Constructing citizenship in post-conflict contexts: the cases of Liberia and Rwanda

In post-conflict and fragile contexts, one central aim of education is to prepare citizens to rebuild society and manage conflict. In this paper, we discuss the ways that citizenship education, students’ civic attitudes, and student civic practices vary across two post-conflict contexts in Africa: Liberia and Rwanda. First, we consider the historical and current complexities of citizenship education in these countries drawing on a post-colonial framework and Osler and Starkey’s three dimensions of citizenship. Next, we discuss survey and interview data from secondary students based on separate multi-level case studies in the respective countries. We note differences and similarities in student conceptions of good citizenship, civic identity, classroom climate, and civic engagement across the two countries, as well as variation by school type and gender. Some notable findings included less active conceptions of citizenship and openness to discussing controversial issues in Rwanda than in Liberia, and less participation in out of school activities among young women than young men. These and other results highlight differing contextual values of development, security, freedom of speech, and civic action and the overall importance of citizenship education in a post-conflict context.     

A Bourdieusian approach to academic reading: reflections on a South African teaching experience

As in many other parts of the world, ‘academic literacy’ has emerged as both a concern and a contested concept in South African universities. In this article we focus specifically on academic reading, which we argue is a relatively underemphasized aspect of academic literacy. This article is the product of reflections on academic reading during and subsequent to the development and presentation of a postgraduate module presented at Stellenbosch University. It briefly explores the literature on academic literacy; develops the Bourdieusian perspective on academic reading that we used to develop the module; and concludes with a discussion of the module. Our intention was to make ‘reading as social practice’ more visible to students. Bourdieu's concepts of ‘competence’, ‘habitus’ and ‘field’ set the scene for a discussion of the role of reading in different disciples and more generally within the social sciences and humanities.     

后种族隔离时期的南非教师教育述评

南非教师教育自产生以来就带有浓厚的种族隔离色彩.1994年新政府上台,取消种族隔离制度,自此南非教师教育走上了新的发展道路.后种族隔离时期,新政府对传统教师教育实施了一系列改革,出台了一系列的政策、法令,重组教师教育机构,转移教师教育责任,建立健全了一套教师教育质量保障体系和机制,并对新时期教师的能力和角色进行了重新定位.新政府的这一系列举措,凸现了后种族隔离时期南非教师教育公平、多元的特征.     

Rebuilding higher education institutions in post-conflict contexts: Policy networks,process, perceptions, & patterns

This research explored the rebuilding of a public university, Université Félix Houphouët-Boigny, in the West African nation of Côte d’Ivoire, destroyed as a result of a highly contested Presidential election. We began by viewing rebuilding as the result of policy networks, a pantheon of interdependent actors cooperating and competing to address policymaking. Then we investigated the characteristics of these efforts, focusing on the policies that result from the complex interplay between university stakeholders and government bodies and the subsequent implementation of policy into practice. The study resulted in a preliminary understanding of one institution’s rebuilding efforts.     

Unpacking (white) privilege in a South African university classroom: A neglected element in multicultural educational contexts

Multiculturalism currently aims for the political accommodation of difference instead of the subversion of the resulting privileges of difference. In the South African context such a distinction is especially important since the economic and symbolic subjugation of the majority of Black South Africans continues despite political transformation, and is exacerbated by an unwillingness to reflect on privilege and inequality. Drawing on Biko and Soudien’s critique of multiculturalism and vision for anti-racist education, this paper describes a classroom activity set for 164 nationally and culturally diverse second year sociology students at a university in Cape Town, South Africa. The activity tasked students to reflect on texts by Peggy McIntosh and Khaya Dlanga (one canonical, the other contextual) and reports on these students’ nuanced understandings of personal biography, experiences of privilege and self-reflexivity that connects personal experience to social structure and historical contexts. It concludes by offering modest implications for moral education in a multicultural university classroom.     

Sexuality education in South African schools: deconstructing the dominant response to young people’s sexualities in contemporary schooling contexts

ABSTRACT

South African schools are tasked with providing sexuality education through the Life Orientation curriculum as a means of challenging continued high rates of HIV, unwanted pregnancy and gender-based violence. While in theory schools are well positioned to provide appropriate knowledge for reproductive health and navigating sexual challenges within a gender justice framework, research on sexuality education in South African schools indicates that this is not the reality in practice. This paper draws on a growing body of qualitative studies, with both educators and learners in South African schools, to understand the issues undermining the goal of a critical and social justice pedagogy of sexuality in Life Orientation classrooms. We argue that sexuality education has been deployed to regulate and discipline young sexualities, reinforce and perpetuate gender binarisms and heteronormativity, re-establish global northern family values of the nuclear family within a pro-family discourse, and represent continued assumptions of adult authority in a civilising mission over young people. We suggest that the failure to make critical use of Life Orientation is linked to the dominance of ‘expert’-based didactic pedagogy, and argue the possibilities of sexuality education as a productive space for young people’s active participation and agency in making meaning of gender and sexualities.     

