Numsa Special National Congress
- NUMSA
- Authors: NUMSA
- Date: Dec 2013
- Subjects: NUMSA
- Language: English
- Type: text
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/117215 , vital:34489
- Description: Numsa's Special National Congress convened from December 17 to December 20, 2013. It was attended by 1,200 delegates representing 338,000 metalworkers from 50 Locals throughout the provinces of South Africa. Numsa was proud to announce in the Congress that it is the biggest union in the history of the African continent. In the last 17 months, since our 9th Congress in Durban, we have grown from 300,000 members to 338,000 members. We are ahead of schedule in our goal to organise 400,000 workers by the time of our 10th Congress in 2016.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: Dec 2013
- Authors: NUMSA
- Date: Dec 2013
- Subjects: NUMSA
- Language: English
- Type: text
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/117215 , vital:34489
- Description: Numsa's Special National Congress convened from December 17 to December 20, 2013. It was attended by 1,200 delegates representing 338,000 metalworkers from 50 Locals throughout the provinces of South Africa. Numsa was proud to announce in the Congress that it is the biggest union in the history of the African continent. In the last 17 months, since our 9th Congress in Durban, we have grown from 300,000 members to 338,000 members. We are ahead of schedule in our goal to organise 400,000 workers by the time of our 10th Congress in 2016.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: Dec 2013
Theses on institutional planning and research at universities
- Authors: Badat, Saleem
- Date: 2013-04-23
- Language: English
- Type: Text
- Identifier: vital:7898 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1016448
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2013-04-23
- Authors: Badat, Saleem
- Date: 2013-04-23
- Language: English
- Type: Text
- Identifier: vital:7898 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1016448
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2013-04-23
Access, success and social justice in post-1994 South African higher education
- Authors: Badat, Saleem
- Date: 2013-06-07
- Language: English
- Type: Text
- Identifier: vital:7932 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1016483
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2013-06-07
- Authors: Badat, Saleem
- Date: 2013-06-07
- Language: English
- Type: Text
- Identifier: vital:7932 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1016483
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2013-06-07
Cosmological efficacy and the politics of Sacred Place: Soli Rainmaking in contemporary Zambia
- Authors: Simbao, Ruth K
- Date: 2014
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/147482 , vital:38642 , https://doi.org/10.1162/AFAR_a_00163
- Description: In this article I analyze cosmological efficacy in light of the politicization and apparent secularization of contemporary annual ceremonies in Zambia, south-central Africa, which are framed by scholars as neotraditional (Lentz 2001), folklorized (van Binsbergen 1994), or retraditionalized (Gould 2005:3, 6) events. My term “festivalization” registers the formalization of Zambian performances such as rituals, harvest festivals, inaugurations, and initiations as annual festival events, but does not imply a pejorative attitude towards cultural change and so-called inauthenticity, as the words “folklorization” or “retraditionalization” seem to do.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2014
- Authors: Simbao, Ruth K
- Date: 2014
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/147482 , vital:38642 , https://doi.org/10.1162/AFAR_a_00163
- Description: In this article I analyze cosmological efficacy in light of the politicization and apparent secularization of contemporary annual ceremonies in Zambia, south-central Africa, which are framed by scholars as neotraditional (Lentz 2001), folklorized (van Binsbergen 1994), or retraditionalized (Gould 2005:3, 6) events. My term “festivalization” registers the formalization of Zambian performances such as rituals, harvest festivals, inaugurations, and initiations as annual festival events, but does not imply a pejorative attitude towards cultural change and so-called inauthenticity, as the words “folklorization” or “retraditionalization” seem to do.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2014
Fatty acid profiles reveal temporal and spatial differentiation in diets within and among syntopic rocky shore suspension-feeders:
- Richoux, Nicole B, Vermeulen, Ilke, Froneman, P William
- Authors: Richoux, Nicole B , Vermeulen, Ilke , Froneman, P William
- Date: 2014
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/143346 , vital:38238 , doi: 10.3354/meps10581
- Description: Regional and temporal variations in the diets of rocky shore suspension-feeders (the volcano barnacle Tetraclita serrata, the brown mussel Perna perna and the reef-building polychaete Gunnarea gaimardi) were assessed using fatty acid profiling. Specimens were collected up-current and down-current of a river mouth in 2 coastal regions ~50 km apart along southeastern South Africa during March and July of 2009. One of the rivers represents a marine-dominated system, and the other a freshwater-dominated system. Our aims were to assess any dietary differences among the 3 suspension-feeders, spatial changes in diet within each species (at regional and local scales—50 and 15 km, respectively), and temporal changes in diet within each species.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2014
- Authors: Richoux, Nicole B , Vermeulen, Ilke , Froneman, P William
- Date: 2014
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/143346 , vital:38238 , doi: 10.3354/meps10581
