Local perceptions of environmental changes in fishing communities of southwest Madagascar:
- Authors: Lemahieu, Anne , Scott, Lucy E P , Malherbe, Willem , Mahatante, Paubert T , Randrianarimanana, José V , Aswani, Shankar
- Date: 2018
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/145370 , vital:38432 , DOI: 10.1016/j.ocecoaman.2018.06.012
- Description: Southwest Madagascar is a region that is significantly impacted upon by climate change. As in a lot of developing countries, the livelihoods of many communities in this region are dependent on fishing. This makes these communities particularly vulnerable to climate-related changes. We conducted a survey in two coastal fishing communities in the Toliara Province, Ambola and Ambotsibotsike. Using a free listing exercise, semi-structured interviews and focus group methods, we documented local perceptions of environmental changes and responses to changes. Results were compared, taking into account the differences in the degree of remoteness, market exposure and religiosity. Time periods that respondents reported as having had a high degree of change were compared to time periods of historical records of cyclones occurring in Toliara Province.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2018
Population connectivity of an overexploited coastal fish, Argyrosomus coronus (Sciaenidae), in an ocean-warming hotspot
- Authors: Henriques, R , Potts, Warren M , Santos, Carmen V D , Sauer, Warwick H H , Shaw, Paul W
- Date: 2018
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/125720 , vital:35811 , https://doi.10.2989/1814232X.2018.1434090
- Description: Anthropogenic activities are recognised as causing significant impacts to marine systems at multiple levels, ranging from habitat disturbance (Pauly et al. 2005) to overfishing (Sala and Knowlton 2006) and loss of genetic diversity (Pinsky and Palumbi 2014). Exploitation and harvesting in particular are known to strongly influence fish populations and their associated ecosystems (Pauly et al. 2005), and in combination with ongoing climate change can have compound effects on the viability and long-term survival of marine fishes (Last et al. 2011). Species can react to the impacts of climate change either by shifting their distributional range or by adapting to changing conditions through individual ecological plasticity and/or local population adaptation (Briggs 2011; Last et al. 2011). However, since ecological plasticity and local adaptation have strong genetic components, overharvesting has the potential to impact the long-term adaptive ability of marine fishes by decreasing the extant genetic diversity (Allendorf et al. 2014). Therefore, understanding the impact of exploitation on genetic diversity and population substructuring is critical for predicting the likely consequences of continued exploitation and climate change.
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- Date Issued: 2018
Remembering the Late Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela Through the Eyes of the Poet:
- Authors: Kaschula, Russell H
- Date: 2018
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/174912 , vital:42521 , https://doi.org/10.1080/1013929X.2018.1439860
- Description: This article seeks to explore the life and post-democratic work of President Mandela through the eyes of the poet. More specifically, two moments in time are captured and analysed, namely, Mandela’s release from prison together with the lead up to the first democratic South African elections in 1994; and his passing in 2013. This analysis includes the work of poets such as Bongani Sitole, Maya Angelou, Raphael d’Abdon and Thabo Mbeki. The mechanics of translation and the interrelatedness of orality and literacy are explored. The poetic memory contained in this article presents us with an approximation towards the collage of collective memory in a country where economics, politics, and society still present multiple challenges, and where political power often challenges the true collective memory.
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- Date Issued: 2018
Variation in perception of environmental change in nine Solomon Islands communities: implications for securing fairness in community-based adaptation
- Authors: Ensor, Jonathan Edward , Abernethy, Kirsten Elizabeth , Hoddy, Eric Timothy , Aswani, Shankar , Albert, Simon , Vaccaro, Ismael , Benedict, Jason Jon , Beare, Douglas James
- Date: 2018
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/145380 , vital:38433 , DOI: 10.1007/s10113-017-1242-1
- Description: Community-based approaches are pursued in recognition of the need for place-based responses to environmental change that integrate local understandings of risk and vulnerability. Yet the potential for fair adaptation is intimately linked to how variations in perceptions of environmental change and risk are treated. There is, however, little empirical evidence of the extent and nature of variations in risk perception in and between multiple community settings. Here, we rely on data from 231 semi-structured interviews conducted in nine communities in Western Province, Solomon Islands, to statistically model different perceptions of risk and change within and between communities.