Educational paradigms and engineering educators in South Africa

In this response to Waghid (2000) the authorsquestion the validity of conclusions reachedfrom an examination of the proceedings of anengineering education conference in SouthAfrica. The authors argue that these papersdo not represent the views of engineeringeducators in general. Furthermore they querythe way in which Waghid uses reference toteaching methods in these papers to deduce thetheoretical perspective of the presenters. Itis suggested that the views of the educatorsinvolved in this conference and others like itin South Africa, can be characterised asfalling within a broad interpretivist(constructivist) perspective. Finally, theauthors agree that an engagement with acritical perspective would contributesignificantly to the transformation of theculture of engineering education in SouthAfrica.     

发展中国家如何致力于更加公平的教育——以印度和南非为例

教育公平是国际社会的共同追求,促进教育公平是各国政府不可推卸的责任.本文选取印度和南非这两个重要的发展中国家,分别从历史、法律、政策、财政等方面,梳理了两国政府在教育公平方面做出的不懈努力,以期为中国的教育公平问题提供一定的借鉴和启示.     

Respect and responsibility: Teaching citizenship in South African high schools

Respect is a core concept in citizenship debates. South African high school educators often draw upon respect as a key value within citizenship education. Their teaching of this value is often conflated with promotion of the practice of responsible citizenship. The constructions of respect and responsibility in these situations are imbued with assumptions around authority and power relations, such that learners’ are expected to take responsibility for demonstrating respect for in an unequal rather than reciprocal understanding of respect. Thus, negotiations of different kinds of respect are highlighted. The need for schools to embody a culture or ethos of respect is noted if learners are to be expected to recognise and adopt respect as a key element to citizenship in theory and in practice.     

Institutionalising racial segregation in the South African school: the School Board Act, 1905

ABSTRACT

This essay attempts to show how the Social Darwinist thinking of white racial superiority, and so, ultimately, white supremacy, came to be institutionalised in law in South Africa. It looks specifically at the making and institutionalisation of the School Board Act (SBA) of 1905 of the Colony of the Cape of Good Hope. It argues that the SBA contains one of the first constitutive moves that are made in the South Africa that is to emerge with the Act of Union in 1910 with respect to classification, ranking, and ordering in the country’s long history of race-making. It precedes better-known pieces of legislation such as the Population Registration Act of 1950 which the apartheid government institutes almost 50 years later. Through the SBA, “race” as a social fact is entrenched in legal and juridical terms. The essay examines how this process is institutionalised through legal judgements provided by the courts of the Cape Colony.     

近二十年来中国的南非教师教育研究热点述评

目前,教师教育已是国际教育领域的一个热点话题。自从1998年我国与非洲建交以来,南非教师教育引起了国内学者的广泛关注,主要表现在南非教师教育历史发展、制度建设、政策变革、课程改革、培养路径、信息化发展以及质量保障等方面,并取得了一定的成果。文章对20世纪90年代以来国内南非教师教育研究加以梳理和分析,以期揭示国内南非教师教育研究的核心内容及基本现状。     

南非学校环境教育政策与策略评析

南非是一个环境问题较严重的国家。结束了种族隔离制度后，南非开始关注环境教育，以此作为解决环境问题的关键策略，并取得了较好的成绩。本文就南非环境教育政策的发展、学校环境教育课程目标、基本策略和途径等方面对南非环境教育的政策与策略作一全面的分析与评价。     

南非高校合并:成效与经验

自20世纪90年代中期以来的南非高校合并,是摆脱了种族隔离制度的新南非改造其整个高等教育体系最重要的手段,在很大程度上改变了南非高等教育的面貌。南非的高校合并是在政府的主导下进行的,具有很强的计划性。充分调研,反复论证;政府推动,因势利导;就近归并,稳定重点;形式明确,深度融合,是南非高校合并获得成功的基本经验。     

