Negotiating the line between information and panic: a case study of vanguard’s coverage of the ebola outbreak in Nigeria
- Authors: Akingbade, Olutobi Elijah
- Date: 2017
- Subjects: Digital media -- Marketing , Marketing -- Technological innovations , Internet marketing , Carbonated beverages -- Marketing , Coca Cola (Trademark) -- Marketing , Social media -- Economic aspects , Soft drink industry -- Internet marketing , Health behavior in adolescence , Advertising -- Carbonated beverages , Obesity in adolescence , Drinking behavior
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/5903 , vital:20986
- Description: This study titled ‘Negotiating the line between information and panic: A case study of Vanguard’s coverage of the Ebola Outbreak in Nigeria’ investigates and evaluates Vanguard’s coverage of the 2014 Ebola Virus Disease (EVD) outbreak in Nigeria. This study was conducted to understand how Vanguard negotiated the line between the dissemination of actual EVD information and the possibility of creating panic and fear during the coverage of the outbreak. Using qualitative content analysis and interview embedded within a qualitative research design, the study was carried out against the backdrop of relevant literature that asserts that the mass media is an important carrier, prime mover and producer of tensions, anxieties, fears and panics while the print media specifically is argued to have as part of its history the business of irrational fear mongering and the creation of panic about social problems. Vanguard, rated as one of the ten largest newspapers in Nigeria, was purposively selected for this study. Vanguard did substantial reporting and dissemination of the 2014 EVD outbreak and it was possible to draw on the availability and accessibility of the electronic archives of the EVD articles. Using the theory of moral panic, the normative theories of the media and theories about essential constituents of journalism culture as a theoretical framework, the study reveals that Vanguard’s coverage of the 2014 EVD outbreak was challenging and more demanding compared to coverage of previous outbreaks of viral diseases in Nigeria by the print medium. The study shows that lack of sufficient understanding of the science that underlies EVD, the initial exclusion of the media from the national response to contain the outbreak, and the lack of sufficient proactive measures by government and the print medium were powerful factors in how the epidemic was reported. The study also shows an interesting dimension in Vanguard’s early and latter coverage of the EVD outbreak while it lasted in Nigeria. This dimension reveals a high number of EVD articles with the propensity to inspire fear and panic in the early days of the coverage compared to EVD articles with the propensity to douse fear and panic in the early and latter days of the outbreak. The study shows that while the challenges encountered stem from Ebola’s mode of transmission, lack of scientific and medically proven cure and early coverage amidst uncertainties, the inherent tensions and anxieties that characterised the outbreak coupled with Vanguard’s fire brigade approach led to the relatively high number of EVD articles with the propensity to inspire fear and panic. The study recommends the mass media’s inclusion in national responses to epidemics and ongoing training for health journalists to update their knowledge base about emerging and infectious diseases. The study also recommends for further study a reception analysis to enhance the socio-cultural understanding of how the EVD articles were received.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
- Authors: Akingbade, Olutobi Elijah
- Date: 2017
- Subjects: Digital media -- Marketing , Marketing -- Technological innovations , Internet marketing , Carbonated beverages -- Marketing , Coca Cola (Trademark) -- Marketing , Social media -- Economic aspects , Soft drink industry -- Internet marketing , Health behavior in adolescence , Advertising -- Carbonated beverages , Obesity in adolescence , Drinking behavior
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/5903 , vital:20986
- Description: This study titled ‘Negotiating the line between information and panic: A case study of Vanguard’s coverage of the Ebola Outbreak in Nigeria’ investigates and evaluates Vanguard’s coverage of the 2014 Ebola Virus Disease (EVD) outbreak in Nigeria. This study was conducted to understand how Vanguard negotiated the line between the dissemination of actual EVD information and the possibility of creating panic and fear during the coverage of the outbreak. Using qualitative content analysis and interview embedded within a qualitative research design, the study was carried out against the backdrop of relevant literature that asserts that the mass media is an important carrier, prime mover and producer of tensions, anxieties, fears and panics while the print media specifically is argued to have as part of its history the business of irrational fear mongering and the creation of panic about social problems. Vanguard, rated as one of the ten largest newspapers in Nigeria, was purposively selected for this study. Vanguard did substantial reporting and dissemination of the 2014 EVD outbreak and it was possible to draw on the availability and accessibility of the electronic archives of the EVD articles. Using the theory of moral panic, the normative theories of the media and theories about essential constituents of journalism culture as a theoretical framework, the study reveals that Vanguard’s coverage of the 2014 EVD outbreak was challenging and more demanding compared to coverage of previous outbreaks of viral diseases in Nigeria by the print medium. The study shows that lack of sufficient understanding of the science that underlies EVD, the initial exclusion of the media from the national response to contain the outbreak, and the lack of sufficient proactive measures by government and the print medium were powerful factors in how the epidemic was reported. The study also shows an interesting dimension in Vanguard’s early and latter coverage of the EVD outbreak while it lasted in Nigeria. This dimension reveals a high number of EVD articles with the propensity to inspire fear and panic in the early days of the coverage compared to EVD articles with the propensity to douse fear and panic in the early and latter days of the outbreak. The study shows that while the challenges encountered stem from Ebola’s mode of transmission, lack of scientific and medically proven cure and early coverage amidst uncertainties, the inherent tensions and anxieties that characterised the outbreak coupled with Vanguard’s fire brigade approach led to the relatively high number of EVD articles with the propensity to inspire fear and panic. The study recommends the mass media’s inclusion in national responses to epidemics and ongoing training for health journalists to update their knowledge base about emerging and infectious diseases. The study also recommends for further study a reception analysis to enhance the socio-cultural understanding of how the EVD articles were received.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
New spaces and old stories: the Luminance woman, black womanhood and the illusion of the “new” South Africa
- Alweendo, Ndapwa Magano Nelao
- Authors: Alweendo, Ndapwa Magano Nelao
- Date: 2017
