Managing natural resources in a rural settlement in Peddie district
- Authors: Ainslie, Andrew
- Date: 1998
- Subjects: Conservation of natural resources -- South Africa -- Management , Natural resources -- South Africa -- Peddie District -- Management , Peddie (South Africa) -- Social conditions , Peddie (South Africa) -- History
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: vital:2110 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1007462 , Conservation of natural resources -- South Africa -- Management , Natural resources -- South Africa -- Peddie District -- Management , Peddie (South Africa) -- Social conditions , Peddie (South Africa) -- History
- Description: This thesis is an account of the challenges people in Tyefu Location, Peddie District, and specifically in Gwabeni village, face in their attempts to manage their common pool natural resources. Taking my analytical cue from the literature which deals with the institutional dimensions of resource management in common property systems, I look at the impact of both outside influences and local dynamics on resource managing institutions at village level. I show how particular historical circumstances, including state interventions, led to the enclosure of Tyefu Location, and to the rapid increase in the population that had to be accommodated here. This placed enormous pressure on the natural resources of the area, and contributed to the emasculation of the local institutions responsible for overseeing resource management. The residents of the location adopted whatever strategies they could to ameliorate the depletion of natural resources in their villages. One 'traditional' strategy they have sought to emulate is to move their imizi (homesteads) away from areas where local resources has been exhausted. Given the finite area of land available to them, this strategy was only ever likely to be successful in the short-term. I analyse social, economic and institutional factors at village level that appear to act as disincentives to collective resource management activities. These factors include the social structure of the imizi and the socio-economic heterogeneity that exists between imizi in Gwabeni village. The varying degrees of household economic marginality that follow from this, together with the differential ownership of livestock and other possessions that decrease people's reliance on locally available natural resources, mean that the transaction costs that people would incur by contributing to collective resource management activities, differ widely. A primary cause of people's failure to engage in resource management at village level stems from the dispersion of the members of their imizi. This factor robs the village of decision makers and undermines the capacity of those left behind to make and implement resource management decisions. It results in the various members of imizi in the village having different orientations that dissipate the energy needed for collective action. It also fuels existing struggles, and creates new ones, over the meanings and uses of the term 'community'. I conclude by arguing that, in Tyefu Location, the management of natural resources is extremely difficult to co-ordinate, because such management is highly contested, undermined by differentiation among resource users, and subject to the attentions of weak village institutions that do not share a clear set of resource management objectives. , KMBT_363
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 1998
Where dreams become reality: professionalism in flight training in the Eastern Cape
- Authors: Allison, Martin
- Date: 2019
- Subjects: Professional socialization , Flight training -- South Africa , Flight schools -- South Africa -- Case studies , Air pilots -- Training of -- South Africa
- Language: English
- Type: text , Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/95376 , vital:31150
- Description: This study explores the construction of the identity of professional pilots through a case study of a flying school in South Africa. Here, a 15-20-month period of intensive study and training of students, fresh from school or college, leads in most cases to the attainment of a Commercial or Airline Transport Pilot’s Licence. The construction of identity is a continuous process and a lifelong project and hence this study can only reflect upon the factors influencing the early stages of a pilot’s career, until the point where the licenced Pilot leaves the Air School and enters full time employment with a commercial undertaking, but it is argued that this is a crucial step in the formation of professional identity, habitus in Bourdieu’s terms. The culture of the air School reflects the military background of the founders of the school and the staff employed in senior positions. The school, which is residential, observes a strict regime of Ground School and Practical Flying Training and a high standard of performance and personal conduct is demanded, both during training and in off duty hours and excessive consumption of alcohol and smoking are discouraged, and drug use absolutely taboo. Progress with training at the school is closely monitored and a disciplined environment maintained by surveillance cameras, house monitors and security guards; in Foucauldian terms, a modern version of the Panopticon, but somewhat less than Goffman’s Total Institution. It was found that the construction of a flying identity for most of the students entering the air school commenced in childhood or early adulthood, through the influence of friends and relatives and they enter the school with the firm intention of becoming Professional pilots. Full participation of the author in the Ground School revealed how professionalization is implemented through the discipline and rigor of the training methods employed. Through mastery of a complex body of theoretical knowledge in the Ground School and the practical skill of learning to fly in a one-on-one relationship with an instructor, the students gain confidence and efficacy which contributes to their self-respect and maturity. The international reputation of the school, confers prestige upon its graduates and they benefit from membership of a profession which commands respect and a high level of income. In large measure, the thesis shows, the success of the School is a function of the founders’ ‘invention of tradition’ focusing on the wartime training school that existed on the site and the many echoes of those times in the (re)construction of its buildings and facilities, continuing in the approach of the multinational that now owns the School.
