Southern African Review of Education with Education with Production, 2015
This article is an overview and critical interrogation of the main arguments of a key text on Mus... more This article is an overview and critical interrogation of the main arguments of a key text on Muslim education that was recently published by Ebrahim Moosa, renowned reformist Islamic scholar. I start by providing an overview of his text, What is a Madrasa? This is followed by a consideration of two issues that I have identified as germane to the author's intellectual task. First, I develop the view that the text represents a harbinger for very difficult but necessary intercultural conversation between the epistemological traditions of the West and non-West. The book opens space for speaking across the vast epistemic chasm that exists, especially in the West, about the knowledge traditions of the non-West, in this case the knowledge and performative transfer modalities of a key Muslim educational institution. The second is a consideration of the texts, knowledge and functional arrangement of this type of institution. I argue that Moosa makes a persuasive case for suggesting that madrasa knowledge is performed on the body of its students, which in effect suggests a thoroughly ontologised account of its knowledge traditions and transfer modalities. I conclude with the suggestion that Moosa's attempt at establishing the intellectual terms for an intercultural dialogue as well as a reformist approach to internal madrasa reorganisation represents an aporia, a madness which yet has to be pursued if madrasas are able to be harnessed for complex modern living.
Road, where the charismatic Imam Ebrahim 'Sep' Davids (1936-1998) officiated. Imam Sep, as he was... more Road, where the charismatic Imam Ebrahim 'Sep' Davids (1936-1998) officiated. Imam Sep, as he was fondly known, was erudite and outspoken. He delivered his sermons in English, which I found attractive and beguiling despite my limited ability in the language. Like the majority of kids from the Cape Flats, my mother tongue is Kaaps Afrikaans. Imam Sep followed in the footsteps of Imam Abdullah Haron as the Imam of the Al-Jaamia Mosque. It was in this context that I was introduced to the figure of Imam Haron, the renowned revolutionary Muslim leader who was martyred by the apartheid regime While my first association with the mosque was through exposure to Imam Hassan Solomon's sermons in the 1984/5 period, it was, however, under the leadership of Imam Rashied Omar, who became the Imam of the mosque in 1986, that the mosque became the key venue in South Africa for practising and conceptually elaborating progressive Islamic commitments in the context of the struggle against apartheid and as an exemplary and courageous vehicle for a socially just expression of Islam. The mosque established institutional infrastructure and an accompanying Islamic progressive language under Imam Rashied's leadership. This was informed by pluralistic and human rights commitments in the unfolding democratic terrain, and a robust social justice platform from where the mosque exercises its Islamic commitments to the poor, needy and socially marginalised communities of Regarding the emerging socio-cultural landscape after the first elections in 1994, the book turns its attention very early to at least two dimensions that emerged quickly and dramatically on the democratic landscape: the first is the complex socioeconomic 1 CMRM khuṭbah, published in Al-Qalam, December 2000.