- Description: Regional and temporal variations in the diets of rocky shore suspension-feeders (the volcano barnacle Tetraclita serrata, the brown mussel Perna perna and the reef-building polychaete Gunnarea gaimardi) were assessed using fatty acid profiling. Specimens were collected up-current and down-current of a river mouth in 2 coastal regions ~50 km apart along southeastern South Africa during March and July of 2009. One of the rivers represents a marine-dominated system, and the other a freshwater-dominated system. Our aims were to assess any dietary differences among the 3 suspension-feeders, spatial changes in diet within each species (at regional and local scales—50 and 15 km, respectively), and temporal changes in diet within each species.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2014
Hsp90 binds directly to fibronectin (FN) and inhibition reduces the extracellular fibronectin matrix in breast cancer cells:
- Hunter, Morgan C, O’Hagan, Kyle L, Kenyon, Amy, Dhanani, Karim C H, Prinsloo, Earl, Edkins, Adrienne L
- Authors: Hunter, Morgan C , O’Hagan, Kyle L , Kenyon, Amy , Dhanani, Karim C H , Prinsloo, Earl , Edkins, Adrienne L
- Date: 2014
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/164841 , vital:41177 , DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0086842
- Description: Heat shock protein 90 (Hsp90) has been identified in the extracellular space and has been shown to chaperone a finite number of extracellular proteins involved in cell migration and invasion. We used chemical cross-linking and immunoprecipitation followed by tandem mass spectrometry (MS/MS) to isolate a complex containing Hsp90 and the matrix protein fibronectin (FN) from breast cancer cells.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2014
- Authors: Hunter, Morgan C , O’Hagan, Kyle L , Kenyon, Amy , Dhanani, Karim C H , Prinsloo, Earl , Edkins, Adrienne L
- Date: 2014
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/164841 , vital:41177 , DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0086842
- Description: Heat shock protein 90 (Hsp90) has been identified in the extracellular space and has been shown to chaperone a finite number of extracellular proteins involved in cell migration and invasion. We used chemical cross-linking and immunoprecipitation followed by tandem mass spectrometry (MS/MS) to isolate a complex containing Hsp90 and the matrix protein fibronectin (FN) from breast cancer cells.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2014
Troubling White Englishness in South Africa: a self-interrogation of privilege, complicity citizenship, and belonging
- Authors: Garman, Anthea
- Date: 2014
- Language: English
- Type: text , book
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/159746 , vital:40339 , ISBN 978-0739192962
- Description: Unveiling Whiteness in the Twenty-First Century: Global Manifestations, Transdisciplinary Interventions is a tightly interconnected and richly collaborative book that will advance our understanding of why it is so difficult to re-form and reimagine whiteness in the twenty-first century. Composed after the election of the first black U.S. president, post-global financial crisis, more than a decade after 9/11, and concomitant with a rash of xenophobic incidents across the globe, the book distills several key themes associated with a post-millennial global whiteness: the individual and collective emotions of whiteness, the recentering of whiteness through governing and legal strategies, and the retreats from social equity and justice that have characterized the late twentieth and twenty-first century nation state. It also attempts the difficult work of reimagining white identities and cultures for a new era.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2014
- Authors: Garman, Anthea
- Date: 2014
- Language: English
- Type: text , book
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/159746 , vital:40339 , ISBN 978-0739192962
- Description: Unveiling Whiteness in the Twenty-First Century: Global Manifestations, Transdisciplinary Interventions is a tightly interconnected and richly collaborative book that will advance our understanding of why it is so difficult to re-form and reimagine whiteness in the twenty-first century. Composed after the election of the first black U.S. president, post-global financial crisis, more than a decade after 9/11, and concomitant with a rash of xenophobic incidents across the globe, the book distills several key themes associated with a post-millennial global whiteness: the individual and collective emotions of whiteness, the recentering of whiteness through governing and legal strategies, and the retreats from social equity and justice that have characterized the late twentieth and twenty-first century nation state. It also attempts the difficult work of reimagining white identities and cultures for a new era.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2014
‘Licking the snake’: the i'khothane and contemporary township youth identities in South Africa
- Howell, Simon, Vincent, Louise
- Authors: Howell, Simon , Vincent, Louise
- Date: 2014
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/141645 , vital:37993 , DOI: 10.1080/21528586.2014.917883
- Description: The i’khothane youth subculture is a relatively new phenomenon that has emerged in some of South Africa’s townships. Characterised by the rampant consumption of certain goods, such as expensive clothing, the subculture is unique in that it is also defined by the destruction of these goods in performances known as ‘battles’. Demonised by the media, we set out to explore what makes these practices meaningful to the participants themselves. On the basis of in-depth interviews conducted with the members of one group, we bring to the academic literature a scarcely analysed phenomenon that is nevertheless an acknowledged element of popular youth culture in contemporary South Africa. We attempt to place the practice of i’khothane within the context of the patterns of conspicuous consumption that have emerged in (a highly unequal) post-apartheid South Africa. While the practice of burning expensive consumer goods in public may seem alien, especially in contrast to the impoverished surroundings within which the i’khothane live, there are discernable and understandable reasons why the subculture has gained both popularity and notoriety. We show how the practice of i’khothane is a potent means of articulating youth identity in settings seemingly left behind by the ‘new’ South Africa.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2014
