During World War II, interest in indigenous South African architecture deepened, leading to studies that challenged modernism and influenced architectural design. Histories of Exchange: Indigenous South Africa in the South African Architectural Record and the Architectural Review remaps the tension between modern and indigenous cultures during the 1940s and 1950s, examining the diaspora of ideas between South Africa and Britain and revealing a new genealogy of postwar architecture. Elisa Dainese addresses indigenous South African architecture as it was seen in the postwar years from the perspectives of two architectural magazines. In doing so, she provides a new theoretical framework that probes the role of architectural journals, considering them as alternative spaces where contact took place among European and African cultures.
University of California Press