- Subjects: Luminance stores (South Africa) , Dhlomo, Khanyi , Dlamini, Judy , Women, Black -- South Africa -- Social life and customes , Women, Black -- South Africa -- Social conditions , Clothing trade -- South Africa , Social classes -- South Africa
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MSocSc
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/42619 , vital:25220
- Description: This study examines ideas of black womanhood in post-apartheid South Africa. The opening of the Luminance boutique in 2013, previously owned by South African businesswoman and media mogul Khanyi Dhlomo in Johannesburg’s ultra-exclusive Hyde Park Corner, has been articulated as representing a rupture in the public and private performance of black womanhood. Luminance has positioned itself as a provider of world-class style and beauty and has embraced a narrative of black women’s empowerment in the process. The study is based on narrative semistructured interviews conducted Johannesburg with black women who have shopped at the boutique and women who believe themselves as having a meaningful connection to the store. The literature on black women, both internationally and in South Africa, acknowledges that black women experience multiple and intersecting oppressions of race, class and gender, among others. Located within black feminist theory, the study argues that the Luminance woman does represent some rupture in the historic understanding of black womanhood in South Africa. This woman is an elite player in both the corporate world and the world of luxury consumption, and is certainly entering spaces to which black women have historically been denied access. However, this study argues that there is a danger in reducing this woman to an oversimplified character, allowing responses to her to ignore the complexities of her reality in favour of the simplicity of her story, and ignore the structural socioeconomic challenges that continue to shape the lives of all black women in postapartheid South Africa. In this regard, the Luminance woman, while on the surface appearing to be an empowering new iteration of womanhood that should inspire other black woman, contributes to the erasure of her particular marginal experiences, and the oppression of black women in general. The story of the Luminance women contributes to a narrative of individual hard work and determination that frames her as a respectable example of what the “new” South Africa has delivered for its citizens. This woman is a model example of a South African who has succeeded because she took advantage of the opportunities supposedly afforded to all in the post-1994 era. It is therefore argued that praise of the Luminance woman serves a dual purpose: to reinforce the myth of equal opportunity in South Africa, and to lessen the legitimacy of marginalised groups’ experiences of oppression, especially black women who continue to constitute the poor majority.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
- Authors: Alweendo, Ndapwa Magano Nelao
- Date: 2017
- Subjects: Luminance stores (South Africa) , Dhlomo, Khanyi , Dlamini, Judy , Women, Black -- South Africa -- Social life and customes , Women, Black -- South Africa -- Social conditions , Clothing trade -- South Africa , Social classes -- South Africa
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MSocSc
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/42619 , vital:25220
- Description: This study examines ideas of black womanhood in post-apartheid South Africa. The opening of the Luminance boutique in 2013, previously owned by South African businesswoman and media mogul Khanyi Dhlomo in Johannesburg’s ultra-exclusive Hyde Park Corner, has been articulated as representing a rupture in the public and private performance of black womanhood. Luminance has positioned itself as a provider of world-class style and beauty and has embraced a narrative of black women’s empowerment in the process. The study is based on narrative semistructured interviews conducted Johannesburg with black women who have shopped at the boutique and women who believe themselves as having a meaningful connection to the store. The literature on black women, both internationally and in South Africa, acknowledges that black women experience multiple and intersecting oppressions of race, class and gender, among others. Located within black feminist theory, the study argues that the Luminance woman does represent some rupture in the historic understanding of black womanhood in South Africa. This woman is an elite player in both the corporate world and the world of luxury consumption, and is certainly entering spaces to which black women have historically been denied access. However, this study argues that there is a danger in reducing this woman to an oversimplified character, allowing responses to her to ignore the complexities of her reality in favour of the simplicity of her story, and ignore the structural socioeconomic challenges that continue to shape the lives of all black women in postapartheid South Africa. In this regard, the Luminance woman, while on the surface appearing to be an empowering new iteration of womanhood that should inspire other black woman, contributes to the erasure of her particular marginal experiences, and the oppression of black women in general. The story of the Luminance women contributes to a narrative of individual hard work and determination that frames her as a respectable example of what the “new” South Africa has delivered for its citizens. This woman is a model example of a South African who has succeeded because she took advantage of the opportunities supposedly afforded to all in the post-1994 era. It is therefore argued that praise of the Luminance woman serves a dual purpose: to reinforce the myth of equal opportunity in South Africa, and to lessen the legitimacy of marginalised groups’ experiences of oppression, especially black women who continue to constitute the poor majority.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
Chinese aid and African agency since 2000: examining the cases of Zimbabwe, Angola and Ghana
- Authors: Chipaike, Ronald
- Date: 2017
- Language: English
- Type: text , Thesis , Doctoral , PhD
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/59151 , vital:27442
- Description: Restricted access-thesis embargoed for 2 years
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
- Authors: Chipaike, Ronald
- Date: 2017
- Language: English
- Type: text , Thesis , Doctoral , PhD
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/59151 , vital:27442
- Description: Restricted access-thesis embargoed for 2 years
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
Masculine performance and enactment in the Rhodes University Rowing Club
- Authors: Dlamini, Thobile Lungile
- Date: 2017
- Subjects: Masculinity in sports -- South Africa , College sports -- South Africa , Male college athletes -- Psychology -- South Africa -- Case studies , Masculinity , Sex role , Rhodes University. Rowing Club , Rhodes University -- Students -- Psychology
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MSocSc
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/4315 , vital:20647