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- Date Issued: 2018
When the students are revolting: the (im) possibilities of listening in academic contexts in South Africa
- Authors: Garman, Anthea
- Date: 2018
- Language: English
- Type: text , book
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/158416 , vital:40182 , ISBN 978-3-319-93958-2 , https://0-doi.org.wam.seals.ac.za/10.1007/978-3-319-93958-2
- Description: Student activists in South Africa have put the decolonisation of higher education firmly on the agenda, demanding that researchers and teachers pay attention to something in particular that is very hard to hear and very possibly unhearable. These young, black South Africans are the intellectual force upon whom we are depending for the altered future of our country. We cannot change the circumstances which continue to frustrate and anger them without paying particular attention to them. Taking on the knowledge bases and knowledge generation in the Global South, they are demanding that we rethink the logos-based project of universities in South Africa. Their struggle is critically about how knowledge is implicated as a shaping force in lives which are still defined by colonial governmentality.
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- Date Issued: 2018
Beyond language: German Studies in a South African context
- Authors: Weber, Undine S , Domingo, Rebecca S C , Fourie, Regine B
- Date: 2017
- Subjects: To be catalogued
- Language: English
- Type: text , book chapter
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/468272 , vital:77038 , ISBN 9781776140275 , https://muse.jhu.edu/book/52741
- Description: To date, there has been no published textbook which takes into account changing sociolinguistic dynamics that have influenced South African society. Multilingualism and Intercultural Communication breaks new ground in this arena. Its scope ranges from macro-sociolinguistic questions pertaining to language policies and their implementation (or non-implementation), to micro-sociolinguistic observations of actual language-use in verbal interaction, mainly in multilingual contexts of Higher Education (HE). There is a gradual move for the study of language and culture to be taught in the context of (professional) disciplines in which they would be used, such as Journalism and African languages, Education and African languages, etc. The book caters for this growing market. Because of its multilingual nature, it caters to English and Afrikaans language speakers, as well as the Sotho and Nguni language groups. It brings together various inter-linked disciplines such as Sociolinguistics and Applied Language Studies, Media Studies and Journalism, History and Education, Social and Natural Sciences, Law, Human Language Technology, Music, Intercultural Communication and Literary Studies. The unique cross-cutting disciplinary features of the book will make it a must-have for twenty-first century South African students and scholars and those interested in applied language issues.
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- Date Issued: 2017
Changes in chemical composition of essential oils from leaves of different Lantana camara L. (Verbenaceae) varieties after feeding by the introduced biological control agent, Falconia intermedia Distant (Hemiptera: Miridae)
- Authors: Ngxande-Koza, Samella W , Heshula, Lelethu U P , Hill, Martin P
- Date: 2017
- Language: English
- Type: article , text
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/59834 , vital:27664 , https://doi.org/10.4001/003.025.0462
- Description: Lantana camara L. (Verbenaceae) is one of the most problematic plant invaders in South Africa and has been targeted for biological control for over 50 years. Essential oil constituents which often change in response to insect herbivory are reported to play a crucial role in plant-insect interactions. However, nothing is known about the chemical profiles of essential oils of L. camara varieties in South Africa and how this changes under herbivory. Therefore, essential oils were collected using hydrodistillation from undamaged and insect-damaged leaves of four L. camara varieties and analysed using gas chromatography-mass spectrometry to elucidate their chemical profiles. A total of 163 compounds were identified from the undamaged leaves of the various L. camara varieties. Feeding by the biocontrol agent Falconia intermedia Distant (Hemiptera: Miridae) resulted in changes in the quality and quantity of chemical constituents of the essential oils. Only 75 compounds were identified from the insect-damaged leaves of L. camara varieties. Terpenes were the major components across the varieties, while caryophyllene, hexane, naphthalene, copaene and a-caryophyllene were common in all the varieties tested from both undamaged and insect-damaged leaves. Results from this study indicated the chemical distinctiveness of the Whitney Farm variety from other varieties. The changes in chemical concentrations indicated that feeding by the mirid on L. camara varieties causes an induction by either reducing or increasing the chemical concentrations. These inductions following the feeding by F. intermedia could be having a negative impact on the success of biological control against L. camara varieties. However, the focus of this paper is to report on the chemical baseline of L. camara varieties. Hence, comparisons of chemical compound concentrations of L. camara essential oils tested and the feeding-induced changes with respect to their quality and quantity are discussed.
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- Date Issued: 2017
Counting on demographic equity to transform institutional cultures at historically white South African universities?:
- Authors: Booi, Masixole , Vincent, Louise , Liccardo, Sabrina
- Date: 2017
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/141946 , vital:38018 , DOI: 10.1080/07294360.2017.1289155
- Description: The post-apartheid higher education transformation project is faced with the challenge of recruiting and retaining black academics and other senior staff. But when we shift the focus from participation rates to equality–inequality within historically white universities (HWUs), then the discourse changes from demographic equity and redress to institutional culture and diversity. HWUs invoke the need to maintain their position as leading higher education institutions globally, and notions of ‘quality’ and ‘excellence’ have emerged as discursive practices, which serve to perpetuate exclusion. The question then arises as to which forms of capital comprise the Gold Standard at HWUs? Several South African universities have responded to the challenge of recruiting and retaining black academics by initiating programmes for the ‘accelerated development’ of these candidates.