- Authors: Howell, Simon , Vincent, Louise
- Date: 2014
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/141645 , vital:37993 , DOI: 10.1080/21528586.2014.917883
- Description: The i’khothane youth subculture is a relatively new phenomenon that has emerged in some of South Africa’s townships. Characterised by the rampant consumption of certain goods, such as expensive clothing, the subculture is unique in that it is also defined by the destruction of these goods in performances known as ‘battles’. Demonised by the media, we set out to explore what makes these practices meaningful to the participants themselves. On the basis of in-depth interviews conducted with the members of one group, we bring to the academic literature a scarcely analysed phenomenon that is nevertheless an acknowledged element of popular youth culture in contemporary South Africa. We attempt to place the practice of i’khothane within the context of the patterns of conspicuous consumption that have emerged in (a highly unequal) post-apartheid South Africa. While the practice of burning expensive consumer goods in public may seem alien, especially in contrast to the impoverished surroundings within which the i’khothane live, there are discernable and understandable reasons why the subculture has gained both popularity and notoriety. We show how the practice of i’khothane is a potent means of articulating youth identity in settings seemingly left behind by the ‘new’ South Africa.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2014
Fish utilization of surf-zones. Are they changing? A case study of the sheltered, warm-temperate King’s Beach
- Rishworth, Gavin M, Strydom, Nadine A, Potts, Warren M
- Authors: Rishworth, Gavin M , Strydom, Nadine A , Potts, Warren M
- Date: 2015
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/124504 , vital:35619 , https://doi.org/10.1080/15627020.2014.11407616
- Description: Surf-zone fish communities and their shifts over time are generally poorly understood. The aim of this study was to compare the current surf-zone fish assemblage at King’s Beach, South Africa, to a similar study conducted three decades ago, before the collapse of many exploited shore fishes in the region. Beach seine nets (mesh sizes of 10 and 50 mm) were used to target juvenile and adult fishes bimonthly from February to August 2011 over the high tide around sunset. A total of 14 species were recorded in both the 30mand 100mseine nets. The catch in these seine nets was dominated by Pomadasys olivaceus and Liza richardsonii, and this was significantly different to three decades ago, when P. olivaceus, Sarpa salpa and Diplodus capensis dominated the catch. Important linefish species belonging to the Sparidae and Sciaenidae families were significantly smaller and less abundant in this study. Two sparids, S. salpa and Lithognathus mormyrus, which made a large contribution to the surf-zone catch three decades ago were absent during this study. Reasons for the significant shifts in the surf-zone fish community, including overexploitation of the linefish and potential habitat modification, are discussed.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2015
- Authors: Rishworth, Gavin M , Strydom, Nadine A , Potts, Warren M
- Date: 2015
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/124504 , vital:35619 , https://doi.org/10.1080/15627020.2014.11407616
- Description: Surf-zone fish communities and their shifts over time are generally poorly understood. The aim of this study was to compare the current surf-zone fish assemblage at King’s Beach, South Africa, to a similar study conducted three decades ago, before the collapse of many exploited shore fishes in the region. Beach seine nets (mesh sizes of 10 and 50 mm) were used to target juvenile and adult fishes bimonthly from February to August 2011 over the high tide around sunset. A total of 14 species were recorded in both the 30mand 100mseine nets. The catch in these seine nets was dominated by Pomadasys olivaceus and Liza richardsonii, and this was significantly different to three decades ago, when P. olivaceus, Sarpa salpa and Diplodus capensis dominated the catch. Important linefish species belonging to the Sparidae and Sciaenidae families were significantly smaller and less abundant in this study. Two sparids, S. salpa and Lithognathus mormyrus, which made a large contribution to the surf-zone catch three decades ago were absent during this study. Reasons for the significant shifts in the surf-zone fish community, including overexploitation of the linefish and potential habitat modification, are discussed.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2015
Issues and concerns in developing regulated markets for endangered species products: the case of rhinoceros horns
- Collins, Alan, Fraser, Gavin C G, Snowball, Jeanette D
- Authors: Collins, Alan , Fraser, Gavin C G , Snowball, Jeanette D
- Date: 2015
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/124877 , vital:35706 , https://doi.org/10.1093/cje/bev076