- Description: Drawing on the interactions between gender and power in the South African context, this study explores how masculinities are produced, reproduced and contested in one particular realm of social life, namely organised university sport. The study focuses on a rowing club at a historically white South African university (RURC). The narratives of ten male participants (aged between 19 and 23) who self-identified as heterosexual and were recruited from RURC, were utilised to make meaning of the process of identity construction of young males who participate in organised sport within the higher education sphere. The ethnographic aspect of the study, which spanned over three months, provided a window into the norms, values and rituals of the club and how these variously reinforce or interrupt the prevailing gender order. Employing Connell’s typology of masculinities as a lens, the study traces the lived construction of masculinity in the individual lives of the members of RURC as one sphere of university life in which masculinities are produced and contested. Within a wider culture that has been characterised as white, heteronormative and patriarchal, the study argues that although masculinities and masculine performances in the RURC are highly contested the practices of the club ultimately perpetuate an exclusionary, orthodox masculinity.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
- Authors: Dlamini, Thobile Lungile
- Date: 2017
- Subjects: Masculinity in sports -- South Africa , College sports -- South Africa , Male college athletes -- Psychology -- South Africa -- Case studies , Masculinity , Sex role , Rhodes University. Rowing Club , Rhodes University -- Students -- Psychology
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MSocSc
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/4315 , vital:20647
- Description: Drawing on the interactions between gender and power in the South African context, this study explores how masculinities are produced, reproduced and contested in one particular realm of social life, namely organised university sport. The study focuses on a rowing club at a historically white South African university (RURC). The narratives of ten male participants (aged between 19 and 23) who self-identified as heterosexual and were recruited from RURC, were utilised to make meaning of the process of identity construction of young males who participate in organised sport within the higher education sphere. The ethnographic aspect of the study, which spanned over three months, provided a window into the norms, values and rituals of the club and how these variously reinforce or interrupt the prevailing gender order. Employing Connell’s typology of masculinities as a lens, the study traces the lived construction of masculinity in the individual lives of the members of RURC as one sphere of university life in which masculinities are produced and contested. Within a wider culture that has been characterised as white, heteronormative and patriarchal, the study argues that although masculinities and masculine performances in the RURC are highly contested the practices of the club ultimately perpetuate an exclusionary, orthodox masculinity.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
Political correctness and freedom of expression
- Authors: Embling, Geoffrey
- Date: 2017
- Subjects: Political correctness , Freedom of speech , Political correctness -- South Africa , Freedom of speech -- South Africa , Censorship , Censorship -- South Africa , South Africa -- Politics and government , Political satire, South African , Fanatacism , Toleration
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/40873 , vital:25035
- Description: A brief history of political correctness is discussed along with various definitions of it, ranging from political correctness being a benign attempt to prevent offense and avert discrimination to stronger views equating it with Communist censorship or branding it as "cultural Marxism". The aim of the research is to discover what political correctness is, how it relates to freedom of expression and what wider implications and effects it has on society. The moral foundations of rights and free speech in particular are introduced in order to set a framework to determine what authority people and governments have to censor others' expression. Different philosophical views on the limits of free speech are discussed, and arguments for and against hate speech are analysed and related to political correctness. The thesis looks at political correctness on university campuses, which involves speech codes, antidiscrimination legislation and changing the Western canon to a more multicultural syllabus. The recent South African university protests involving issues such as white privilege, university fees and rape are discussed and related to political correctness. The thesis examines the role of political correctness in the censorship of humour, it discusses the historical role of satire in challenging dogmatism and it looks at the psychology behind intolerance. Political correctness appeals to tolerance, which is sometimes elevated at the expense of truth. Truth and tolerance are therefore weighed up, along with their altered definitions in today's relativistic society. The last part of the thesis looks at South Africa's unique brand of political correctness, along with Black Economic Empowerment, colonialism and white guilt, and the research concludes that political correctness is a distinct form of censorship which has developed in modern democracies. The new forms of justice and morality seen in political correctness are distortions of left-wing liberalism, which appeal to different values to those of traditional liberalism.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
- Authors: Embling, Geoffrey
- Date: 2017
- Subjects: Political correctness , Freedom of speech , Political correctness -- South Africa , Freedom of speech -- South Africa , Censorship , Censorship -- South Africa , South Africa -- Politics and government , Political satire, South African , Fanatacism , Toleration
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/40873 , vital:25035
- Description: A brief history of political correctness is discussed along with various definitions of it, ranging from political correctness being a benign attempt to prevent offense and avert discrimination to stronger views equating it with Communist censorship or branding it as "cultural Marxism". The aim of the research is to discover what political correctness is, how it relates to freedom of expression and what wider implications and effects it has on society. The moral foundations of rights and free speech in particular are introduced in order to set a framework to determine what authority people and governments have to censor others' expression. Different philosophical views on the limits of free speech are discussed, and arguments for and against hate speech are analysed and related to political correctness. The thesis looks at political correctness on university campuses, which involves speech codes, antidiscrimination legislation and changing the Western canon to a more multicultural syllabus. The recent South African university protests involving issues such as white privilege, university fees and rape are discussed and related to political correctness. The thesis examines the role of political correctness in the censorship of humour, it discusses the historical role of satire in challenging dogmatism and it looks at the psychology behind intolerance. Political correctness appeals to tolerance, which is sometimes elevated at the expense of truth. Truth and tolerance are therefore weighed up, along with their altered definitions in today's relativistic society. The last part of the thesis looks at South Africa's unique brand of political correctness, along with Black Economic Empowerment, colonialism and white guilt, and the research concludes that political correctness is a distinct form of censorship which has developed in modern democracies. The new forms of justice and morality seen in political correctness are distortions of left-wing liberalism, which appeal to different values to those of traditional liberalism.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