South Africa's starkly segregated spatial geographies-impoverished and prosperous settlements onl... more South Africa's starkly segregated spatial geographies-impoverished and prosperous settlements only short distances apart-correlate with gross disparities in education provisions, thus displaying what Kozol (1991) famously referred to as 'savage inequalities'. In his research across city districts of the 'advanced capitalist' United States of the 1980s, Kozol studied how intersecting class-race structures of unequal power reflect in sharply distinct demographics, linked to school resource disparities, across neighbourhoods in close proximity. From statistical and ethnographic data, Kozol provided relational analysis of how schools in well-off and 'white' areas held gross educational advantages over schools in zones populated by poor and mainly African-American or Latino groups. Kozol's primary focus was on resource inequalities across schools, highlighting what Fraser (2009) calls the redistributive element of social justice: that justice requires redistributing crucial resources-which powermarginalised groups lack systemically (i.e. through no 'deficit' of their own)-to support educational access, engagement and success. Some thirty years later, in the 'post-colonial' South African context of areas around Cape Town and Stellenbosch, The Educational Practices and Pathways of South African Students across Power-Marginalised Spaces (TEPP) likewise highlights savage inequalities. In addition to redistribution, educational focus is given to the remaining two of Fraser's '3R' principles for pursuing robust social justice: recognition, by inclusion in the curriculum, of students' cultural-historic heritages and codes; and participatory representation, from all groups whose lives are subjected to educational institutions, in decisions that determine what knowledge-abilities are taught-and-learned. Emergent questions include: How do educational settings mis-recognise the learning capacities of students from power-marginalised spaces as embodying 'deficits in 'natural ability' or 'cultural functionality'? How might education instead recognise value, and make curricular and pedagogic use of the social-cultural assets in these students' lifeworlds? Can educational practices thus change, rather than reproduce, what Appadurai (2004) calls 'the terms of recognition'? (We note that both Appadurai's and Fraser's The Educational Practices and Pathways of South African Students 2 conceptual framings are taken up in various chapters of TEPP, as tools for analyses of ethnographic findings.) TEPP authors approach these questions through ethnographic studies, paying qualitative attention to connections across lifeworld and educational settings, thereby illuminating how social and educational spaces interact in subjective and cultural processes by which power-marginalised young people form learning dispositions, along with senses of how educational institutions may or may not serve their and their communities' needs and aspirations. In so doing, authors elucidate social-educational features of a 'post-colonised' and 'post-apartheid' South Africa that need to be distinguished from (so-called) 'first-world' nations. It is important to take into consideration that inequalities are far more savage in South Africa. In this 'wealthiest African nation', at best 20%-mainly Anglo and Afrikaner (but not all)-still live in conditions of economic prosperity. Despite having a 'majority' government since 1994, most of SA's roughly 75% 'Black' and 9% 'Coloured' communities (by 2011 census categories) live in extreme poverty. Such structural steepness in South Africa's 'race'/class-entwined dynamics of inequality far exceeds that of Australia or the USA (with less 'trickle-down' in South Africa than what reaches 'internally colonised' groups in first-world nations). Close attention thus needs to be paid to specificities of South African inequalities-and how educational institutions and policy 'reform' efforts are implicated-within cross-national conversations on how best to understand and redress social-educational injustices on a local and, relationally, global level. This is a critical time for South Africa, as a 'post-colonised' nation where justice is long overdue to, and demanded by, the diverse majority of power-marginalised groups, while 'majority' government appears inadequate to the task of addressing their needs and aspirations. 2016's university student protests, demanding that fees must fall and curriculum must be decolonised, are not mere moments of catharsis, we suggest, but signify deep disturbances with the educational status quo that has not made good on promises, for most, of pathways out of impoverished and racialised segregations that persist well into the 'post-apartheid' era. More ructions are likely, not just in universities but in other education sectors, so long as South Africa's savage inequalities fester unabated. It is an important juncture, then, for rethinking how education research can contribute to ongoing struggles for robust justice, with close qualitative attention to furthering the prospects of power-marginalised groups, not just in 'mainstream' educational sites but also spaces of experiment with vocational and alternative education. Indeed, several TEPP authors do undertake combinations of ethnographic and proactive research in such sites, on which they report in their respective chapters.
Several teachers have recently started introducing coding into their teaching in primary schools.... more Several teachers have recently started introducing coding into their teaching in primary schools. This comes on the back of the emerging prominence of educational technology and the teaching of computational skills at school level, in light of the country’s policy commitment to the Fourth Industrial Revolution. Coding has been punted as 1 of 2 essential subjects to be launched in schools countrywide from 2020; the other being robotics. In this article we focus on the implementation of coding as a subject in selected Foundation Phase classes in the Western Cape. We aim to gain an understanding of coding as a subject from the perspective of teachers who are implementing this very new subject in the Foundation Phase. We specifically discuss the experiences and challenges of teachers who have been teaching the subject over the last few years, based on in-depth qualitative interviews with 4 Foundation Phase teachers. Overall, we provide a set of considerations for the optimal implementation of coding as a subject in Foundation Phase in South African schools. The participants’ experiences highlight the challenges associated with implementation, teachers’ pedagogical skills and competences, and resource requirements. We raise the following areas that need to be addressed for the successful implementation of coding: professional development addressing teaching methodologies on the development of computational thinking skills in young learners, providing support for teachers, addressing time constraints in the teaching of the subject, and providing resources.