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- Date Issued: 2017
Fibronectin is a stress responsive gene regulated by HSF1 in response to geldanamycin
- Authors: Dhanani, Karim C H , Samson, William J , Edkins, Adrienne L
- Date: 2017
- Language: English
- Type: article , text
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/59931 , vital:27711 , https://doi:10.1038/s41598-017-18061-y
- Description: Fibronectin is an extracellular matrix glycoprotein with key roles in cell adhesion and migration. Hsp90 binds directly to fibronectin and Hsp90 depletion regulates fibronectin matrix stability. Where inhibition of Hsp90 with a C-terminal inhibitor, novobiocin, reduced the fibronectin matrix, treatment with an N-terminal inhibitor, geldanamycin, increased fibronectin levels. Geldanamycin treatment induced a stress response and a strong dose and time dependent increase in fibronectin mRNA via activation of the fibronectin promoter. Three putative heat shock elements (HSEs) were identified in the fibronectin promoter. Loss of two of these HSEs reduced both basal and geldanamycin-induced promoter activity, as did inhibition of the stress-responsive transcription factor HSF1. Binding of HSF1 to one of the putative HSE was confirmed by ChIP under basal conditions, and occupancy shown to increase with geldanamycin treatment. These data support the hypothesis that fibronectin is stress-responsive and a functional HSF1 target gene. COLA42 and LAMB3 mRNA levels were also increased with geldanamycin indicating that regulation of extracellular matrix (ECM) genes by HSF1 may be a wider phenomenon. Taken together, these data have implications for our understanding of ECM dynamics in stress-related diseases in which HSF1 is activated, and where the clinical application of N-terminal Hsp90 inhibitors is intended.
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- Date Issued: 2017
Integrating Afrocentric approaches for meaningful learning of science concepts
- Authors: Chikunda, Charles , Ngcoza, Kenneth M
- Date: 2017
- Subjects: To be catalogued
- Language: English
- Type: text , book chapter
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/436248 , vital:73252 , ISBN 978-3-319-45989-9 , https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-45989-9_
- Description: Economic and social development in any modern country re-lies heavily on a sound scientific and technological base. Es-sentially, science constitutes an area of any nation’s education system where many of the skills that are needed to stimulate development are learned, such as securing good health, fighting diseases, protecting the environment, farming and de-veloping agriculture and developing new industries and tech-nologies and even building resilience to climate change. There is a need therefore for a country to harness the intellectual and scientific capacity of its young people. Ironically, however, sci-ence (especially physical sciences) is one of the least popular areas within the educational system of most developing countries. Research shows that students’ and especially girls’ low interest in science and their relatively negative attitudes are at least partially attributed to the way science is taught at school.
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- Date Issued: 2017
Justin Davy of Burning Museum: an interview
- Authors: Dantas, Nancy
- Date: 2017
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/147070 , vital:38590 , https://www.on-curating.org/issue-32-reader/justin-davy-of-the-burning-museum.html#.Xs0mCmgzbIU
- Description: The Burning Museum is an arts collective based in Cape Town, South Africa. This interview is the result of a three-part Skype conversation between Justin Davy of the Burning Museum and Nancy Dantas, an independent curator and researcher with an interest in recovering the neglected and overlooked exhibition histories and practices of the south.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
Local people and conservation officials’ perceptions on relationships and conflicts in South African protected areas
- Authors: Thondhlana, Gladman , Cundill, Georgina
- Date: 2017
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/68640 , vital:29300 , https://doi.org/10.1080/21513732.2017.1315742
- Description: Protected areas (PAs) are often conflict-ridden, but conflict resolution mechanisms are often constrained by little appreciation of the perceptions of the principal agents (PA managers and local communities) about such conflicts. Getting local people’s support in PA management efforts is considered important for achieving conservation and livelihood goals. Using data from 13 nature reserves in South Africa, this study explores the perceptions of reserve managers and local communities about their relationships and the existence and underlying causes of conflicts. The findings showed sharp contrasts in perceptions between reserve managers and local communities. Reserve managers generally perceived that there were no conflicts with local communities and that their relationship with them was positive while local communities thought otherwise, claiming conflicts were centred around restricted access to PAs, lack of benefits from PAs and communication problems. These findings have profound implications for conservation, especially considering the importance of getting local people’s support in PA management.
