'I always knew I would go to university': a social realist account of student agency: part 1
- Authors: Ellery, Karen , Baxen, Jean
- Date: 2015
- Language: English
- Type: article , text
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/61207 , vital:27990
- Description: Academic development programmes at higher education institutions (HEIs) in South Africa are often underpinned by discourses that view students as deficit. Archer's social realist ontology offers a means of understanding reflexivities and agency of students in the higher education context. Using narrative data and drawing on Archer's (2003) theory of mediation between structure and agency through internal conversations, this study examined the socio-economic background of one particular student, Thando, and his agential journey to arrive at the academy. The analysis reveals Thando has a deliberate and determined stance towards achieving his project of obtaining a tertiary education in order to realise a better life for himself and his family. Despite what could be perceived as constraining socio-cultural conditions, Thando strategically circumvents such restrictions and acts in ways that help him pursue his project. It is argued that student agency needs to take a more central place within academic development programmes in higher education.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2015
- Authors: Ellery, Karen , Baxen, Jean
- Date: 2015
- Language: English
- Type: article , text
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/61207 , vital:27990
- Description: Academic development programmes at higher education institutions (HEIs) in South Africa are often underpinned by discourses that view students as deficit. Archer's social realist ontology offers a means of understanding reflexivities and agency of students in the higher education context. Using narrative data and drawing on Archer's (2003) theory of mediation between structure and agency through internal conversations, this study examined the socio-economic background of one particular student, Thando, and his agential journey to arrive at the academy. The analysis reveals Thando has a deliberate and determined stance towards achieving his project of obtaining a tertiary education in order to realise a better life for himself and his family. Despite what could be perceived as constraining socio-cultural conditions, Thando strategically circumvents such restrictions and acts in ways that help him pursue his project. It is argued that student agency needs to take a more central place within academic development programmes in higher education.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2015
A question of inclusivity: how did average incomes change over the first fifteen years of democracy?
- Authors: Visagie, Justin
- Date: 2015
- Subjects: Income -- South Africa Economic development -- South Africa Income distribution -- South Africa South Africa -- Economic conditions
- Language: English
- Type: Book , Text
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/3071 , vital:20366 , ISBN 9780868106052
- Description: This paper attempts to assess the extent of inclusivity in post-apartheid income growth by focusing on one intuitive part of the income distribution: the actual middle (or middle-income strata). If South African macro and social policy explicitly aims to be ‘inclusive’, it is important to know how the average [median] South African income level changed over the first fifteen years of democracy. Common summary measures of economic progress such as GDP per capita may mask the standard of living experienced by the majority of the population in any particular period. Tracking the progress in the middle strata of South Africa’s income distribution provides a fresh perspective on the nature of economic progress in the country. This is against a worrying backdrop of rising income inequality post-1994 (Van der Berg and Louw, 2004; Hoogeveen and Özler, 2006; Leibbrandt et al, 2010). The paper is structured as follows. Section 2 motivates for the importance of focussing on the actual middle of the income distribution and highlights the emphasis on reducing income inequality within South African macroeconomic and social policy. Issues of comparability in the data and the choice of definition for the middle are discussed in section 3. Section 4 presents descriptive statistics relating to changes in incomes, and ends with a brief analysis of non-income measures of progress. The final section summarises the main findings and concludes.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2015
A question of inclusivity: how did average incomes change over the first fifteen years of democracy?
