often struggling universities. What this means for over-burdened lecturers and post-doctoral fellows is that they have far fewer opportunities for their papers to be published in the best African Studies journals, compared to scholars based at universities in the global North.

To address this situation in an effective way, a group of JSAS Advisory Board members based in southern Africa organise regular writing workshops as the Journal’s central initiative in its goal to engage with the next generation of scholars in the region.

The group’s firsthand experience of implementing the Journal’s standards for publication, as well as their knowledge of the obstacles that lie in the path of scholars in southern Africa, places them in a unique position to train others in the practical writing skills and cutting-edge approaches needed to publish for a global audience. They also take into account the talents and ambitions of these young scholars and, thus, have given the workshop a vital intellectual dimension, contributing to a potential transformation of international scholarship itself, shifting the balance towards the Global South. This takes the form of an annual plenary on the most pressing and controversial issues being debated by scholars in the region. In the first workshop, the plenary focused on ‘De-colonising (Southern) African Studies’, airing the frustrations of some of Africa’s best thinkers with the continuing dominance of Northern institutions and academics in deciding what topics will be researched, what research will be published and even what styles of education will shape university teaching in Africa. The plenary is intended not only to critique current issues, but also to find a way forward – bringing together the critical reflections of the established scholars who designed the workshop with the fresh ideas of the early career scholars attending it.

Advisory board members initiated the workshop to encourage more Africa-based scholars to publish in JSAS and other international journals. To achieve this goal they are planning further interventions based on evidence they are gathering themselves. Each year the workshop will host a panel of papers reporting their on-going research into the conditions for scholarship in the countries of the region. These papers will inform the group’s innovations in workshop content. And plans are afoot to produce a collection of articles to appear in the Journal, to provide a solid base of data useful for action to improve those conditions.


JSAS – A Short History

William Beinart

JSAS was established in 1974 to cater for the growing volume of academic work on Southern Africa and to provide an interdisciplinary vehicle for academic scholarship. The original statement by James Barber, founding chairman of the editorial board, explicitly committed the journal to including ‘conflicting views’ and added that the journal ‘is not intended as a mouthpiece for a particular viewpoint’. Broadly speaking, JSAS was a site for scholarship that was critical of colonialism, minority regimes and apartheid in the region but the editorial board included those who identified both with liberal and radical scholarship. There was some tension between those with differing ideological viewpoints in the early years and a change in the editors reflected this. However, Terence Ranger became chair of the board in 1975 and ensured that the journal, while rooted in radical scholarship, kept a relatively broad church. Although JSAS has published theoretical work through the years, the major emphasis has been on original work of high academic quality that includes new empirical research.

The editorial board of JSAS was based in Britain from the start. The major reason was that the board remained committed to participatory and collective administrative and editorial practices. Papers were discussed and decisions made at meetings, usually quarterly. Editors worked closely with the chair and board members. Most of the reading of papers has been done by board members. In these respects, JSAS differs from many other journals. The practice of joint editorship (usually three) and rotating editors (usually serving from three to five years) also became established early in the journal’s history and this ensured connections with new voices, new ideas and new networks. The board also gradually expanded from about 14 in the 1970s to 40 in the 2010s, incorporating younger scholars, and expanding disciplinary approaches and country specialists. In response to representations from colleagues in southern Africa and north America, JSAS initiated an Advisory Board in the mid-1990s which has now grown to over 30. Members assist with reading submissions and participate in JSAS events.

Special thematic issues have been a particular feature and strength of the journal. Drawing together a number of linked articles they have helped to map innovative directions in scholarship including agrarian, gender, environmental and urban studies. In recent years, the editors have increasingly worked with guest editors on special issues, further broadening the academic networks involved in producing the journal.

The success of the journal and increasing submissions prompted an expansion from two to four issues a year in the 1980s. In 1994, the board decided to switch publisher from Oxford University Press to Carfax (later Routledge). JSAS had been running on a shoestring and more generous financing from Routledge enabled journal activities to be further expanded. The major difference was that editorial duties could be better rewarded and an editorial manager, and later copy editor, appointed. Resources were available to ensure that editors attended key conferences and Advisory Board members could be invited to attend board meetings and events in the UK. Conferences have long been a central feature of JSAS activity and the additional funding has enabled more of these to be held in the region. Several have been organised, working with regional academics and universities, including recent events in Malawi and Zambia. Special issues have been an important outcome.

JSAS has grown enormously in scale. In 2014, the journal marked its 40th anniversary by expanding to six issues a year in order to cater for increasing submissions, especially from the region. The volume of articles published a year has increased over the 40 years from about 10 to 70 with submissions at about three times that number. Dealing with an enterprise of this scale is demanding for the chair of board and the editorial group as well as the readers. But the board remains a participatory group and a very valuable network for ideas and academic innovation. The journal remains committed to consolidating and expanding an interdisciplinary academic approach to the region, encouraging scholars to think across boundaries. A key aim is to foster younger academics and to support an international network of those who research in and on the region.