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- Date Issued: 2017
Riding the waves: Journalism education in post-apartheid South Africa
- Authors: Garman, Anthea , Van der Merwe, Mia
- Date: 2017
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/158405 , vital:40181 , https://0-doi.org.wam.seals.ac.za/10.1177/1077695817720679
- Description: Since 1994, South African journalism education has undergone waves of introspection about curricula and methods of teaching as educators respond to the challenging realities of the post-apartheid environment. The most recent challenge to journalism educators is the student protests which started at the end of 2015, questioning the high costs of education and demanding “decolonization” of curricula. The traditional alignment with media companies has also been upended as the drastic contraction of newsrooms removes the promise of jobs upon graduation and the swiftly shifting digital terrain rearranges the financial basis of all journalism. These factors introduce a dynamism and uncertainty into South African journalism that educators are compelled to respond to with imagination and principle.
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- Date Issued: 2017
Situated learning in relation to human conduct and social-ecological change
- Authors: O’Donoghue, R
- Date: 2017
- Subjects: To be catalogued
- Language: English
- Type: text , book chapter
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/436278 , vital:73254 , ISBN 978-3-319-45989-9 , https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-45989-9_2
- Description: This chapter traces how education has developed to provide orientation in a modern world that is characterised by emerging risk. It examines how ESD initially developed as a modernist process to enable social reorientation and has been centred on problem-solving engagement in relation to issues and risk. The intractable complexity of most social-ecological problems has meant that change-orientated and transformative imagi-naries arising in learning are not easily realised in tangible change to resolve the problems at hand. The chapter thus poses the question, “Is ESD as situated learning with trans-gressive social-ecological reorientation possible?” To address this question, the study reviews ESD as a reflexive social process in modernity and tracks some of the expansive trajectories in the developing field over the last 10 years of the UN Decade of Education for Sustainable Development in Southern Africa.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
Situated learning in relation to human conduct and social-ecological change
- Authors: O'Donoghue, Rob B
- Date: 2017
- Subjects: To be catalogued
- Language: English
- Type: text , book chapter
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/437513 , vital:73390 , ISBN 978-3-319-45989 , https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-45989-9_2
- Description: This chapter traces how education has developed to provide orientation in a modern world that is characterised by emerging risk. It examines how ESD initially developed as a modernist process to enable social reorientation and has been centred on problem-solving engagement in relation to issues and risk. The intractable complexity of most social-ecological problems has meant that change-orientated and transformative imagi-naries arising in learning are not easily realised in tangible change to resolve the problems at hand. The chapter thus poses the question, “Is ESD as situated learning with trans-gressive social-ecological reorientation possible?” To address this question, the study reviews ESD as a reflexive social pro-cess in modernity and tracks some of the expansive trajecto-ries in the developing field over the last 10 years of the UN Decade of Education for Sustainable Development in South-ern Africa.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
Strengthening teachers’ knowledge and practices through a biodiversity education professional development programme
- Authors: Songqwaru, Zintle , Shava, Soul
- Date: 2017
- Subjects: To be catalogued
- Language: English
- Type: text , book chapter
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/436294 , vital:73255 , ISBN 978-3-319-45989-9 , https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-45989-9_15
- Description: What constitutes adequate teacher professional development support that enables teachers to engage meaningfully with ESD learning processes? In an attempt to answer this question, this chapter focuses on how continuing teacher profes-sional development programmes can support teachers of Life Sciences to teach biodiversity as a grounding concept to strengthen educational quality and relevance of Life Sciences education. It reflects on how continuing teacher professional development programmes may be designed and implemented to support South African teachers to work creatively with a con-tent and assessment-referenced national school curriculum. The chapter focuses on what content knowledge, teaching and assessment approaches to include as well as teachers’ reflections on the impacts of such a programme.
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- Date Issued: 2017
Thermoluminescence of SrAl2O4: Eu2+, Dy3+: kinetic analysis of a composite-peak
- Authors: Chithambo, Makaiko L , Wako, A H , Finch, A A
- Date: 2017
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/124157 , vital:35571 , https://doi.org/10.1016/j.radmeas.2016.12.009
- Description: The kinetic analysis of thermoluminescence of beta-irradiated SrAl2O4:Eu2+,Dy3+ is reported. The glow-curve is dominated by an apparently-single peak. It has been demonstrated using a number of tests including partial dynamic-heating, isothermal heating, phosphorescence and, the effect of fading, that the peak and the glow-curve consists of a set of closely-spaced peaks. In view of the peak being complex, its first few components were abstracted and analysed and for comparison, the peak was also analysed assuming it is genuinely single.