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- Date Issued: 2019
Jah children the experience of Rastafari children in South Africa as members of a minority group with particular reference to communities in the former Cape Province
- Authors: Bain, Pauline
- Date: 2004
- Subjects: Rastafari movement -- South Africa -- Eastern Cape , Rastafari movement -- South Africa -- Western Cape , Rastafari movement -- South Africa -- Northern Cape , Reggae music -- South Africa -- History and criticism , Rastafarian ethics -- South Africa , Rastafari movement -- Doctrines , Children of minorities -- South Africa -- Education , Socialization -- South Africa
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: vital:2087 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1002650 , Rastafari movement -- South Africa -- Eastern Cape , Rastafari movement -- South Africa -- Western Cape , Rastafari movement -- South Africa -- Northern Cape , Reggae music -- South Africa -- History and criticism , Rastafarian ethics -- South Africa , Rastafari movement -- Doctrines , Children of minorities -- South Africa -- Education , Socialization -- South Africa
- Description: This thesis is an ethnography of Rastafari childhood in the former Cape Province, South Africa, through the eyes of both parents and children. If children are a ‘muted group’, then what are the identity formation implications for “double-muted” groups, the children of ethnic minorities whose voices are not heard? Rasta parents’ experience of the struggle, ie. the opposition to apartheid, has shaped the Rastafari chant of ‘equal rights’ and ‘justice’ into a distinctly South African form of protest and resistance. Their childhood experiences have resulted in a desire to provide a better life for their children, using Rastafari as a vehicle. This is expressed in a continuation of the struggle that was started during apartheid, in the Rasta ideology children grow up learning. The Rasta child has become a contested body in this struggle. The South African Government, through policy, has a mandate to protect the child, and legislature exists to do so in accordance with international law. However, as child-raising differs phenomenally from culture to culture, these goals on the part of the State start infringing upon the rights and freedoms of minorities to raise their children according to their own cultural goals. This study examines the tension between Rastafari and government with regards to child raising, specifically looking at the following main points of contestation: public health, public schools and policy/legislation; in order to examine how Rasta children negotiate their identity in the face of these conflicting messages and struggles. Their identity can be influenced by three main groups, the Rasta family they grow up in; school; and multi-media. What these children choose to accept or reject in their worldview is moderated by their own agency. This study shows that this tension results in a new generation of Rastafari children, who are strongly grounded in an identity as Rastafari and take pride in this identity. It also illustrates how Rastafari are impacting on and changing government policy through resistance. Their successes in challenging the state on the grounds of multiculturalism and religious freedom, has helped in the attainment of a sense of dignity.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2004
Coping with xenophobia : Senegalese migrants in Port Elizabeth
- Authors: Barbali, Silvana Claudia
- Date: 2009
- Subjects: Xenophobia -- South Africa -- Port Elizabeth Migrant labor -- South Africa -- Port Elizabeth Immigrants -- South Africa -- Port Elizabeth Foreign workers -- South Africa -- Port Elizabeth Aliens -- South Africa -- Social conditions Immigrants -- Africa -- Social conditions
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: vital:2102 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1002665
- Description: This thesis seeks to investigate Senegalese migrants' experiences of xenophobia in South Africa. It explores prevailing theories used to explain the phenomenon of xenophobia and uses data collected via anthropological fieldwork to support arguments made. It is argued that a culture of migration in Senegal and the significance of migration as a rite of passage in Senegalese masculinity assists migrants to orientate themselves in host countries, and influences the way Senegalese are „received‟ by South Africans. In addition, Senegalese Islam (Sufi Orientation), which organises its members into brotherhoods, assists in the social integration of Senegalese men in Port Elizabeth. The men belong to the Mouride Brotherhood and the thesis shows how membership to the brotherhood provides a strong network of support for migrant men without resulting in the enclaving of the men in the broader social and economic context of Port Elizabeth. This has important implications for the individual and collective migration experience of Senegalese and influences the men's creation of meaning in their experiences as migrants. The thesis makes use of the concept of transnationalism to analyse the complex and multifaceted nature of transnational migration, arguing that migration experiences are influenced by a range of transnational factors and is deeply culturally influenced. The research suggests that migration experts and government departments in South Africa should take these complexities into account when formulating new programmes and policies for migrants.