This article is an attempt to bring the social complexity of education into a conversation with w... more This article is an attempt to bring the social complexity of education into a conversation with what is referred to as a humanising pedagogy. In the article, I work with a definition of humanising pedagogy based on a three-dimensional conception of social justice. Drawing on Nancy Fraser (2009), I suggest that such a pedagogy should involve 1) the question of knowledge redistribution, 2) recognition of the knowledges, literacies, and identities of students, and 3) an emphasis on participation that brings process pedagogical orientations back into view to counter the rigid pedagogical orientation that informs South Africa's curriculum approach. The article unpacks what it means to insert a conception of the social-subjective into educational theorising in South African education academic work. I argue that this dimension is largely absent in hegemonic educational academic orientations, the consequence of which is a thinned-out focus on curriculum and pedagogy, devoid of how the complex social-subjective frames the subject's access to education. Based on my ethnographic work in urban sites, the article offers a view of the social-subjective that is aimed at disrupting South African educational theorising and provides a "pedagogical justice" view of education that may, conceptually, be able to account for the complex social-subjective in education-and thereby better enable the emergence of a humanising pedagogy in our educational discourses.
This article considers the nature and trajectory of the African National Congress's (ANC) educati... more This article considers the nature and trajectory of the African National Congress's (ANC) education policy discourses from its founding in 1912, until its repatriation from exile by 1992. The broad issue that this article considers is how to explain why the ANC was inadequately prepared to address the educational challenges of a democratic South Africa. The article considers the relationship between its political struggles against segregation and apartheid and the particular educational focus that it favoured during this period. From its inception, the ANC was actively involved in the political arena, with the purpose of opposing racist rule. The article suggests that its involvement in the education arena was subordinate to its political focus, with consequences for the type of educational change and curriculum orientation that it favoured. Employing a historical-sociological perspective, we divide ANC involvement in politics and education into two broad and distinct periods. The first period from 1912 to 1960 examines ANC involvement within South Africa. The second period from 1960 to 1992 examines the ANC in exile. We end the article with some discussion of the ANC's education reform trajectory from 1992 to 1995, in other words, its educational orientations during the context of political negotiations, and the first years of a democratic South Africa. It will be argued that during both periods, the ANC focused on struggle politics that relegated education to a position ancillary to its political struggle, which resulted in discursive continuities in its educational orientations. Despite some contestation, these continuities were characterised by their remarkably consistent support for a traditional liberal education across the existence of the organisation.
This article explores the place-making and identifications practices of two high school girls in ... more This article explores the place-making and identifications practices of two high school girls in the out-of-classroom spaces of their school. We employ Henri Lefebvre's spatial triad, consisting of the interaction between the physical, social and mental dimensions of space, as the conceptual foundation for understanding how these girls turn space into place at their school. The article is based on an ethnographic study in which we utilised a range of methods, including unstructured, semi-structured and photo-elicitation interviews; participant observation; focus group discussions; student-produced photography and photo-diaries. We found that the ways in which the girls inhabited and 'made place' in the school's out-of-classroom spaces are determined by their unique biographies, interactions with the school's expressive culture, and the subsequent social networks, movements and practices that they mobilise in these out-of-classroom spaces. Via these daily practices, they turn their school spaces into a place which, in their unique ways, they are able to call home.
