Soweto Johannesburg: History, Heritage & the Township Experience

Soweto (South Western Townships) is one of the most historically significant neighbourhoods in the world — a city within a city that was home to Nelson Mandela and Archbishop Desmond Tutu, that produced the 1976 uprising that catalysed the final collapse of apartheid, and that now houses nearly 2 million people in a community of extraordinary cultural vitality. Vilakazi Street in Orlando West is the only street in the world to have housed two Nobel Peace Prize laureates: Mandela's modest home (a museum since 1997) and Tutu's family home are 500 metres apart. The Hector Pieterson Museum commemorates the June 16, 1976 massacre of student protesters — Sam Nzima's photograph of 13-year-old Hector being carried by Mbuyisa Makhubo became the image that galvanised international opposition to apartheid. The Apartheid Museum, 20 minutes from Soweto on the Gold Reef City site, is arguably the world's most powerful human rights museum. Day tours from Sandton or Maboneng operate daily; spending a night at a Soweto guesthouse provides a more authentic community experience.