- Description: A proposal for addressing rhinoceros poaching is to legalise the trade in rhino horn and adopt a regulated market approach, overturning the current trade ban. This orthodox economic prescription aims to reduce incentives to poach endangered wildlife by driving down the market price of their products via auctioned stockpile releases. Biologists are clear, however, that securing a stockpile for some species needs biological success in captive breeding programmes (CBPs), which varies markedly across species and habitats. Rhinoceros herds in a CBP would need spatially extensive terrain and costly permanent security measures; this only appears feasible for the less aggressive ‘white’ rhino. We argue that the market price would actually need to be sustained at a high level to cover protection costs over the longer reproduction cycles in CBPs and that, without extensive monitoring and the correct institutional structures being in place, legalising trade may encourage, rather than prevent, poaching. Supplementary policy measures that differentiate among consumer groups would also likely prove necessary.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2015
- Authors: Collins, Alan , Fraser, Gavin C G , Snowball, Jeanette D
- Date: 2015
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/124877 , vital:35706 , https://doi.org/10.1093/cje/bev076
- Description: A proposal for addressing rhinoceros poaching is to legalise the trade in rhino horn and adopt a regulated market approach, overturning the current trade ban. This orthodox economic prescription aims to reduce incentives to poach endangered wildlife by driving down the market price of their products via auctioned stockpile releases. Biologists are clear, however, that securing a stockpile for some species needs biological success in captive breeding programmes (CBPs), which varies markedly across species and habitats. Rhinoceros herds in a CBP would need spatially extensive terrain and costly permanent security measures; this only appears feasible for the less aggressive ‘white’ rhino. We argue that the market price would actually need to be sustained at a high level to cover protection costs over the longer reproduction cycles in CBPs and that, without extensive monitoring and the correct institutional structures being in place, legalising trade may encourage, rather than prevent, poaching. Supplementary policy measures that differentiate among consumer groups would also likely prove necessary.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2015
Shifting white identities in South Africa: white Africanness and the struggle for racial justice
- Authors: Matthews, Sally
- Date: 2015
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/142180 , vital:38056 , DOI: 10.25159/2413-3086/3821
- Description: The end of apartheid predictably caused something of an identity crisis for white South Africans. The sense of uncertainty about what it means to be white has led to much public debate about whiteness in South Africa, as well as a growing body of literature on whites in post-apartheid South Africa. One of the many responses to this need to rethink white identity has been the claim by some that white South Africans can be considered to be African or ought to begin to think of themselves as being African. This paper argues that whites' assertion of an African identity does not necessarily assist in the achievement of racial justice, but that some kind of shift in white identity is required in order for whites to be able to contribute to the achievement of a racially just South Africa. In making this argument, the paper brings contemporary discussions on race and whiteness, and in particular discussions about racial eliminativism, to bear on the question of whether or not white South Africans may rightly claim an African identity.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2015
- Authors: Matthews, Sally
- Date: 2015
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/142180 , vital:38056 , DOI: 10.25159/2413-3086/3821
- Description: The end of apartheid predictably caused something of an identity crisis for white South Africans. The sense of uncertainty about what it means to be white has led to much public debate about whiteness in South Africa, as well as a growing body of literature on whites in post-apartheid South Africa. One of the many responses to this need to rethink white identity has been the claim by some that white South Africans can be considered to be African or ought to begin to think of themselves as being African. This paper argues that whites' assertion of an African identity does not necessarily assist in the achievement of racial justice, but that some kind of shift in white identity is required in order for whites to be able to contribute to the achievement of a racially just South Africa. In making this argument, the paper brings contemporary discussions on race and whiteness, and in particular discussions about racial eliminativism, to bear on the question of whether or not white South Africans may rightly claim an African identity.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2015
Transnationalism as Process, Diaspora as Condition:
- Authors: Owen, Joy
- Date: 2015
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/147983 , vital:38699 , https://www.ajol.info/index.php/jsda/article/view/136745
- Description: In 2004 I embarked on 15 months of ethnographic fieldwork that spanned a six year period with Congolese migrants in Muizenberg, Cape Town. During fieldwork it was necessary to identify these migrants either as diasporic or as a transnational community given the purchase of transnationalism in the migration field.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2015
- Authors: Owen, Joy
- Date: 2015
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/147983 , vital:38699 , https://www.ajol.info/index.php/jsda/article/view/136745