Misrecognition of South African university students is at the heart of this article. Misrecogniti... more Misrecognition of South African university students is at the heart of this article. Misrecognition refers in this article to the exclusionary institutional discourses and practices of this country's universities, which continue to prevent the majority of their (Black) students' from achieving a successful education. It is a conceptual account of the ways in which these misrecognized students develop a complex educational life in their quest for a university education. The article argues that at the heart of students' university experiences is an essential misrecognition of who they are, and how they access and encounter their university studies. I suggest that gaining greater purchase on their (mis)recognition struggles may place the university in a position to establish an engaging recognition platform to facilitate their educational success. Divided into four sections, the article starts with a rationale for bringing the institutional misrecognition of students into view. This is followed by a theoretical consideration of the notion of recognition, which opens space for what I call the recognitive agency of the education subject, who remains largely unknown to the university. The third section provides an account of the nature and extent of Black students' survivalist educational navigations and practices in their family, community, school, and university contexts. The final and concluding section of the article presents a normative argument for developing an education platform for facilitating a productive encounter aimed at animating students' educational becoming. This, I argue, should proceed on the basis of a decolonizing knowledge approach, involving curriculum recognition, which would accord students the conceptual tools for developing the epistemic virtues necessary for complex decolonized living.
CITATION: Fillies, H. & Fataar, A. 2017. Die leerpraktykvorming van plattelandse werkersklasl... more CITATION: Fillies, H. & Fataar, A. 2017. Die leerpraktykvorming van plattelandse werkersklasleerders gegrond op hulle fondse van kennis. LitNet Akademies, 14(1):186-212.
Hierdie artikel fokus op die inwerking van 'n plattelandse-dorp-konteks op skoolhoofde se lei... more Hierdie artikel fokus op die inwerking van 'n plattelandse-dorp-konteks op skoolhoofde se leierskappraktyke. Skole in Suid-Afrika verskil drasties van mekaar ten opsigte van konteks, en skoolhoofde se leierskappraktyke is konteksverbonde praktyke. Die fokus is op aspekte van skoolhoofde se identiteitsvorming in 'n spesifieke landelike-dorp-konteks. Die navorsingmateriaal vir die artikel is afkomstig uit 'n omvattende navorsingsprojek oor die skoolhoofde van plattelandse skole op 'n dorp met die skuilnaam Cogmans in die Wes-Kaap. Gefokusde semigestruktureerde een-tot-een onderhoude is gebruik om inligting te versamel deur na skoolhoofde se eie stories oor hul eie leefwereld te luister ten einde dit moontlik te maak om die storie van elkeen se sosiale leefwereld te kan konstrueer. Op hierdie wyse is professionele verhale oor skoolhoof wees op 'n plattelandse dorp verbind aan die kritiese ontleding van die skoolhoofde se vorme van kapitaal, in besonder simboliese kapitaal. Die artikel is geskoei op die toepassing van die teorie van Pierre Bourdieu. Bourdieu se konsepte van veld, kapitaal, praktyke en habitus word aangewend as teoretiese lense om die ontledende fokus van hierdie artikel uit te lig, naamlik hoe die skoolhoofde van die skole op 'n plattelandse dorp se plattelandse konteks en elke skoolhoof se eie habitus hulle op 'n bepaalde wyse posisioneer wat meewerk in die manifestering van 'n verhewe mate van simboliese kapitaal van die skoolhoofde. Ons wil aanvoer dat "landelikheid" sentraal is in die aard van hulle habitusvorming, meer spesifiek die wyse waarop hulle sosiale kapitaal gegenereer word in wat ons beskryf as die verhewe simboliese kapitaal van hierdie skoolhoofde in hierdie spesifieke plattelandse-dorp-konteks. The elevated symbolic capital of school principals in a rural town This article presents a discussion of the impact of a rural town on the leadership practices of school principals. The town is located in South Africa's Western Cape Province about 200 kilometres from Cape Town. Our point of departure is that schools in South Africa differ dramatically from one another depending on the nature of their class, gender, race and geographic dimensions. In the case of this article we suggest that the rural location of the schools under discussion is a primary articulator of the identities of schools and the nature of leadership practices established in them by their principals. The focus of the article is on the complex ways in which principals in this rural town go about establishing their leadership practices in their respective schools. The article provides insight into school principals' practices at the intersection of their respective schools' everyday functioning on the one hand and their rural social context on the other. This is a much neglected area in the school leadership literature.
