Constitution Hill, a heritage site that opened in the inner city of Johannesburg in March, offers real possibilities for excitement about the past to be generated amongst learners.
It is the new home of the Constitutional Court, the protector of our basic rights and freedoms.
It is also the site of Johannesburg’s notorious Old Fort Prison Complex, which comprises the Old Fort, the Women’s Jail, Section Four and Five and the Awaiting Trial Block.
Thousands of ordinary South Africans were held in these prisons for transgressing a myriad of discriminatory laws during the colonial and apartheid eras. Many of South Africa’s leading political activists, including Mahatma Gandhi, Winnie Mandela, Fatima Meer and Nelson Mandela, were detained here.
With the move of the Constitutional Court to the prison site, what was once a place of injustice and brutality has become a place of solidarity and democracy for South Africa.
Situated on a hill overlooking the bustling Johannesburg inner city to the south and the forested suburbs to the north, the site provides a unique perspective on the City of Gold and its dramatic history. It is a vantage-point from which we can see both the difficulties of the past and the possibilities of the future; from which we can view the site, the city, and our entire society in transition.
Constitution Hill is unique in that it enables us to memorialise the past at the same time as envisioning the future.
Constitution Hill schools programmes make clear links with the curriculum. The Hill’s Education Team intends to develop Constitution Hill as a crucial site of learning that can meet cross-curriculum learning outcomes. The learner’s experience of the site takes place through specialist educational guided tours that start at the tunnel entrance of the Old Fort, move up onto the ramparts or military fortifications, into Number Four prison and then end up in the Constitutional Court – a literal journey from the past to the present. Learners are asked to analyse and write down their findings at each step with the aid of workbooks supplied by Constitution Hill.
Over the course of next year, Constitution Hill aims to develop ‘travelling trunks” which are available to schools on request and contain artefacts, activity cards, photo packs and teacher resource notes so that teachers can use the trunks in their classes. Likewise, it hopes to create the possibility for a virtual tour of the site on the Constitution Hill website.
Both these initiatives are an attempt to ensure that Constitution Hill becomes a national resource – one that contributes to the task of ensuring that the site can be employed in the study of history and archaeology and used as a tool ‘against amnesia and any triumphalism of the present”. – Constitution Hill Education Team.