- Description: In 2004 I embarked on 15 months of ethnographic fieldwork that spanned a six year period with Congolese migrants in Muizenberg, Cape Town. During fieldwork it was necessary to identify these migrants either as diasporic or as a transnational community given the purchase of transnationalism in the migration field.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2015
Sport consumption patterns in the Eastern Cape: cricket spectators as sporting univores or omnivores
- Brock, Kelcey, Fraser, Gavin C G, Botha, Ferdi
- Authors: Brock, Kelcey , Fraser, Gavin C G , Botha, Ferdi
- Date: 2016
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/69362 , vital:29508 , https://doi.org/10.4102/jef.v9i3.64
- Description: Since its inception, consumption behaviour theory has developed to account for the important social aspects that underpin or at least to some extent explain consumer behaviour. Empirical studies on consumption behaviour of cultural activities, entertainment and sport have used Bourdieu’s (1984) omnivore/univore theory to investigate consumption of leisure activities. The aim of this study is to investigate whether South African cricket spectators are sporting omnivores or univores. The study was conducted among cricket spectators in the Eastern Cape at four limited overs cricket matches in the 2012/2013 cricket season. The results indicate that consumption behaviour of sport predominantly differs on the grounds of education and race. This suggests that there are aspects of social connotations underpinning sports consumption behaviour within South Africa.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2016
Sport consumption patterns in the Eastern Cape: cricket spectators as sporting univores or omnivores
- Authors: Brock, Kelcey , Fraser, Gavin C G , Botha, Ferdi
- Date: 2016
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/69362 , vital:29508 , https://doi.org/10.4102/jef.v9i3.64
- Description: Since its inception, consumption behaviour theory has developed to account for the important social aspects that underpin or at least to some extent explain consumer behaviour. Empirical studies on consumption behaviour of cultural activities, entertainment and sport have used Bourdieu’s (1984) omnivore/univore theory to investigate consumption of leisure activities. The aim of this study is to investigate whether South African cricket spectators are sporting omnivores or univores. The study was conducted among cricket spectators in the Eastern Cape at four limited overs cricket matches in the 2012/2013 cricket season. The results indicate that consumption behaviour of sport predominantly differs on the grounds of education and race. This suggests that there are aspects of social connotations underpinning sports consumption behaviour within South Africa.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2016
The nature of learning and work transitioning in boundaryless work : the case of the environmental engineer
- Ramsarup, Presha, Lotz-Sisitka, Heila
- Authors: Ramsarup, Presha , Lotz-Sisitka, Heila
- Date: 2017
- Subjects: Environmental engineers -- South Africa , Environmental degradation , Workplace literacy
- Language: English
- Type: article , text
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/59657 , vital:27635 , https://doi.org/10.4314/sajee.v.33i1.8
- Description: Transition is a common characteristic of our lives, particularly in a rapidly changing world. In this context, how careers are enacted has become increasingly varied, requiring new conceptual tools to study the transitions of learners and workers. This paper uses theoretical constructs from the literature on boundaryless career discourse as well as learning and on work transitioning in order to explore the learning pathways of environmental engineers. It thus contributes to empirical work that articulates ongoing transitions (beyond the first job) within ‘occupational and organisational life’, as well as to the understanding of learning pathways as educational and occupational progression. The career stories help us to understand how non-linear transitions emerge, the complexity of these transitions, and the need to attend to broader institutional arrangements within and across education and training, the labour market and the workplace. Through its focus on the environmental engineer, it helps us to understand the processes and outcomes of transitions in an important occupation in contemporary professional work in South Africa. Finally, in a field dominated by research on entry into a first job, the paper also provides much-needed insights into occupational transitions into specialised work.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
- Authors: Ramsarup, Presha , Lotz-Sisitka, Heila
- Date: 2017
- Subjects: Environmental engineers -- South Africa , Environmental degradation , Workplace literacy
- Language: English
- Type: article , text
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/59657 , vital:27635 , https://doi.org/10.4314/sajee.v.33i1.8
- Description: Transition is a common characteristic of our lives, particularly in a rapidly changing world. In this context, how careers are enacted has become increasingly varied, requiring new conceptual tools to study the transitions of learners and workers. This paper uses theoretical constructs from the literature on boundaryless career discourse as well as learning and on work transitioning in order to explore the learning pathways of environmental engineers. It thus contributes to empirical work that articulates ongoing transitions (beyond the first job) within ‘occupational and organisational life’, as well as to the understanding of learning pathways as educational and occupational progression. The career stories help us to understand how non-linear transitions emerge, the complexity of these transitions, and the need to attend to broader institutional arrangements within and across education and training, the labour market and the workplace. Through its focus on the environmental engineer, it helps us to understand the processes and outcomes of transitions in an important occupation in contemporary professional work in South Africa. Finally, in a field dominated by research on entry into a first job, the paper also provides much-needed insights into occupational transitions into specialised work.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