- Authors: Visagie, Justin
- Date: 2015
- Subjects: Income -- South Africa Economic development -- South Africa Income distribution -- South Africa South Africa -- Economic conditions
- Language: English
- Type: Book , Text
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/3071 , vital:20366 , ISBN 9780868106052
- Description: This paper attempts to assess the extent of inclusivity in post-apartheid income growth by focusing on one intuitive part of the income distribution: the actual middle (or middle-income strata). If South African macro and social policy explicitly aims to be ‘inclusive’, it is important to know how the average [median] South African income level changed over the first fifteen years of democracy. Common summary measures of economic progress such as GDP per capita may mask the standard of living experienced by the majority of the population in any particular period. Tracking the progress in the middle strata of South Africa’s income distribution provides a fresh perspective on the nature of economic progress in the country. This is against a worrying backdrop of rising income inequality post-1994 (Van der Berg and Louw, 2004; Hoogeveen and Özler, 2006; Leibbrandt et al, 2010). The paper is structured as follows. Section 2 motivates for the importance of focussing on the actual middle of the income distribution and highlights the emphasis on reducing income inequality within South African macroeconomic and social policy. Issues of comparability in the data and the choice of definition for the middle are discussed in section 3. Section 4 presents descriptive statistics relating to changes in incomes, and ends with a brief analysis of non-income measures of progress. The final section summarises the main findings and concludes.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2015
Blind spots: trickery and the'opaque stickiness' of seeing
- Authors: Simbao, Ruth K
- Date: 2015
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/147303 , vital:38624 , https://0-hdl.handle.net.wam.seals.ac.za/10520/EJC176319
- Description: In a flash the spot will disappear, and in its place - and this is the interesting thing - there is nothing. According to experimental psychology, the eye does not fill in the blind spot, but tricks us into thinking that it has been filled. The blind spot is pure absence of vision, and cannot be experienced at all. The blind spot is an invisible absence : an absence whose invisibility is itself invisible (Elkins 1996 : 170).
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2015
- Authors: Simbao, Ruth K
- Date: 2015
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/147303 , vital:38624 , https://0-hdl.handle.net.wam.seals.ac.za/10520/EJC176319
- Description: In a flash the spot will disappear, and in its place - and this is the interesting thing - there is nothing. According to experimental psychology, the eye does not fill in the blind spot, but tricks us into thinking that it has been filled. The blind spot is pure absence of vision, and cannot be experienced at all. The blind spot is an invisible absence : an absence whose invisibility is itself invisible (Elkins 1996 : 170).
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2015
Planning for the future: mapping anticipated environmental and social impacts in a nascent tourism destination
- Aswani, Shankar, Diedrich, Amy, Currier, Kitty
- Authors: Aswani, Shankar , Diedrich, Amy , Currier, Kitty
- Date: 2015
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/145415 , vital:38436 , DOI: 10.1080/08941920.2015.1020582
- Description: Tourism is a significant driver of social and ecological change in developing countries, particularly in small-island states, which are susceptible to tourism impacts due to their particular social and environmental characteristics. In this article we present a participatory mapping approach to obtaining spatially explicit local perceptions of future environmental and social change resulting from tourism development, as well as addressing the different community conflicts that may arise through the introduction of tourism in the future in a Solomon Islands community. The results show that spatial conflicts within a community over territory and associated resources are likely to occur when designing natural resource management and tourism development plans. This knowledge can help us increase the future sustainability of tourism in nascent small-islands destinations, particularly in vulnerable regions such as Roviana, which have experienced very little tourism development and will likely experience more in the near future.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2015
- Authors: Aswani, Shankar , Diedrich, Amy , Currier, Kitty
- Date: 2015
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/145415 , vital:38436 , DOI: 10.1080/08941920.2015.1020582