Southern African Review of Education with Education with Production, 2015
This article is an overview and critical interrogation of the main arguments of a key text on Mus... more This article is an overview and critical interrogation of the main arguments of a key text on Muslim education that was recently published by Ebrahim Moosa, renowned reformist Islamic scholar. I start by providing an overview of his text, What is a Madrasa? This is followed by a consideration of two issues that I have identified as germane to the author's intellectual task. First, I develop the view that the text represents a harbinger for very difficult but necessary intercultural conversation between the epistemological traditions of the West and non-West. The book opens space for speaking across the vast epistemic chasm that exists, especially in the West, about the knowledge traditions of the non-West, in this case the knowledge and performative transfer modalities of a key Muslim educational institution. The second is a consideration of the texts, knowledge and functional arrangement of this type of institution. I argue that Moosa makes a persuasive case for suggesting that madrasa knowledge is performed on the body of its students, which in effect suggests a thoroughly ontologised account of its knowledge traditions and transfer modalities. I conclude with the suggestion that Moosa's attempt at establishing the intellectual terms for an intercultural dialogue as well as a reformist approach to internal madrasa reorganisation represents an aporia, a madness which yet has to be pursued if madrasas are able to be harnessed for complex modern living.
Road, where the charismatic Imam Ebrahim 'Sep' Davids (1936-1998) officiated. Imam Sep, as he was... more Road, where the charismatic Imam Ebrahim 'Sep' Davids (1936-1998) officiated. Imam Sep, as he was fondly known, was erudite and outspoken. He delivered his sermons in English, which I found attractive and beguiling despite my limited ability in the language. Like the majority of kids from the Cape Flats, my mother tongue is Kaaps Afrikaans. Imam Sep followed in the footsteps of Imam Abdullah Haron as the Imam of the Al-Jaamia Mosque. It was in this context that I was introduced to the figure of Imam Haron, the renowned revolutionary Muslim leader who was martyred by the apartheid regime While my first association with the mosque was through exposure to Imam Hassan Solomon's sermons in the 1984/5 period, it was, however, under the leadership of Imam Rashied Omar, who became the Imam of the mosque in 1986, that the mosque became the key venue in South Africa for practising and conceptually elaborating progressive Islamic commitments in the context of the struggle against apartheid and as an exemplary and courageous vehicle for a socially just expression of Islam. The mosque established institutional infrastructure and an accompanying Islamic progressive language under Imam Rashied's leadership. This was informed by pluralistic and human rights commitments in the unfolding democratic terrain, and a robust social justice platform from where the mosque exercises its Islamic commitments to the poor, needy and socially marginalised communities of Regarding the emerging socio-cultural landscape after the first elections in 1994, the book turns its attention very early to at least two dimensions that emerged quickly and dramatically on the democratic landscape: the first is the complex socioeconomic 1 CMRM khuṭbah, published in Al-Qalam, December 2000.
