Colin James Bundy
MPhil, DPhil, (BA Natal, BA Hons Witwatersrand)
Principal
Colin Bundy took office as the first Principal of Green Templeton College in October 2008 having served as Warden of Green College from 2006. Previously, he was Principal and Vice-Chancellor of the University of the Witwatersrand and Director and Principal of the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London.
A South African, Colin Bundy took undergraduate degrees at the Universities of Natal and the Witwatersrand. In 1968 he went to Merton College, Oxford, as a Rhodes Scholar, and in 1971 became a member of St Antony’s College on a Beit Senior Research Scholarship. At Oxford he was awarded a MPhil in American History, and a DPhil for a dissertation on South African rural history.
Bundy held teaching and research positions at Manchester Polytechnic and the University of Oxford before returning to South Africa in 1985 where he held chairs in History at the University of Cape Town and the University of the Western Cape. In 1994 he fell amongst administrators and served as Vice-Rector (Academic) at UWC before moving to as Vice-Chancellor to the University of the Witwatersrand in 1997.
Bundy was a member of a generation of historians whose work substantially reinterpreted South African history. Best known for his The Rise and Fall of a South African Peasantry, he co-authored Hidden Struggles in Rural South Africa and also wrote Remaking the Past: New Perspectives in South African History. He has written 40 scholarly articles and chapters on South African history and politics, and over a hundred reviews and shorter articles. Other academic activities include having been secretary of the (British) Oral History Society, a member of the Executive Council of the African Studies Association in the UK, and Editor of the Journal of Southern African Studies.
In South Africa, Professor Bundy held a number of public posts. He chaired the UNESCO National Commission; was a member of the Board of the Human Sciences Research Council and the Council of the Robben Island Museum; and was an executive member of the South African Universities Vice-Chancellors Association. In the UK he served as a member of the Commonwealth Scholarships Commission and is a trustee of several charitable organisations.