- Description: Tourism is a significant driver of social and ecological change in developing countries, particularly in small-island states, which are susceptible to tourism impacts due to their particular social and environmental characteristics. In this article we present a participatory mapping approach to obtaining spatially explicit local perceptions of future environmental and social change resulting from tourism development, as well as addressing the different community conflicts that may arise through the introduction of tourism in the future in a Solomon Islands community. The results show that spatial conflicts within a community over territory and associated resources are likely to occur when designing natural resource management and tourism development plans. This knowledge can help us increase the future sustainability of tourism in nascent small-islands destinations, particularly in vulnerable regions such as Roviana, which have experienced very little tourism development and will likely experience more in the near future.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2015
Rewarding tax compliance: taxpayers’ attitudes and beliefs
- Bornman, Marina, Stack, Elizabeth M
- Authors: Bornman, Marina , Stack, Elizabeth M
- Date: 2015
- Subjects: To be catalogued
- Language: English
- Type: article , text
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/61039 , vital:27931
- Description: In a society the tax climate is determined by the interaction between taxpayers and tax authorities. In a ‘service and client’ climate, taxpayers do not expect authorities to automatically suspect them of being tax evaders. Evidence suggests that recognising good tax behaviour with strategies of rewards has a positive effect on voluntary tax compliance. Principles derived from the cognitive evaluation theory predict that when feelings of competence are affirmed and this is accompanied by a sense of autonomy it can enhance the intrinsic motivation for an action. The present research surveyed the attitudes and beliefs of taxpayers involved in small business on being rewarded for tax compliance. Results were corroborated with the principles of the cognitive evaluation theory and it was found that that the principles of the theory are applicable to rewarding tax compliance behaviour.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2015
- Authors: Bornman, Marina , Stack, Elizabeth M
- Date: 2015
- Subjects: To be catalogued
- Language: English
- Type: article , text
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/61039 , vital:27931
- Description: In a society the tax climate is determined by the interaction between taxpayers and tax authorities. In a ‘service and client’ climate, taxpayers do not expect authorities to automatically suspect them of being tax evaders. Evidence suggests that recognising good tax behaviour with strategies of rewards has a positive effect on voluntary tax compliance. Principles derived from the cognitive evaluation theory predict that when feelings of competence are affirmed and this is accompanied by a sense of autonomy it can enhance the intrinsic motivation for an action. The present research surveyed the attitudes and beliefs of taxpayers involved in small business on being rewarded for tax compliance. Results were corroborated with the principles of the cognitive evaluation theory and it was found that that the principles of the theory are applicable to rewarding tax compliance behaviour.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2015
Visible light transformation of Rhodamine 6G using tetracarbazole zinc phthalocyanine when embedded in electrospun fibers and in the presence of ZnO and Ag particles
- Khoza, Phindile, Nyokong, Tebello
- Authors: Khoza, Phindile , Nyokong, Tebello
- Date: 2015
- Language: English
- Type: Article
- Identifier: vital:7246 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1020251
- Description: Herein, we report the photocatalytic transformation of Rhodamine 6G (Rh 6G) using tetracarbazole zinc phthalocyanine (TCbZnPc) when alone or when conjugated with ZnO macroparticles (ZnOMPs) and silver nanoparticles (AgNPs), represented as TCbZnPc–ZnOMPs and TCbZnPc–AgNPs, respectively. The photocatalysts were supported onto electrospun polystyrene fibers. The efficiency of TCbZnPc was improved by the presence of both ZnOMPs and AgNPs. HPLC equipped with UV–vis was used to study phototransformation products. The mechanism of transformation was via the N-de-ethylation of Rh 6G. , Original publication is available at http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00958972.2015.1013944
- Full Text: false
- Date Issued: 2015
- Authors: Khoza, Phindile , Nyokong, Tebello
- Date: 2015
- Language: English
- Type: Article
- Identifier: vital:7246 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1020251
- Description: Herein, we report the photocatalytic transformation of Rhodamine 6G (Rh 6G) using tetracarbazole zinc phthalocyanine (TCbZnPc) when alone or when conjugated with ZnO macroparticles (ZnOMPs) and silver nanoparticles (AgNPs), represented as TCbZnPc–ZnOMPs and TCbZnPc–AgNPs, respectively. The photocatalysts were supported onto electrospun polystyrene fibers. The efficiency of TCbZnPc was improved by the presence of both ZnOMPs and AgNPs. HPLC equipped with UV–vis was used to study phototransformation products. The mechanism of transformation was via the N-de-ethylation of Rh 6G. , Original publication is available at http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00958972.2015.1013944
- Full Text: false
- Date Issued: 2015
Water, water everywhere: is Integrated Water Resource Management the right institutional prescription for South Africa's water management challenges?