Transgressing the norm: Transformative agency in community-based learning for sustainability in southern African contexts
- Lotz-Sisitka, Heila, Mukute, Mutizwa, Chikunda, Charles, Baloi, Aristides, Pesanayi, Tichaona V
- Authors: Lotz-Sisitka, Heila , Mukute, Mutizwa , Chikunda, Charles , Baloi, Aristides , Pesanayi, Tichaona V
- Date: 2017
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/127204 , vital:35977 , https://10.1007/s11159-017-9689-3
- Description: Environment and sustainability education processes are often oriented to change and transformation, and frequently involve the emergence of new forms of human activity. However, not much is known about how such change emerges from the learning process, or how it contributes to the development of transformative agency in community contexts. The authors of this article present four cross-case perspectives of expansive learning and transformative agency development in community-based education in southern Africa, studying communities pursuing new activities that are more socially just and sustainable. The four cases of community learning and transformative agency focus on the following activities: (1) sustainable agriculture in Lesotho; (2) seed saving and rainwater harvesting in Zimbabwe; (3) community-based irrigation scheme management in Mozambique; and (4) biodiversity conservation co-management in South Africa. The case studies all draw on cultural-historical activity theory to guide learning and change processes, especially third-generation cultural-historical activity theory (CHAT), which emphasises expansive learning in collectives across interacting activity systems. CHAT researchers, such as the authors of this article, argue that expansive learning can lead to the emergence of transformative agency. The authors extend their transformative agency analysis to probe if and how expansive learning might also facilitate instances of transgressing norms – viewed here as embedded practices which need to be reframed and changed in order for sustainability to emerge.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
- Authors: Lotz-Sisitka, Heila , Mukute, Mutizwa , Chikunda, Charles , Baloi, Aristides , Pesanayi, Tichaona V
- Date: 2017
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/127204 , vital:35977 , https://10.1007/s11159-017-9689-3
- Description: Environment and sustainability education processes are often oriented to change and transformation, and frequently involve the emergence of new forms of human activity. However, not much is known about how such change emerges from the learning process, or how it contributes to the development of transformative agency in community contexts. The authors of this article present four cross-case perspectives of expansive learning and transformative agency development in community-based education in southern Africa, studying communities pursuing new activities that are more socially just and sustainable. The four cases of community learning and transformative agency focus on the following activities: (1) sustainable agriculture in Lesotho; (2) seed saving and rainwater harvesting in Zimbabwe; (3) community-based irrigation scheme management in Mozambique; and (4) biodiversity conservation co-management in South Africa. The case studies all draw on cultural-historical activity theory to guide learning and change processes, especially third-generation cultural-historical activity theory (CHAT), which emphasises expansive learning in collectives across interacting activity systems. CHAT researchers, such as the authors of this article, argue that expansive learning can lead to the emergence of transformative agency. The authors extend their transformative agency analysis to probe if and how expansive learning might also facilitate instances of transgressing norms – viewed here as embedded practices which need to be reframed and changed in order for sustainability to emerge.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
Urban foraging: a ubiquitous human practice overlooked by urban planners, policy, and research
- Shackleton, Charlie M, Hurley, Patrick T, Dahlberg, Annika C, Emery, Marla R, Nagendra, Harini
- Authors: Shackleton, Charlie M , Hurley, Patrick T , Dahlberg, Annika C , Emery, Marla R , Nagendra, Harini
- Date: 2017
- Language: English
- Type: article , text
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/60876 , vital:27848 , https://doi.org/10.3390/su9101884
- Description: Although hardly noticed or formally recognised, urban foraging by humans probably occurs in all urban settings around the world. We draw from research in India, South Africa, Sweden, and the United States to demonstrate the ubiquity and varied nature of urban foraging in different contexts. Across these different contexts, we distil seven themes that characterise and thereby advance thinking about research and the understanding of urban foraging. We show that it is widespread and occurs across a variety of urban spaces and places. The species used and the local practices vary between contexts, and are in constant flux as urban ecological and social settings change. This requires that urban foragers are knowledgeable about diverse species, harvest locations, and rights of access, and that their practices are adaptable to changing contexts. Despite its ubiquity, most cities have some forms of regulations that prohibit or discourage urban foraging. We highlight a few important exceptions that can provide prototypes and lessons for other cities regarding supportive policy frameworks and initiatives. The formulation of dynamic policy, design, and management strategies in support of urban foraging will benefit from understanding the common characteristics of foraging in cities worldwide, but also will require comprehension of the specific and dynamic contexts in which they would be implemented.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