South Africa's starkly segregated spatial geographies-impoverished and prosperous settlements onl... more South Africa's starkly segregated spatial geographies-impoverished and prosperous settlements only short distances apart-correlate with gross disparities in education provisions, thus displaying what Kozol (1991) famously referred to as 'savage inequalities'. In his research across city districts of the 'advanced capitalist' United States of the 1980s, Kozol studied how intersecting class-race structures of unequal power reflect in sharply distinct demographics, linked to school resource disparities, across neighbourhoods in close proximity. From statistical and ethnographic data, Kozol provided relational analysis of how schools in well-off and 'white' areas held gross educational advantages over schools in zones populated by poor and mainly African-American or Latino groups. Kozol's primary focus was on resource inequalities across schools, highlighting what Fraser (2009) calls the redistributive element of social justice: that justice requires redistributing crucial resources-which powermarginalised groups lack systemically (i.e. through no 'deficit' of their own)-to support educational access, engagement and success. Some thirty years later, in the 'post-colonial' South African context of areas around Cape Town and Stellenbosch, The Educational Practices and Pathways of South African Students across Power-Marginalised Spaces (TEPP) likewise highlights savage inequalities. In addition to redistribution, educational focus is given to the remaining two of Fraser's '3R' principles for pursuing robust social justice: recognition, by inclusion in the curriculum, of students' cultural-historic heritages and codes; and participatory representation, from all groups whose lives are subjected to educational institutions, in decisions that determine what knowledge-abilities are taught-and-learned. Emergent questions include: How do educational settings mis-recognise the learning capacities of students from power-marginalised spaces as embodying 'deficits in 'natural ability' or 'cultural functionality'? How might education instead recognise value, and make curricular and pedagogic use of the social-cultural assets in these students' lifeworlds? Can educational practices thus change, rather than reproduce, what Appadurai (2004) calls 'the terms of recognition'? (We note that both Appadurai's and Fraser's The Educational Practices and Pathways of South African Students 2 conceptual framings are taken up in various chapters of TEPP, as tools for analyses of ethnographic findings.) TEPP authors approach these questions through ethnographic studies, paying qualitative attention to connections across lifeworld and educational settings, thereby illuminating how social and educational spaces interact in subjective and cultural processes by which power-marginalised young people form learning dispositions, along with senses of how educational institutions may or may not serve their and their communities' needs and aspirations. In so doing, authors elucidate social-educational features of a 'post-colonised' and 'post-apartheid' South Africa that need to be distinguished from (so-called) 'first-world' nations. It is important to take into consideration that inequalities are far more savage in South Africa. In this 'wealthiest African nation', at best 20%-mainly Anglo and Afrikaner (but not all)-still live in conditions of economic prosperity. Despite having a 'majority' government since 1994, most of SA's roughly 75% 'Black' and 9% 'Coloured' communities (by 2011 census categories) live in extreme poverty. Such structural steepness in South Africa's 'race'/class-entwined dynamics of inequality far exceeds that of Australia or the USA (with less 'trickle-down' in South Africa than what reaches 'internally colonised' groups in first-world nations). Close attention thus needs to be paid to specificities of South African inequalities-and how educational institutions and policy 'reform' efforts are implicated-within cross-national conversations on how best to understand and redress social-educational injustices on a local and, relationally, global level. This is a critical time for South Africa, as a 'post-colonised' nation where justice is long overdue to, and demanded by, the diverse majority of power-marginalised groups, while 'majority' government appears inadequate to the task of addressing their needs and aspirations. 2016's university student protests, demanding that fees must fall and curriculum must be decolonised, are not mere moments of catharsis, we suggest, but signify deep disturbances with the educational status quo that has not made good on promises, for most, of pathways out of impoverished and racialised segregations that persist well into the 'post-apartheid' era. More ructions are likely, not just in universities but in other education sectors, so long as South Africa's savage inequalities fester unabated. It is an important juncture, then, for rethinking how education research can contribute to ongoing struggles for robust justice, with close qualitative attention to furthering the prospects of power-marginalised groups, not just in 'mainstream' educational sites but also spaces of experiment with vocational and alternative education. Indeed, several TEPP authors do undertake combinations of ethnographic and proactive research in such sites, on which they report in their respective chapters.
Several teachers have recently started introducing coding into their teaching in primary schools.... more Several teachers have recently started introducing coding into their teaching in primary schools. This comes on the back of the emerging prominence of educational technology and the teaching of computational skills at school level, in light of the country’s policy commitment to the Fourth Industrial Revolution. Coding has been punted as 1 of 2 essential subjects to be launched in schools countrywide from 2020; the other being robotics. In this article we focus on the implementation of coding as a subject in selected Foundation Phase classes in the Western Cape. We aim to gain an understanding of coding as a subject from the perspective of teachers who are implementing this very new subject in the Foundation Phase. We specifically discuss the experiences and challenges of teachers who have been teaching the subject over the last few years, based on in-depth qualitative interviews with 4 Foundation Phase teachers. Overall, we provide a set of considerations for the optimal implementation of coding as a subject in Foundation Phase in South African schools. The participants’ experiences highlight the challenges associated with implementation, teachers’ pedagogical skills and competences, and resource requirements. We raise the following areas that need to be addressed for the successful implementation of coding: professional development addressing teaching methodologies on the development of computational thinking skills in young learners, providing support for teachers, addressing time constraints in the teaching of the subject, and providing resources.