- Madigele, Patricia K, Snowball, Jeanette D, Fraser, Gavin C G
- Authors: Madigele, Patricia K , Snowball, Jeanette D , Fraser, Gavin C G
- Date: 2015
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/68555 , vital:29282 , http://2015.essa.org.za/fullpaper/essa_2849.pdf
- Description: Publisher version , Ostrom (2007) and Ostrom and Cox (2010) argue that natural resource management has been plagued by the “panacea problem": that one-size-fits-all solutions to allocation and management problems have been applied without due consideration of the specific context. The outcome has been the disappointing results of many development and management programs. Integrated Water Resource Management (IWRM) has been recognised as a potentially effective way of allocating water where there are multiple, sometimes competing, users (Saravanan et al. 2009). It has been used successfully in a number of other developing country contexts, including Mexico, Brazil, India and Thailand (Orne-Giliemann 2008; Meinzen-Dick 2007). The principles of IWRM were also adopted in South Africa under the National Water Act (1998). Water User Associations (WUA) are seen as one of the key institutions driving IWRM, since they are designed to allow stake-holders at local level a say in the allocation and management of this important public good (Aoki 2001). However, WUAs in South Africa have mostly not been a success and are currently being reviewed at national level. For the most part, emerging black farmers and rural communities still do not have equal access to water, or a meaningful role in decision-making, and there are significant security of supply and allocation issues with regard to municipal users as well. Using the AID (Institutional Analysis and Development) framework (Ostrom 2007), with particular reference to economic theory relating to incentives and transactions costs, this paper asks if IWRM is a panacea treatment that does not fit the diagnosis of South Africa's water management problems. A case study approach is used, focusing on one of the few established WUAs in the Sundays River Valley Municipality in a rural area of South Africa.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2015
- Authors: Madigele, Patricia K , Snowball, Jeanette D , Fraser, Gavin C G
- Date: 2015
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/68555 , vital:29282 , http://2015.essa.org.za/fullpaper/essa_2849.pdf
- Description: Publisher version , Ostrom (2007) and Ostrom and Cox (2010) argue that natural resource management has been plagued by the “panacea problem": that one-size-fits-all solutions to allocation and management problems have been applied without due consideration of the specific context. The outcome has been the disappointing results of many development and management programs. Integrated Water Resource Management (IWRM) has been recognised as a potentially effective way of allocating water where there are multiple, sometimes competing, users (Saravanan et al. 2009). It has been used successfully in a number of other developing country contexts, including Mexico, Brazil, India and Thailand (Orne-Giliemann 2008; Meinzen-Dick 2007). The principles of IWRM were also adopted in South Africa under the National Water Act (1998). Water User Associations (WUA) are seen as one of the key institutions driving IWRM, since they are designed to allow stake-holders at local level a say in the allocation and management of this important public good (Aoki 2001). However, WUAs in South Africa have mostly not been a success and are currently being reviewed at national level. For the most part, emerging black farmers and rural communities still do not have equal access to water, or a meaningful role in decision-making, and there are significant security of supply and allocation issues with regard to municipal users as well. Using the AID (Institutional Analysis and Development) framework (Ostrom 2007), with particular reference to economic theory relating to incentives and transactions costs, this paper asks if IWRM is a panacea treatment that does not fit the diagnosis of South Africa's water management problems. A case study approach is used, focusing on one of the few established WUAs in the Sundays River Valley Municipality in a rural area of South Africa.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2015
What about the queers?: the institutional culture of heteronormativity and its implications for queer staff and students
- Authors: Donaldson, Natalie
- Date: 2015
- Language: English
- Type: text , book
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/142051 , vital:38045 , ISBN 9781869142902 , https://books.google.co.za/books?id=49o8rgEACAAJanddq=Being+at+home:+Race,+institutional+culture+and+transformation+at+South+African+higher+education+institutionandhl=enandsa=Xandved=0ahUKEwiPgsa6mpjjAhXNN8AKHbNwAtoQ6AEIKDAA
- Description: This edited work has gathered together contributions on how to transform universities in South Africa; as many are struggling to shift their institutional culture. In a South African context, transformation means to attempt to change higher education institutions such that they no longer reflect the values promoted by apartheid but rather reflect the values embodied in South Africa's 1996 Constitution. Institutional culture is the main subject for discussion in this book. In order to transform South Africa's universities, the contributors begin by analyzing the idea of what a university is, and relatedly, what its ideal aims are. A second theme is to understand what institutional culture is and how it functions. Moreover, transformation cannot occur without transforming the broader cultures of which they are a part. Related to this theme is a general concern about how contemporary moves towards the instrumentalization of higher education affect the ability to transform institutions. These institutions are being pushed to conform to goals that are outside the traditional idea of a university, such as concerns that universities are being 'bureaucratized' and becoming corporations, instead of a place of learning open to all. In conclusion it can be said that the contemporary South African academic community has an opportunity to recreate itself as the end of apartheid created space for engaging in transformative epistemic projects. The transformation of the tertiary sector entails a transformation of institutional cultures.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2015