Researching research culture: a case study of Rhodes University Humanities Faculty research culture
- Authors: Hwami, Rudo Fortunate
- Date: 2017
- Subjects: Rhodes University. Humanities Faculty , Rhodes University -- Graduate work , Rhodes University. Humanities Faculty -- Research , Research -- South Africa -- Makhanda
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MSocSc
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/7522 , vital:21269
- Description: This thesis explores the idea of research having organisational characteristics which are affected by the institutional culture but can not be defined as a subculture of the institutional culture. In particular, it examines how research culture(s) can be exclusionary and reproduce discriminatory practices. Using quantitative data in the form of Rhodes University Annual Reports and interviews conducted with 11 participants, the thesis documents the current research practices of the Faculty of Humanities at Rhodes University. Such practices incorporate multiple dimensions, including how research is done, who does research, what research is done and research funding rituals. The purpose of this study is to reveal how research cultures are constructed through the seemingly mundane and everyday research practices within a research community. Through the analysis of these everyday practices, participants’ experiences and theoretical arguments, this thesis found that research culture and institutional culture are separate entities, and that research culture plays a vital role in the formation of research practices.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
- Authors: Hwami, Rudo Fortunate
- Date: 2017
- Subjects: Rhodes University. Humanities Faculty , Rhodes University -- Graduate work , Rhodes University. Humanities Faculty -- Research , Research -- South Africa -- Makhanda
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MSocSc
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/7522 , vital:21269
- Description: This thesis explores the idea of research having organisational characteristics which are affected by the institutional culture but can not be defined as a subculture of the institutional culture. In particular, it examines how research culture(s) can be exclusionary and reproduce discriminatory practices. Using quantitative data in the form of Rhodes University Annual Reports and interviews conducted with 11 participants, the thesis documents the current research practices of the Faculty of Humanities at Rhodes University. Such practices incorporate multiple dimensions, including how research is done, who does research, what research is done and research funding rituals. The purpose of this study is to reveal how research cultures are constructed through the seemingly mundane and everyday research practices within a research community. Through the analysis of these everyday practices, participants’ experiences and theoretical arguments, this thesis found that research culture and institutional culture are separate entities, and that research culture plays a vital role in the formation of research practices.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
Pushing the bounds of possibility: South African academics narrate their experiences of having agency to effect transformation
- Authors: Idahosa, Grace Ese-Osa
- Date: 2017
- Subjects: Education, Higher -- South Africa , Education, Higher -- Social aspects -- South Africa , Educational change -- South Africa , Higher education and state -- South Africa , Rhodes University
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Doctoral , PhD
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/5845 , vital:20981
- Description: Over 20 years after the first democratic elections, the institutional cultures and structures of many South African universities remain un-transformed; they are embedded with racist and sexist discourses and attitudes that allow for the marginalisation and exclusion of students and staff (Department of Education 2008; Soudien 2010; van Wyk and Alexander 2010; Akoojee and Nkomo 2007; Hemson and Singh 2010). In order to effect change, research has noted the importance of leadership and staff involvement in the transformation process (Van-Der Westhuizen 2006; Portnoi 2009; Niemann 2010; Viljoen and Rothmann 2002). These studies argue that both leaders and staff members must be interested, and actively involved in, the transformation process. This suggests that the extent to which leaders and individual staff members have agency to effect transformatory practices determines the success of transformation policies. But what motivates this interest in transformation? While a number of studies have focused on the imperative to transform, few studies have focused on the role of individual agency in the transformation process. After all the world and in some ways structural properties are given to us and at the same time ‘actively constituted by us’ (van Manen 1997, XI). Drawing on interviews with academic staff members at one university in South Africa, this study uses a hermeneutic phenomenological approach to understand the nature of having agency to enable transformation drawing on the experiences of academic staff members. In the context of studies on the agency- structure divide and the need for a structural and cultural change in universities in South Africa, the project aimed to find out how transformation happens, when it does happen. I was interested in how individual agents are able to use their agency to ensure transformation amid limiting and rigid structures and cultures in the university. Given the fact that structures are only revealed in human action, the individual experience of transformation at once gives insight into the dominant structures, the social context and how their capacity to act was deployed to enable a change in such structures - at least in their own experience and understanding. This may help our understanding of transformation and what is needed to effect the transformation of deeply embedded apartheid legacies in university structures and cultures. This study aimed to reveal moments at which individuals embedded in what have been identified as rigid structures and cultures perceive themselves as having had the agency to interrupt and transform them despite their rigid nature. The study was interested in what characterises these moments and what individual and institutional contexts make them more or less possible/likely.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
- Authors: Idahosa, Grace Ese-Osa
- Date: 2017
- Subjects: Education, Higher -- South Africa , Education, Higher -- Social aspects -- South Africa , Educational change -- South Africa , Higher education and state -- South Africa , Rhodes University
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Doctoral , PhD
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/5845 , vital:20981