Evaluating postgraduate preparation in the South African context

Little work is being undertaken in South Africa to systematically and intentionally prepare undergraduate students to pursue postgraduate studies. This is concerning given the shortage of postgraduate students and the small scale of postgraduate studies. The few programmes and endeavours that exist to prepare students for postgraduate studies are not necessarily evaluated to assess their achievements and shortcomings. This paper provides an evaluation of an academic year-long postgraduate preparation programme, and is specifically concerned with examining subsequent postgraduate enrolment and improvement of participants’ marks. The study draws on both quantitative and qualitative data. The findings indicate that the majority of programme participants proceeded to subsequently enrol in postgraduate studies immediately after completing the programme and that the programme played a role in the pursuit of postgraduate studies. However, the findings also indicate that overall participants’ marks did not improve after participating in the programme. The study brings to light that, while some achievements are possible, the limits of the programme must also be acknowledged.     

南非农村基础教育变革新动向探析

近年,南非政府开始关注并重视农村基础教育,成立了若干促进农村基础教育变革的专门机构。这些机构陆续出台的文本,显示出南非农村基础教育变革的新动向。本文在梳理这些文本的基础上,从学校布局调整、课程内容改革和师资力量加强三个侧面来探析南非政府在推进城乡基础教育均衡发展方面所作出的努力。     

The international performance of the South African academic institutions: a citation assessment

This article reports the results of an investigation to identify the disciplinary strengths and the international standing of the higher education institutions in South Africa. Even though comparative assessments provide valuable information for research administrations, researchers and students such information is not available in South Africa currently. The Essential Science Indicators database of the Institute for Scientific Information is utilized for the investigation and six South African universities are identified to be included in the top 1% of the world’s institutions cited in the international scientific literature. The identified institutions are University of Cape Town, University of Pretoria, Orange Free State University, University of Witwatersrand, University of Natal and University of Stellenbosch. Analysis of the scientific disciplines in which the South African institutions meet the threshold requirements for inclusion in the database shows that the country has citation footprints in only nine of the 22 broad scientific disciplines. The article identifies the international standing of the South African universities in the various scientific disciplines, and elaborates on the consequences relevant to higher education and science and technology policy.     

To be or not to be an academic: South African graduate students’ vocational choices

In the post-apartheid era, South African universities are striving to attract and retain diverse faculty, as mandated by the 1998 Employment Equity Act (EEA). While the focus on faculty is critical to the transformation agenda, it is informative to step back and consider the factors that influence graduate students’ decisions regarding joining the academy. This qualitative study explores the educational experiences and vocational decisions of 50 masters and doctoral students from the EEA's “designated groups,” who are poised to become academics. Factors influencing graduate students’ vocational choices should be taken into consideration as universities strive to attract more diverse faculty.     

南非教师质量问题及归因分析

教师质量问题是全球普遍关注的话题,也是发展中国家为努力实现全民教育2015目标和千年发展目标面临的最大挑战。南非教师质量虽名列非洲国家前茅,但仍存在着结构较单一、学历层次较低、健康状况不良等诸多问题。究其原因,国家政策制定或实施不当、社会经济地位下降是南非教师质量问题的主导因素。     

Designing an effective sexuality education curriculum for schools: lessons gleaned from the South(ern) African literature

Sexuality education forms part of the national school curricula of most sub-Saharan African countries, yet risk-related sexual behaviour among young people continues to fuel the HIV pandemic in this part of the world. One of the arguments put forward to explain why sexuality education seems to have had little impact on sexual risk-taking is that existing curricula have neglected to take into account the complexity of the social, cultural and gender norms that influence the behaviour of school-going young people in sub-Saharan Africa. Over the past few years, the Department of Basic Education in South Africa has recognised the need to provide guidance to teachers on the content, pedagogical processes and messages that are relevant to their specific context. This paper critically reflects on findings from a literature-based study conducted to identify the cognitive and social factors influencing the behaviour of school-going young people in South Africa and the risk and protective factors that might be particular to their circumstances. The findings provide helpful guidelines about the development, content and implementation of sexuality education curricula more likely to be relevant in contexts of serious poverty and disadvantage. Although based on the South African literature, the findings may also offer useful lessons for curriculum designers in other developing countries.     

Education and madrassahs in South Africa: on preventing the possibility of extremism

Nowadays education in the madrassahs (Muslim schools) is constantly being placed under the spotlight, such as being considered as seedbeds for terrorism. This article takes a critical look at some South African madrassahs with the aim to find out what these educational institutions do and whether or not the possibility for radicalisation and extremism exists. It concludes with an argument for democratic citizenship education to be taught in the madrassahs.