- Authors: Donaldson, Natalie
- Date: 2015
- Language: English
- Type: text , book
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/142051 , vital:38045 , ISBN 9781869142902 , https://books.google.co.za/books?id=49o8rgEACAAJanddq=Being+at+home:+Race,+institutional+culture+and+transformation+at+South+African+higher+education+institutionandhl=enandsa=Xandved=0ahUKEwiPgsa6mpjjAhXNN8AKHbNwAtoQ6AEIKDAA
- Description: This edited work has gathered together contributions on how to transform universities in South Africa; as many are struggling to shift their institutional culture. In a South African context, transformation means to attempt to change higher education institutions such that they no longer reflect the values promoted by apartheid but rather reflect the values embodied in South Africa's 1996 Constitution. Institutional culture is the main subject for discussion in this book. In order to transform South Africa's universities, the contributors begin by analyzing the idea of what a university is, and relatedly, what its ideal aims are. A second theme is to understand what institutional culture is and how it functions. Moreover, transformation cannot occur without transforming the broader cultures of which they are a part. Related to this theme is a general concern about how contemporary moves towards the instrumentalization of higher education affect the ability to transform institutions. These institutions are being pushed to conform to goals that are outside the traditional idea of a university, such as concerns that universities are being 'bureaucratized' and becoming corporations, instead of a place of learning open to all. In conclusion it can be said that the contemporary South African academic community has an opportunity to recreate itself as the end of apartheid created space for engaging in transformative epistemic projects. The transformation of the tertiary sector entails a transformation of institutional cultures.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2015
Colonial tales, alter-narratives and the enduring value of anthropology
- Authors: Boswell, Rose
- Subjects: Anthrology , Oral tradition , f-sa
- Language: English
- Type: text , Lectures
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10948/20989 , vital:29425
- Description: Stories and story-telling are fundamental to human beings. What stories do we choose to tell, hear and relate? From childhood through to adulthood, stories and story-telling provide social content, example, advice, therapy, continuity, connection and entertainment. Story-telling is also a space for hidden resistance, embodiment and the invocation of rank. Accompanied by song and dance, those intangible heritages which must remain dynamic to endure, stories facilitate an aural and oral community that engenders its own understanding of time, place and identity. In anthropology, the study of humanity in all its complexities, there is the collection, collation and retelling of stories for audiences who would otherwise not understand or seek to essentialise those deemed ‗other‘. In this inaugural lecture I focus on the value of stories gathered from anthropological field research in the southwest Indian Ocean Islands. The stories (often constitutive of a multiply-situated self), shed light on the finer details of gendered, ethnic and raced existence in the island communities. They also offer deep insight into the nature and possible ‗evolutions‘ of contemporary societies. Finally, I suggest that alter-narratives, those stories rarely told, provide access not only to multiple worlds, they are part of an aural epistemology which might lead to alternative ways of connecting with others and thereby conceptualising and articulating identity in our contemporary global society.
- Full Text:
- Authors: Boswell, Rose
- Subjects: Anthrology , Oral tradition , f-sa
- Language: English
- Type: text , Lectures
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10948/20989 , vital:29425
- Description: Stories and story-telling are fundamental to human beings. What stories do we choose to tell, hear and relate? From childhood through to adulthood, stories and story-telling provide social content, example, advice, therapy, continuity, connection and entertainment. Story-telling is also a space for hidden resistance, embodiment and the invocation of rank. Accompanied by song and dance, those intangible heritages which must remain dynamic to endure, stories facilitate an aural and oral community that engenders its own understanding of time, place and identity. In anthropology, the study of humanity in all its complexities, there is the collection, collation and retelling of stories for audiences who would otherwise not understand or seek to essentialise those deemed ‗other‘. In this inaugural lecture I focus on the value of stories gathered from anthropological field research in the southwest Indian Ocean Islands. The stories (often constitutive of a multiply-situated self), shed light on the finer details of gendered, ethnic and raced existence in the island communities. They also offer deep insight into the nature and possible ‗evolutions‘ of contemporary societies. Finally, I suggest that alter-narratives, those stories rarely told, provide access not only to multiple worlds, they are part of an aural epistemology which might lead to alternative ways of connecting with others and thereby conceptualising and articulating identity in our contemporary global society.
- Full Text:
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