- Description: Over 20 years after the first democratic elections, the institutional cultures and structures of many South African universities remain un-transformed; they are embedded with racist and sexist discourses and attitudes that allow for the marginalisation and exclusion of students and staff (Department of Education 2008; Soudien 2010; van Wyk and Alexander 2010; Akoojee and Nkomo 2007; Hemson and Singh 2010). In order to effect change, research has noted the importance of leadership and staff involvement in the transformation process (Van-Der Westhuizen 2006; Portnoi 2009; Niemann 2010; Viljoen and Rothmann 2002). These studies argue that both leaders and staff members must be interested, and actively involved in, the transformation process. This suggests that the extent to which leaders and individual staff members have agency to effect transformatory practices determines the success of transformation policies. But what motivates this interest in transformation? While a number of studies have focused on the imperative to transform, few studies have focused on the role of individual agency in the transformation process. After all the world and in some ways structural properties are given to us and at the same time ‘actively constituted by us’ (van Manen 1997, XI). Drawing on interviews with academic staff members at one university in South Africa, this study uses a hermeneutic phenomenological approach to understand the nature of having agency to enable transformation drawing on the experiences of academic staff members. In the context of studies on the agency- structure divide and the need for a structural and cultural change in universities in South Africa, the project aimed to find out how transformation happens, when it does happen. I was interested in how individual agents are able to use their agency to ensure transformation amid limiting and rigid structures and cultures in the university. Given the fact that structures are only revealed in human action, the individual experience of transformation at once gives insight into the dominant structures, the social context and how their capacity to act was deployed to enable a change in such structures - at least in their own experience and understanding. This may help our understanding of transformation and what is needed to effect the transformation of deeply embedded apartheid legacies in university structures and cultures. This study aimed to reveal moments at which individuals embedded in what have been identified as rigid structures and cultures perceive themselves as having had the agency to interrupt and transform them despite their rigid nature. The study was interested in what characterises these moments and what individual and institutional contexts make them more or less possible/likely.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
Malawi’s foreign policy decision-making: the 2012 Malawi-Tanzania boundary dispute
- Kaunda, Mapopa Charles Martin Sazamleke
- Authors: Kaunda, Mapopa Charles Martin Sazamleke
- Date: 2017
- Language: English
- Type: text , Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/59225 , vital:27484
- Description: Expected release date-April 2019
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
- Authors: Kaunda, Mapopa Charles Martin Sazamleke
- Date: 2017
- Language: English
- Type: text , Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/59225 , vital:27484
- Description: Expected release date-April 2019
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
Demobilisation and the civilian reintegration of women ex-combatants in post-apartheid South Africa: the aftermath of transnational guerrilla girls, combative mothers and in- betweeners in the shadows of a late twentieth-century war
- Authors: Magadla, Siphokazi
- Date: 2017
- Subjects: South Africa. National Defence Force , Umkhonto we Sizwe (South Africa) -- Demobilization , Azanian People's Liberation Army -- Demobilization , Amabutho Self-Defence Unit -- Demobilization , South Africa. Army -- Women , Women soldiers -- South Africa , Government, Resistance to -- South Africa -- History , Women veterans -- South Africa -- History , Women veterans -- South Africa -- Interviews
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Doctoral , PhD
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/41775 , vital:25133
- Description: This study examines the state assisted demobilisation and civilian reintegration of women excombatants in post-apartheid South Africa. The study is based on life history interviews conducted with 36 women who fought for Umkhonto we Sizwe (MK), Azanian People’s Liberation Army (APLA) and Amabutho Self-Defence Unit. There is agreement across the literature that the armed struggle against apartheid falls within the category of guerilla warfare, fought in multiple terrains, that blur conventional distinctions of civilian and combatant, homefront and battlefront, as well as the domestic and transnational. Located within feminist International Relations theory, the study argues that the formal process that led to the integration of statutory and non-statutory forces to form the South African National Defence Force, which facilitated the demobilisation process, was framed in ways that did not reflect the unconventional nature of the armed struggle against apartheid. The few women who participated in this process were the transnationally trained combatants of MK and APLA. The majority of women who participated in the multiple and overlapping sites of the domestic and international apartheid battlefront were left out of this process. It is argued that women’s roles in the armed struggle were shaped by various factors, such as age, space and period of struggle. Three categories, guerilla girls, combative mothers and the in-betweeners, are introduced in order to demonstrate the different spaces from within which women fought, and the methods they used, all of which were central to the success of the People’s War strategy. In this regard, the venerated transnationally trained woman combatant, like their male counterpart, is argued to be an exception, as the majority of women were thrust into the armed struggle without military training. Furthermore, it is argued that conservative feminist readings of black women’s relationship with nationalism in the anti-apartheid struggle have misrecognised and undermined women’s combatant contributions, by inscribing their forms of resistance as maternal, and outside the war effort. The study shows that the majority of women combatants have transitioned to civilian life without formal state recognition and assistance. The erasure of women’s role as combatants also means that they are excluded from the current legislative framework facilitated by the Department of Military Veterans to support the welfare of former combatants. As such, the study builds on Jacklyn Cock’s (1991) pioneering study on war and gender in South Africa; it is the first study that exclusively focuses on women ex-combatants’ experiences in postapartheid South Africa.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
- Authors: Magadla, Siphokazi
- Date: 2017
- Subjects: South Africa. National Defence Force , Umkhonto we Sizwe (South Africa) -- Demobilization , Azanian People's Liberation Army -- Demobilization , Amabutho Self-Defence Unit -- Demobilization , South Africa. Army -- Women , Women soldiers -- South Africa , Government, Resistance to -- South Africa -- History , Women veterans -- South Africa -- History , Women veterans -- South Africa -- Interviews
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Doctoral , PhD
