Robert Ross, born in Sidcup, UK, in 1949. Ph.D. from the University of Cambridge. Co-ordinator of African Studies at Leiden University.
Fellow (1 September 1996 – 30 June 1997)
During the course of my ten months at NIAS, I wrote, from scratch, “A Concise History of South Africa”, for which I had been contracted by the Cambridge University Press. This will result in a book of about 220 pages, and will I hope be published in 1998. I also almost finished a book entitled A Tragedy of Manners: Status and Respectability at the Cape of Good Hope, 1750-1870, which has also been accepted for publication by the Cambridge University Press, and which will result in a book of around 250 pages. Perhaps two-thirds of the first draft of this manuscript, which now only requires the checking of a dozen references and the writing of two short sections, had been written before I arrived at NIAS, but the work necessary to get into its almost final form could not have been completed without the NIAS stay. I also wrote four other conference and seminar papers. Thus I hope, and almost believe, that I have made optimal use of the opportunities for writing and reflection which NIAS provides to its fellows