South+African+culture

=South Africa= source: http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0107983.html

[| **Administrative capital (2003 est.):**] Pretoria, 1,541,300 (metro. area), 1,249,700 (city proper); **Legislative capital and largest city:** Cape Town, 3,140,600 (metro. area), 2,733,000 (city proper). **Judicial capital:** Bloemfontein, 378,000. No decision has been made to relocate the seat of government. South Africa is demarcated into nine provinces, consisting of the Gauteng, Northern Province, Mpumalanga, North West, KwaZulu/Natal, Eastern Cape, Western Cape, Northern Cape, and Free State. Each province has its own capital **[|More Facts & Figures]** || =Geography= South Africa, on the continent's southern tip, is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean on the west and by the Indian Ocean on the south and east. Its neighbors are Namibia in the northwest, Zimbabwe and Botswana in the north, and Mozambique and Swaziland in the northeast. The kingdom of Lesotho forms an enclave within the southeast part of South Africa, which occupies an area nearly three times that of California. The southernmost point of Africa is Cape Agulhas, located in the Western Cape Province about 100 mi (161 km) southeast of the Cape of Good Hope. =Government= Republic. =History= The San people were the first settlers; the Khoikhoi and Bantu-speaking tribes followed. The Dutch East India Company landed the first European settlers on the Cape of Good Hope in 1652, launching a colony that by the end of the 18th century numbered only about 15,000. Known as Boers or Afrikaners, and speaking a Dutch dialect known as Afrikaans, the settlers as early as 1795 tried to establish an independent republic. After occupying the Cape Colony in that year, Britain took permanent possession in 1815 at the end of the Napoleonic Wars, bringing in 5,000 settlers. Anglicization of government and the freeing of slaves in 1833 drove about 12,000 Afrikaners to make the “great trek” north and east into African tribal territory, where they established the republics of the Transvaal and the Orange Free State. The discovery of diamonds in 1867 and gold nine years later brought an influx of “outlanders” into the republics and spurred Cape Colony prime minister Cecil Rhodes to plot annexation. Rhodes's scheme of sparking an “outlander” rebellion, to which an armed party under Leander Starr Jameson would ride to the rescue, misfired in 1895, forcing Rhodes to resign. What British expansionists called the “inevitable” war with the Boers broke out on Oct. 11, 1899. The defeat of the Boers in 1902 led in 1910 to the Union of South Africa, composed of four provinces, the two former republics, and the old Cape and Natal colonies. Louis Botha, a Boer, became the first prime minister. Organized political activity among Africans started with the establishment of the African National Congress in 1912. [|**Next: South Africa's Independence is Tarnished by Apartheid**]
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 * ~ Facts & Figures ||
 * || [[image:http://www.infoplease.com/images/msafrica.t.gif width="120" height="101" caption="Map of South Africa" link="http://www.infoplease.com/atlas/country/southafrica.html"]][|Map of South Africa] ||  ||
 * **President:** Jacob Zuma (2009)
 * Total area:** 471,008 sq mi (1,219,912 sq km)
 * Population (2009 est.):** 49,052,489 (growth rate: –0.2%); birth rate: 19.9/1000; infant mortality rate: 44.4/1000; life expectancy: 49.0; density per sq mi: 93
 * Other large cities:** Durban/Pinetown, 2,396,100; Johannesburg, 1,675,200; East Rand, 1,378,792 (part of Johannesburg metro. area, 2000 est.)
 * Monetary unit:** Rand
 * || [[image:http://www.infoplease.com/images/safrica.gif width="250" height="154" caption="Flag of South Africa"]] ||  ||
 * || Index ||
 * # South Africa Main Page
 * 1) [| South Africa's Independence is Tarnished by Apartheid]
 * 2) [| Apartheid is Abolished; Mandela Becomes President]
 * 3) [| Mbeki Takes Over From Mandela]
 * 4) [| Motlanthe Serves as "Interim" President; Opposition to the ANC Grows]
 * 5) [| Zuma Assumes the Presidency] ||   ||

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