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/41775 , vital:25133
- Description: This study examines the state assisted demobilisation and civilian reintegration of women excombatants in post-apartheid South Africa. The study is based on life history interviews conducted with 36 women who fought for Umkhonto we Sizwe (MK), Azanian People’s Liberation Army (APLA) and Amabutho Self-Defence Unit. There is agreement across the literature that the armed struggle against apartheid falls within the category of guerilla warfare, fought in multiple terrains, that blur conventional distinctions of civilian and combatant, homefront and battlefront, as well as the domestic and transnational. Located within feminist International Relations theory, the study argues that the formal process that led to the integration of statutory and non-statutory forces to form the South African National Defence Force, which facilitated the demobilisation process, was framed in ways that did not reflect the unconventional nature of the armed struggle against apartheid. The few women who participated in this process were the transnationally trained combatants of MK and APLA. The majority of women who participated in the multiple and overlapping sites of the domestic and international apartheid battlefront were left out of this process. It is argued that women’s roles in the armed struggle were shaped by various factors, such as age, space and period of struggle. Three categories, guerilla girls, combative mothers and the in-betweeners, are introduced in order to demonstrate the different spaces from within which women fought, and the methods they used, all of which were central to the success of the People’s War strategy. In this regard, the venerated transnationally trained woman combatant, like their male counterpart, is argued to be an exception, as the majority of women were thrust into the armed struggle without military training. Furthermore, it is argued that conservative feminist readings of black women’s relationship with nationalism in the anti-apartheid struggle have misrecognised and undermined women’s combatant contributions, by inscribing their forms of resistance as maternal, and outside the war effort. The study shows that the majority of women combatants have transitioned to civilian life without formal state recognition and assistance. The erasure of women’s role as combatants also means that they are excluded from the current legislative framework facilitated by the Department of Military Veterans to support the welfare of former combatants. As such, the study builds on Jacklyn Cock’s (1991) pioneering study on war and gender in South Africa; it is the first study that exclusively focuses on women ex-combatants’ experiences in postapartheid South Africa.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
Walking the Spatial Triad: how do Rhodians experience Rhodes University as a place?
- Authors: Mtolo, Siyathokoza
- Date: 2017
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/36082 , vital:24476
- Description: Globally and locally the documentation of the experience of the tertiary education institution as a place in the human or cultural geography sense of the word is an under-utilised academic exercise. Locally, however, with the 2015 #RhodesMustFall moment which highlighted South Africa's tertiary education institutions as places of meaning and accompanying experience, the documentation of such overlooked place experience became ever more pressing. The purpose of this thesis is to document how some members of the population of one South African tertiary education, the Rhodians of Rhodes University, experience that university as the place that it is to them. This is a phenomenological documentation of experience as the thesis makes it a point to look at a selection of Rhodians and their experience of emplacement in the place that is Rhodes University. In-depth mobile interviews, closely related to transect walks, were conducted with 12 Rhodians randomly selected in the hope for maximum sample variation. The interviews were conducted with the aid of a camera recording each participant’s daily transit route through campus as they reflected on their experience of Rhodes University as the place it is for them. The thesis finds that the experience of Rhodes University as a place is highly informed by the university's built and decorated environment being a visual experience that is both walked through as part of living in the place, and wherein people find themselves engaging in social relations with other Rhodians. The thesis also finds that the experience of Rhodes University as a place is also highly informed by previous experiences of places as visual and social activity entities - that the participants bring other places with them into this place. The Rhodians who participated in this research experience the placeness of Rhodes University as an emplacement that is part old, part modern, part intrigue, and part contest. Socially the university is found to be both challenging and negotiable in line with what the individual Rhodian is and is not willing to do in accordance with their emplacement and its social demands. Ultimately, the experience of Rhodes University as a place is highly determined by the individual Rhodian's past experiences of emplacement and the expectations that they bring with them which shape what their present place is to them.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
- Authors: Mtolo, Siyathokoza
- Date: 2017
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/36082 , vital:24476
- Description: Globally and locally the documentation of the experience of the tertiary education institution as a place in the human or cultural geography sense of the word is an under-utilised academic exercise. Locally, however, with the 2015 #RhodesMustFall moment which highlighted South Africa's tertiary education institutions as places of meaning and accompanying experience, the documentation of such overlooked place experience became ever more pressing. The purpose of this thesis is to document how some members of the population of one South African tertiary education, the Rhodians of Rhodes University, experience that university as the place that it is to them. This is a phenomenological documentation of experience as the thesis makes it a point to look at a selection of Rhodians and their experience of emplacement in the place that is Rhodes University. In-depth mobile interviews, closely related to transect walks, were conducted with 12 Rhodians randomly selected in the hope for maximum sample variation. The interviews were conducted with the aid of a camera recording each participant’s daily transit route through campus as they reflected on their experience of Rhodes University as the place it is for them. The thesis finds that the experience of Rhodes University as a place is highly informed by the university's built and decorated environment being a visual experience that is both walked through as part of living in the place, and wherein people find themselves engaging in social relations with other Rhodians. The thesis also finds that the experience of Rhodes University as a place is also highly informed by previous experiences of places as visual and social activity entities - that the participants bring other places with them into this place. The Rhodians who participated in this research experience the placeness of Rhodes University as an emplacement that is part old, part modern, part intrigue, and part contest. Socially the university is found to be both challenging and negotiable in line with what the individual Rhodian is and is not willing to do in accordance with their emplacement and its social demands. Ultimately, the experience of Rhodes University as a place is highly determined by the individual Rhodian's past experiences of emplacement and the expectations that they bring with them which shape what their present place is to them.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
