Scholarship on the Soweto students’ uprising of 16 June 1976 focuses on the political mobilisation of the march, the day of the march itself and memorialisation of the event. Many of these studies fail to portray the everyday lives of the students who protested against the Bantu Education system in South Africa, dwelling on the spectacular. This article primarily draws on oral history interviews with former student activists of the 1960s and 1970s to historicise their reading practices. It thus introduces a new layer to the story of the making of youth political consciousness in South African schools in the 1970s. The article shows how reading happened in the classroom, the playground and the home and how this reading led to the formation of multiple and contiguous subaltern counterpublic spheres that became the crucible of many of the student leaders of the march of 1976. It adds to the literature on the subversion of apartheid by exploring some contradictions in the system that were exploited by students and teachers.

关于 1976 年 6 月 16 日索韦托学生起义的奖学金重点关注游行的政治动员、游行当天以及对该事件的纪念。其中许多研究未能描绘抗议南非班图教育体系的学生的日常生活，只关注壮观的景象。本文主要利用对 20 世纪 60 年代和 1970 年代前学生活动家的口述历史采访，将他们的阅读实践历史化。因此，它为 20 世纪 70 年代南非学校青年政治意识的形成故事引入了新的层面。这篇文章展示了阅读是如何在课堂上发生的，