Analysis of South African universities and communities archives.

Abstract

The study aims to investigate the relations between South Africa (SA) universities anduniversities surrounding communities (USC) to preserve community history to serve theuniversities’mandate of teaching and scholarship and preservation of communities’history.Community engagement is one of the three founding principles along with teaching andresearch of the post-apartheid reconstruction of South African higher education system inthe Higher Education Act 101 of 1997. Universities’communities relations provide amechanism for re-examining the communities’purposes of universities and be a basis forinstitutional change. Preservation of communities’history plays a meaningful role in theteaching, learning and research. This is because USC possesses archives with cultural, political, historical and educational significance. Universities are to acknowledge having social accountability and civic responsibility to engage with the wider communities.