Lizalise Idinga Lakho [Honour Thy Promise]: The Methodist Church Women’s Manyano, the Bifurcated Public Sphere, Divine Strength, Ubufazi and Motherhood in Post-Apartheid South Africa
- Authors: Ngcobozi, Lihle
- Date: 2017
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/17717 , vital:22271
- Description: This study examines the socio-political role of the Christian church based women’s Manyano organisations in post-apartheid South Africa. Specifically, the study examines the ways in which the women’s Manyano organisations offer black women a site for the performance of citizenship. The study is based on life history interviews conducted with seventeen members of the Methodist Church Women’s Manyano of the Lamontville Circuit in Kwa-Zulu Natal. The study shows that dominant literature on Manyano women is primarily located in the historiography of the formation of Manyano groups within the historical development of the black church from the moment of missionary contact in South Africa. This literature shows that the missionaries used the coming together of black women in the church to promote ideas of devout domesticity that are based on Anglophone Victorian womanhood. This literature also shows that the structural constraints of colonisation and apartheid transformed the black church into a counterpublic space which focused largely on the liberation of the black majority from political, economic, and social exclusion from the colonial and apartheid public sphere. These constraints also transformed the role of women’s Manyano organisations to become an important space from which black women came to resist and defeat apartheid. This study shows that this historical framing of women’s Manyano groups has shaped their role in post-apartheid South Africa. Located in the African feminist theory, the study argues that Manyano women’s publicness is not limited to gendered expressions of the public and private sphere. Instead, Manyano women demonstrate that their publicness in post-apartheid South Africa ought to be understood through a combination of the varied identities that they straddle, such as those of a politically and culturally defined womanhood and communally based motherhood, which express their understanding and performance of citizenship. The thesis, therefore, argues that the contemporary role and functioning of Manyanos is located within both the hegemonic public sphere that is granted by the civil liberties of the new South Africa, and the historical black bifurcated counterpublic -which combined offer black women the ability to devise strategies to confront present-day socioeconomic challenges such as structural poverty that shapes the lives of the majority of black women in post-apartheid South Africa. The study contributes, therefore, to the reconstruction of the concept of the public sphere through the use of Manyano women’s dynamic position in post-apartheid South Africa. It shows that the dualist nature of Manyano women’s position and identity allows for a multifaceted approach in the understanding of citizenship for Manyano women today. Furthermore, and importantly, the study shows that the complex roles that Manyano women navigate within the different spheres complicate the interpretations of womanhood and motherhood as understood in dominant (white western) feminist theory in ways that often lead to the delegitimisation and erasure of Manyano women’s contributions to ideas about post-apartheid feminisms.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
- Authors: Ngcobozi, Lihle
- Date: 2017
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/17717 , vital:22271
- Description: This study examines the socio-political role of the Christian church based women’s Manyano organisations in post-apartheid South Africa. Specifically, the study examines the ways in which the women’s Manyano organisations offer black women a site for the performance of citizenship. The study is based on life history interviews conducted with seventeen members of the Methodist Church Women’s Manyano of the Lamontville Circuit in Kwa-Zulu Natal. The study shows that dominant literature on Manyano women is primarily located in the historiography of the formation of Manyano groups within the historical development of the black church from the moment of missionary contact in South Africa. This literature shows that the missionaries used the coming together of black women in the church to promote ideas of devout domesticity that are based on Anglophone Victorian womanhood. This literature also shows that the structural constraints of colonisation and apartheid transformed the black church into a counterpublic space which focused largely on the liberation of the black majority from political, economic, and social exclusion from the colonial and apartheid public sphere. These constraints also transformed the role of women’s Manyano organisations to become an important space from which black women came to resist and defeat apartheid. This study shows that this historical framing of women’s Manyano groups has shaped their role in post-apartheid South Africa. Located in the African feminist theory, the study argues that Manyano women’s publicness is not limited to gendered expressions of the public and private sphere. Instead, Manyano women demonstrate that their publicness in post-apartheid South Africa ought to be understood through a combination of the varied identities that they straddle, such as those of a politically and culturally defined womanhood and communally based motherhood, which express their understanding and performance of citizenship. The thesis, therefore, argues that the contemporary role and functioning of Manyanos is located within both the hegemonic public sphere that is granted by the civil liberties of the new South Africa, and the historical black bifurcated counterpublic -which combined offer black women the ability to devise strategies to confront present-day socioeconomic challenges such as structural poverty that shapes the lives of the majority of black women in post-apartheid South Africa. The study contributes, therefore, to the reconstruction of the concept of the public sphere through the use of Manyano women’s dynamic position in post-apartheid South Africa. It shows that the dualist nature of Manyano women’s position and identity allows for a multifaceted approach in the understanding of citizenship for Manyano women today. Furthermore, and importantly, the study shows that the complex roles that Manyano women navigate within the different spheres complicate the interpretations of womanhood and motherhood as understood in dominant (white western) feminist theory in ways that often lead to the delegitimisation and erasure of Manyano women’s contributions to ideas about post-apartheid feminisms.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
What are the barriers and prospects for integrating environmental sustainability into the curriculum?