- Authors: Shackleton, Charlie M , Hurley, Patrick T , Dahlberg, Annika C , Emery, Marla R , Nagendra, Harini
- Date: 2017
- Language: English
- Type: article , text
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/60876 , vital:27848 , https://doi.org/10.3390/su9101884
- Description: Although hardly noticed or formally recognised, urban foraging by humans probably occurs in all urban settings around the world. We draw from research in India, South Africa, Sweden, and the United States to demonstrate the ubiquity and varied nature of urban foraging in different contexts. Across these different contexts, we distil seven themes that characterise and thereby advance thinking about research and the understanding of urban foraging. We show that it is widespread and occurs across a variety of urban spaces and places. The species used and the local practices vary between contexts, and are in constant flux as urban ecological and social settings change. This requires that urban foragers are knowledgeable about diverse species, harvest locations, and rights of access, and that their practices are adaptable to changing contexts. Despite its ubiquity, most cities have some forms of regulations that prohibit or discourage urban foraging. We highlight a few important exceptions that can provide prototypes and lessons for other cities regarding supportive policy frameworks and initiatives. The formulation of dynamic policy, design, and management strategies in support of urban foraging will benefit from understanding the common characteristics of foraging in cities worldwide, but also will require comprehension of the specific and dynamic contexts in which they would be implemented.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
‘If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it’: challenges facing institutional transformation of historically white South African universities
- Booi, Masixole, Vincent, Louise, Liccardo, Sabrina
- Authors: Booi, Masixole , Vincent, Louise , Liccardo, Sabrina
- Date: 2017
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/141878 , vital:38012 , https://www.ajol.info/index.php/asr/article/view/163701/153175
- Description: Research on transformation of higher education institutions shows that the underrepresentation, recruitment and retention of blacks and women in senior posts is still the major challenge facing the project of transforming higher education, particularly in Historically White Universities (HWUs). Several South African universities have responded to this challenge by initiating programmes for the ‘accelerated development’ of black academic staff. In this project we were interested to examine the wider implications of such programmes for transforming/reproducing existing institutional cultures. Focusing on one particular HWU and the participants in its Accelerated Development Programme (ADP) we asked whether or not the programme could be thought to have contributed to the interruption or reproduction of the existing dominant institutional culture of the university. The paper is based on interviews with 18 black lecturers who entered the academic workforce through the university’s ADP. Employing Pierre Bourdieu’s theoretical framework of social and cultural reproduction, we discuss how difficult it is to interrupt the naturalised norms and values that form part of the existing institutional culture of a university.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
- Authors: Booi, Masixole , Vincent, Louise , Liccardo, Sabrina
- Date: 2017
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/141878 , vital:38012 , https://www.ajol.info/index.php/asr/article/view/163701/153175
- Description: Research on transformation of higher education institutions shows that the underrepresentation, recruitment and retention of blacks and women in senior posts is still the major challenge facing the project of transforming higher education, particularly in Historically White Universities (HWUs). Several South African universities have responded to this challenge by initiating programmes for the ‘accelerated development’ of black academic staff. In this project we were interested to examine the wider implications of such programmes for transforming/reproducing existing institutional cultures. Focusing on one particular HWU and the participants in its Accelerated Development Programme (ADP) we asked whether or not the programme could be thought to have contributed to the interruption or reproduction of the existing dominant institutional culture of the university. The paper is based on interviews with 18 black lecturers who entered the academic workforce through the university’s ADP. Employing Pierre Bourdieu’s theoretical framework of social and cultural reproduction, we discuss how difficult it is to interrupt the naturalised norms and values that form part of the existing institutional culture of a university.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
Bollywood Nights: Indian youth and the creation of diasporic identity in South Africa
- Authors: Boshoff, Priscilla A
- Date: 2018
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/143494 , vital:38251 , DOI: 10.3138/topia.26.29