- Full Text: false
- Date Issued: 2017
Thermoluminescence of the main peak in SrAl2O4: Eu2+, Dy3+: spectral and kinetics features of secondary emission detected in the ultra-violet region
- Authors: Chithambo, Makaiko L
- Date: 2017
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/124197 , vital:35575 , https://doi.org/10.1016/j.radmeas.2016.12.001
- Description: We report the thermoluminescence of SrAl2O4:Eu2+,Dy3+ measured in the ultra-violet region of the spectrum between 300 and 400 nm. Complementary measurements of X-ray excited optical luminescence confirm emission bands of stimulated luminescence in this region. As a further test, optically stimulated luminescence was also measured in this region. The glow curve measured at 1 °C s−1 following irradiation to various doses appears simple and single but is in reality a collection of several components. This was shown by results from the Tm-Tstop method on both ends of the peak, application of thermal cleaning beyond the peak maximum as well as the dependence of the peak on fading. The latter shows that new peaks appear as preceding ones fade. Kinetic analysis of some of the main peaks was carried out giving an activation energy of 0.6 eV. The implication of the results on measurement of phosphorescence, interpretation of dose response and fading is discussed.
- Full Text: false
- Date Issued: 2017
Dung beetle (Coleoptera Scarabaeoidea) assemblages in the western Italian Alps: benchmark data for land use monitoring
- Authors: Tocco, Claudia , Villet, Martin H
- Date: 2016
- Subjects: To be catalogued
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/441361 , vital:73879 , 10.3897/BDJ.4.e10059
- Description: Traditional agro-pastoral practices are in decline over much of the Alps (MacDonald et al. 2000), leading to shrub and tree encroachment, and this represents one of the main threats for the conservation of alpine biodiversity, as many plant and animal species are dependent on the presence of semi-natural open habitats. However, quantifying this environmental change and assessing its impact on biodiversity may be difficult, especially in the context of sparse historical survey data. The accessibility of contemporary data about local biodiversity surveys in general, and indicator taxa in particular, is an essential consideration for planning future evaluations of conservation status in the Alps and for conservation plans that use ecological indicators to monitor temporal changes in biodiversity. Dung beetles are important ecosystem service providers (Nichols et al. 2008) that have been assessed as a good ecological indicator taxon in several studies (reviewed by Nichols and Gardner 2011), and although the Alps is perhaps one of the best-studied regions in respect of dung beetles, there are still only eight readily-accessible publications. We have augmented and comprehensively reviewed the data from these publications.
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- Date Issued: 2016
Keeping it in the family: coevolution of latrunculid sponges and their dominant bacterial symbionts
- Authors: Matcher, Gwynneth F , Waterworth, Samantha C , Walmsley, Tara A , Matsatsa, Tendayi , Parker-Nance, Shirley , Davies-Coleman, Michael T , Dorrington, Rosemary A
- Date: 2016
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/65603 , vital:28818 , https://doi.org/10.1002/mbo3.417
- Description: publisher version , The Latrunculiidae are a family of cold water sponges known for their production of bioactive pyrroloiminoquinone alkaloids. Previously it was shown that the bacterial community associated with a Tsitsikamma sponge species comprises unusual bacterial taxa and is dominated by a novel Betaproteobacterium. Here, we have characterized the bacterial communities associated with six latrunculid species representing three genera (Tsitsikamma, Cyclacanthia, and Latrunculia) as well as a Mycale species, collected from Algoa Bay on the South African southeast coast. The bacterial communities of all seven sponge species were dominated by a single Betaproteobacterium operational taxonomic unit (OTU0.03), while a second OTU0.03 was dominant in the Mycale sp. The Betaproteobacteria OTUs from the different latrunculid sponges are closely related and their phylogenetic relationship follows that of their hosts. We propose that the latrunculid Betaproteobacteria OTUs are members of a specialized group of sponge symbionts that may have coevolved with their hosts. A single dominant Spirochaetae OTU0.03 was present in the Tsitsikamma and Cyclacanthia sponge species, but absent from the Latrunculia and Mycale sponges. This study sheds new light on the interactions between latrunculid sponges and their bacterial communities and may point to the potential involvement of dominant symbionts in the biosynthesis of the bioactive secondary metabolites. , This research was supported by a SARChI grant from the South African National Research Foundation (NRF, GUN: 87583) and the Rhodes University Sandisa Imbewu Programme. S. C. W. was supported by an NRF Innovation PhD Scholarship and a Rhodes University Henderson PhD Scholarship. T. A. W. was supported by PhD Fellowships from the NRF and the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD)
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- Date Issued: 2016