ABSTRACT

South Africa, a multicultural society, has many different family structures. This chapter elaborates on the husband/father in the white Afrikaner family. The Afrikaner paterfamilias was the patriarch of his family. With the re-emergence of feminism in the 1960s and 1970s, however, more and more white Afrikaner women became involved in bringing about equality between men and women. Due to the qualitative and explorative nature of the research and the small number of cases, representative sampling was not attempted. In trying to assess what the respondents' perceptions of their family roles and their involvement in family life are, the focus fell on two relationships, the father-child, and the husband-wife. In the light of the historical overview given of the Afrikaner husband/father with his strong religious convictions, it is important to conclude this discussion of the present-day Afrikaner man by referring to the respondents' views on religion.