This article is an attempt to bring the social complexity of education into a conversation with w... more This article is an attempt to bring the social complexity of education into a conversation with what is referred to as a humanising pedagogy. In the article, I work with a definition of humanising pedagogy based on a three-dimensional conception of social justice. Drawing on Nancy Fraser (2009), I suggest that such a pedagogy should involve 1) the question of knowledge redistribution, 2) recognition of the knowledges, literacies, and identities of students, and 3) an emphasis on participation that brings process pedagogical orientations back into view to counter the rigid pedagogical orientation that informs South Africa's curriculum approach. The article unpacks what it means to insert a conception of the social-subjective into educational theorising in South African education academic work. I argue that this dimension is largely absent in hegemonic educational academic orientations, the consequence of which is a thinned-out focus on curriculum and pedagogy, devoid of how the complex social-subjective frames the subject's access to education. Based on my ethnographic work in urban sites, the article offers a view of the social-subjective that is aimed at disrupting South African educational theorising and provides a "pedagogical justice" view of education that may, conceptually, be able to account for the complex social-subjective in education-and thereby better enable the emergence of a humanising pedagogy in our educational discourses.
This article considers the nature and trajectory of the African National Congress's (ANC) educati... more This article considers the nature and trajectory of the African National Congress's (ANC) education policy discourses from its founding in 1912, until its repatriation from exile by 1992. The broad issue that this article considers is how to explain why the ANC was inadequately prepared to address the educational challenges of a democratic South Africa. The article considers the relationship between its political struggles against segregation and apartheid and the particular educational focus that it favoured during this period. From its inception, the ANC was actively involved in the political arena, with the purpose of opposing racist rule. The article suggests that its involvement in the education arena was subordinate to its political focus, with consequences for the type of educational change and curriculum orientation that it favoured. Employing a historical-sociological perspective, we divide ANC involvement in politics and education into two broad and distinct periods. The first period from 1912 to 1960 examines ANC involvement within South Africa. The second period from 1960 to 1992 examines the ANC in exile. We end the article with some discussion of the ANC's education reform trajectory from 1992 to 1995, in other words, its educational orientations during the context of political negotiations, and the first years of a democratic South Africa. It will be argued that during both periods, the ANC focused on struggle politics that relegated education to a position ancillary to its political struggle, which resulted in discursive continuities in its educational orientations. Despite some contestation, these continuities were characterised by their remarkably consistent support for a traditional liberal education across the existence of the organisation.
This article explores the place-making and identifications practices of two high school girls in ... more This article explores the place-making and identifications practices of two high school girls in the out-of-classroom spaces of their school. We employ Henri Lefebvre's spatial triad, consisting of the interaction between the physical, social and mental dimensions of space, as the conceptual foundation for understanding how these girls turn space into place at their school. The article is based on an ethnographic study in which we utilised a range of methods, including unstructured, semi-structured and photo-elicitation interviews; participant observation; focus group discussions; student-produced photography and photo-diaries. We found that the ways in which the girls inhabited and 'made place' in the school's out-of-classroom spaces are determined by their unique biographies, interactions with the school's expressive culture, and the subsequent social networks, movements and practices that they mobilise in these out-of-classroom spaces. Via these daily practices, they turn their school spaces into a place which, in their unique ways, they are able to call home.