- Authors: Rorke, Joshua
- Date: 2017
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/5522 , vital:20938
- Description: This study attempts to investigate the extent to which environmental sustainability has been integrated into the curriculum of the Humanities Faculty at Rhodes University as well as the barriers and prospects for further integration. This thesis argues that the integration of environmental sustainability has been very limited. The three main components of environmental sustainability, namely environmental content, interdisciplinarity and participatory curriculum formation, are all lacking in most departments' curricula. This is despite all departments' affirmation that environmental issues are among the most critical problems the world faces today. Most of the departments are arguably only paying lip-service to environmental issues while making little to no effort toward integrating the environment into their curriculum. A lack of space in the curriculum is a frequently suggested barrier to introducing environmental sustainability into a course. However, this thesis argues that the environmentally conscious transformation of a curriculum cannot be achieved simply by adding content to the existing syllabus, but requires a restructuring of the curriculum itself. Many of the other barriers found by this study can be overcome through sufficient will on the part of departments to change their curricula. However, generating this will is difficult, as students are not ostensibly interested in environmental concerns. It is then incumbent on the lecturers themselves to educate the students on critical environmental issues, as well as on students to urge their lecturers to bring about change.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
- Authors: Rorke, Joshua
- Date: 2017
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/5522 , vital:20938
- Description: This study attempts to investigate the extent to which environmental sustainability has been integrated into the curriculum of the Humanities Faculty at Rhodes University as well as the barriers and prospects for further integration. This thesis argues that the integration of environmental sustainability has been very limited. The three main components of environmental sustainability, namely environmental content, interdisciplinarity and participatory curriculum formation, are all lacking in most departments' curricula. This is despite all departments' affirmation that environmental issues are among the most critical problems the world faces today. Most of the departments are arguably only paying lip-service to environmental issues while making little to no effort toward integrating the environment into their curriculum. A lack of space in the curriculum is a frequently suggested barrier to introducing environmental sustainability into a course. However, this thesis argues that the environmentally conscious transformation of a curriculum cannot be achieved simply by adding content to the existing syllabus, but requires a restructuring of the curriculum itself. Many of the other barriers found by this study can be overcome through sufficient will on the part of departments to change their curricula. However, generating this will is difficult, as students are not ostensibly interested in environmental concerns. It is then incumbent on the lecturers themselves to educate the students on critical environmental issues, as well as on students to urge their lecturers to bring about change.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
Lived experience of positional suffering for room attendants at Rhodes University: insights for the transformation agenda
- Authors: Toli, Vuyolwethu
- Date: 2017
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MSocSc
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/7890 , vital:21320
- Description: Taking insights from the domestic work literature both locally and internationally, this study explores the lived experiences of room attendants who work as cleaners in the students’ residences at Rhodes University. The study focuses on the housekeeping division of Rhodes University. Data was generated from in-depth individual interviews and focus groups with 26 women and 3 men participants (aged between 28 and 60) who work as room attendants, and who were recruited from the residences across the university. The phenomenological approach allowed the participants to articulate in-depth, their experiences of working as room attendants in intimate spaces. This study used a triangulated conceptual framework, which amalgamated the concepts of pain, social space and intersectionality, and exploitation under the umbrella concept of positional suffering. Within a higher education transformation agenda which has marginalised the experiences of unskilled workers at the university, the study seeks to bring insights to the understanding of transformation at Rhodes University through the experiences of the being-in-the-world of room attendants.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
- Authors: Toli, Vuyolwethu
- Date: 2017
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MSocSc
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/7890 , vital:21320
- Description: Taking insights from the domestic work literature both locally and internationally, this study explores the lived experiences of room attendants who work as cleaners in the students’ residences at Rhodes University. The study focuses on the housekeeping division of Rhodes University. Data was generated from in-depth individual interviews and focus groups with 26 women and 3 men participants (aged between 28 and 60) who work as room attendants, and who were recruited from the residences across the university. The phenomenological approach allowed the participants to articulate in-depth, their experiences of working as room attendants in intimate spaces. This study used a triangulated conceptual framework, which amalgamated the concepts of pain, social space and intersectionality, and exploitation under the umbrella concept of positional suffering. Within a higher education transformation agenda which has marginalised the experiences of unskilled workers at the university, the study seeks to bring insights to the understanding of transformation at Rhodes University through the experiences of the being-in-the-world of room attendants.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
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