- Description: Bollywood’s popularity as a global cultural form has occurred at the same time as the valorization of difference in the South African political landscape. As the youngest members of the 19th-century labour diaspora, South African Indian youths are the inheritors of a conservative—yet adaptable—home culture amidst the marginalized identities of (post-)apartheid South Africa. Their desire to create an identity for themselves that encompasses their self-perception both as modern South African subjects and as guardians of their traditional home cultures is achieved through Bollywood, which speaks to its diasporic audiences through images of an idealized traditional yet modern India. While India is not a place of return for these youth, their reactivation of a diasporic identity through Bollywood’s representations of a successful Indian diasporic culture and their participation in South African Bollywood concerts and award ceremonies has provided an opportunity for young South African Indians to reimagine their diasporic Indian identity in ways that (re-)connect them to India and to an imagined global diaspora.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2018
- Authors: Boshoff, Priscilla A
- Date: 2018
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/143494 , vital:38251 , DOI: 10.3138/topia.26.29
- Description: Bollywood’s popularity as a global cultural form has occurred at the same time as the valorization of difference in the South African political landscape. As the youngest members of the 19th-century labour diaspora, South African Indian youths are the inheritors of a conservative—yet adaptable—home culture amidst the marginalized identities of (post-)apartheid South Africa. Their desire to create an identity for themselves that encompasses their self-perception both as modern South African subjects and as guardians of their traditional home cultures is achieved through Bollywood, which speaks to its diasporic audiences through images of an idealized traditional yet modern India. While India is not a place of return for these youth, their reactivation of a diasporic identity through Bollywood’s representations of a successful Indian diasporic culture and their participation in South African Bollywood concerts and award ceremonies has provided an opportunity for young South African Indians to reimagine their diasporic Indian identity in ways that (re-)connect them to India and to an imagined global diaspora.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2018
Can Jamaica put music first?: a comment
- Authors: Stanley Niaah, Sonjah
- Date: 2018
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/145941 , vital:38480 , https://0-doi.org.wam.seals.ac.za/10.1080/00086495.2018.1480319
- Description: Many development programmes fail because they don’t account for cultural contexts. In a context where cultural and creative industries represent 10% of the GNP in economies such as Brazil, China, India, and Indonesia, there is no doubt that culture is vital for their sustainable development.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2018
- Authors: Stanley Niaah, Sonjah
- Date: 2018
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/145941 , vital:38480 , https://0-doi.org.wam.seals.ac.za/10.1080/00086495.2018.1480319
- Description: Many development programmes fail because they don’t account for cultural contexts. In a context where cultural and creative industries represent 10% of the GNP in economies such as Brazil, China, India, and Indonesia, there is no doubt that culture is vital for their sustainable development.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2018
Confronting the Colonial Library: teaching Political Studies amidst calls for a decolonised curriculum
- Authors: Matthews, Sally
- Date: 2018
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/142191 , vital:38057 , DOI: 10.1080/02589346.2018.1418204
- Description: This paper engages with Mudimbe's concept of the ‘colonial library’ with the aim of using this engagement to contribute to current debates about decolonising South African university curricula. The term ‘colonial library’ refers to the body of texts and epistemological order which construct Africa as a symbol of otherness and inferiority. Mudimbe shows that even the most determined attempts to resist the colonial library draw on this same epistemological order. This presents a profound challenge for attempts to decolonise university curricula as it suggests that the colonial library's reach extends into attempts to dismantle it. In response to this challenge, I discuss ways in which we can oppose epistemological ethnocentrism and argue that we need to be open to the possibility of the emancipatory reappropriation of aspects of the colonial library. The paper concludes by relating the foregoing discussion to the South African political studies classroom.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2018
- Authors: Matthews, Sally
- Date: 2018
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/142191 , vital:38057 , DOI: 10.1080/02589346.2018.1418204
- Description: This paper engages with Mudimbe's concept of the ‘colonial library’ with the aim of using this engagement to contribute to current debates about decolonising South African university curricula. The term ‘colonial library’ refers to the body of texts and epistemological order which construct Africa as a symbol of otherness and inferiority. Mudimbe shows that even the most determined attempts to resist the colonial library draw on this same epistemological order. This presents a profound challenge for attempts to decolonise university curricula as it suggests that the colonial library's reach extends into attempts to dismantle it. In response to this challenge, I discuss ways in which we can oppose epistemological ethnocentrism and argue that we need to be open to the possibility of the emancipatory reappropriation of aspects of the colonial library. The paper concludes by relating the foregoing discussion to the South African political studies classroom.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2018