Misrecognition of South African university students is at the heart of this article. Misrecogniti... more Misrecognition of South African university students is at the heart of this article. Misrecognition refers in this article to the exclusionary institutional discourses and practices of this country's universities, which continue to prevent the majority of their (Black) students' from achieving a successful education. It is a conceptual account of the ways in which these misrecognized students develop a complex educational life in their quest for a university education. The article argues that at the heart of students' university experiences is an essential misrecognition of who they are, and how they access and encounter their university studies. I suggest that gaining greater purchase on their (mis)recognition struggles may place the university in a position to establish an engaging recognition platform to facilitate their educational success. Divided into four sections, the article starts with a rationale for bringing the institutional misrecognition of students into view. This is followed by a theoretical consideration of the notion of recognition, which opens space for what I call the recognitive agency of the education subject, who remains largely unknown to the university. The third section provides an account of the nature and extent of Black students' survivalist educational navigations and practices in their family, community, school, and university contexts. The final and concluding section of the article presents a normative argument for developing an education platform for facilitating a productive encounter aimed at animating students' educational becoming. This, I argue, should proceed on the basis of a decolonizing knowledge approach, involving curriculum recognition, which would accord students the conceptual tools for developing the epistemic virtues necessary for complex decolonized living.
CITATION: Fillies, H. & Fataar, A. 2017. Die leerpraktykvorming van plattelandse werkersklasl... more CITATION: Fillies, H. & Fataar, A. 2017. Die leerpraktykvorming van plattelandse werkersklasleerders gegrond op hulle fondse van kennis. LitNet Akademies, 14(1):186-212.
Hierdie artikel fokus op die inwerking van 'n plattelandse-dorp-konteks op skoolhoofde se lei... more Hierdie artikel fokus op die inwerking van 'n plattelandse-dorp-konteks op skoolhoofde se leierskappraktyke. Skole in Suid-Afrika verskil drasties van mekaar ten opsigte van konteks, en skoolhoofde se leierskappraktyke is konteksverbonde praktyke. Die fokus is op aspekte van skoolhoofde se identiteitsvorming in 'n spesifieke landelike-dorp-konteks. Die navorsingmateriaal vir die artikel is afkomstig uit 'n omvattende navorsingsprojek oor die skoolhoofde van plattelandse skole op 'n dorp met die skuilnaam Cogmans in die Wes-Kaap. Gefokusde semigestruktureerde een-tot-een onderhoude is gebruik om inligting te versamel deur na skoolhoofde se eie stories oor hul eie leefwereld te luister ten einde dit moontlik te maak om die storie van elkeen se sosiale leefwereld te kan konstrueer. Op hierdie wyse is professionele verhale oor skoolhoof wees op 'n plattelandse dorp verbind aan die kritiese ontleding van die skoolhoofde se vorme van kapitaal, in besonder simboliese kapitaal. Die artikel is geskoei op die toepassing van die teorie van Pierre Bourdieu. Bourdieu se konsepte van veld, kapitaal, praktyke en habitus word aangewend as teoretiese lense om die ontledende fokus van hierdie artikel uit te lig, naamlik hoe die skoolhoofde van die skole op 'n plattelandse dorp se plattelandse konteks en elke skoolhoof se eie habitus hulle op 'n bepaalde wyse posisioneer wat meewerk in die manifestering van 'n verhewe mate van simboliese kapitaal van die skoolhoofde. Ons wil aanvoer dat "landelikheid" sentraal is in die aard van hulle habitusvorming, meer spesifiek die wyse waarop hulle sosiale kapitaal gegenereer word in wat ons beskryf as die verhewe simboliese kapitaal van hierdie skoolhoofde in hierdie spesifieke plattelandse-dorp-konteks. The elevated symbolic capital of school principals in a rural town This article presents a discussion of the impact of a rural town on the leadership practices of school principals. The town is located in South Africa's Western Cape Province about 200 kilometres from Cape Town. Our point of departure is that schools in South Africa differ dramatically from one another depending on the nature of their class, gender, race and geographic dimensions. In the case of this article we suggest that the rural location of the schools under discussion is a primary articulator of the identities of schools and the nature of leadership practices established in them by their principals. The focus of the article is on the complex ways in which principals in this rural town go about establishing their leadership practices in their respective schools. The article provides insight into school principals' practices at the intersection of their respective schools' everyday functioning on the one hand and their rural social context on the other. This is a much neglected area in the school leadership literature.
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