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- Date Issued: 2009
Messages from the deep : water divinities, dreams and diviners in Southern Africa
- Authors: Bernard, Penelope Susan
- Date: 2010
- Subjects: Dreams -- Religious aspects , Zulu (African people) -- Religion , Xhosa (African people) -- Religion , Shamanism -- South Africa
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Doctoral , PhD
- Identifier: vital:2112 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1007644 , Dreams -- Religious aspects , Zulu (African people) -- Religion , Xhosa (African people) -- Religion , Shamanism -- South Africa
- Description: This thesis is a comparative regional study of a complex of beliefs and practices regarding the water divinities in southern Africa. These snake and mermaid-like divinities, which are said to work in conjunction with one's ancestors, are believed to be responsible for the calling and training of certain diviner-healers by taking them underwater for periods of time. In addition to granting healing knowledge, these divinities are associated with fertility, water and rain, and the origins of humanity. The research combines comparative ethnography with the anthropology of extraordinary experience (AEE), and focuses particularly on the Zulu, Cape Nguni, Shona and Khoisan groups. The use of the 'radical participation' method, as recommended by AEE, was facilitated by the author being identified as having a ' calling' from these water divinities, which subsequently resulted in her initiation under the guidance of a Zulu isangoma (diviner-healer) who had reputedly been taken underwater. The research details the rituals that were performed and how dreams are used to guide the training process of izangoma. This resulted in the research process being largely dream-directed, in that the author traces how the izangoma responded to various dreams she had and how these responses opened new avenues for understanding the phenomenon of the water divinities. The comparative study thus combines literature sources, field research and dream-directed experiences, and reveals a complex of recurring themes, symbols and norms pertaining to the water divinities across the selected groups. In seeking to explain both the commonalities and differences between these groups, the author argues for a four-level explanatory model that combines both conventional anthropological theory and extraordinary experience. Responses to the author's dream-led experiences are used to throw light on the conflicting discourses of morality regarding traditional healers and the water divinities in the context of political-economic transformations relating to capitalism and the moral economy; to illuminate the blending of ideas and practices between Zulu Zionists and diviner-healer traditions; and to link up with certain issues relating to San rock art, rain-making and healing rituals, which contribute to the debates regarding trance-induced rock art in southern Africa.
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- Date Issued: 2010
The religious system of the Ndlambe of East London district
- Authors: Bigalke, Erich Heinrich
- Date: 1970
- Subjects: Xhosa (African people) -- Religion
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: vital:2113 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1007648
- Description: From conclusion: This study has had a twofold objective, to present ethnographic data on a people who belong to the Xhosa tribal cluster and more specifically, to throw light on aspects of the ancestor cult among the Xhosa. In particular an attempt has been made to explore the nature of the interrelation between the social structure and the ancestor cult. Attention has been focussed on the lineage as an institution, on the rituals devoted to the ancestors and on the means of explaining misfortune. Though the Ndlambe, in common with other groups of indigenous people in the Eastern Cape, have been experiencing developments brought about by social change during the better part of two centuries, the recent implementation of the Betterment Scheme has resulted in drastic demographic changes. The former settlement pattern of scattered homesteads has given way before village formation. Beyond the fact that it has resulted in the closer proximity of homesteads, with the opportunities for cooperation and conflict that this situation implies, nothing is known of the direct organizational influence of this development. More…
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- Date Issued: 1970
Where are the men? : an investigation into female-headed households in Rini, with reference to household structures, the dynamics of gender and strategies against poverty
- Authors: Brown, Brenda
- Date: 1996
- Subjects: Women heads of households -- South Africa , Poor women -- South Africa
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: vital:2097 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1002660 , Women heads of households -- South Africa , Poor women -- South Africa
- Description: An in-depth study is conducted into ten female-headed households in the township of Rini, an underprivileged section of Grahamstown in the Eastem Cape region of South Africa. The study provides information on the way in which such households function in conditions of poverty and underemployment. The meaning of the term 'household' is clearly defined. A household consists of a group of people, who may or may not be kin-related, but who usually live under the same roof, eat together and share resources. Household members may be absent for varying periods of time, but are still considered to have rights in the household to which they belong. The female-headed household usually contains a core of adult women who are often uterine kin. Men are frequently members of these households and are usually related to the women who form the core. Their status and roles in such households are defined and intra-household relations between household members are discussed. In this study, female headship is observed to occur in conditions of poverty when an elderly woman is widowed, receives a regular income in the form of and old age pension, and when her status as the senior member of the household is acknowledged. The presence of men in female-headed households has not been widely emphasised in other studies, either of the female-headed household itself, or in research done in this area of South Africa. An attempt is therefore made to illustrate the way in which men function in these households and the varying roles they play. An attempt is also made to describe other structures and practices which support the female-headed household in a rapidly changing urban environment. These include church membership, burial society membership, the informal economy, wider kinship networks and, in the case of the men, the rite of circumcision.
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- Date Issued: 1996
Towards an understanding of Amayeza esiXhosa stores (African chemists): how they operate, and the services they offer in the Eastern Cape
- Authors: Cocks, Michelle L
- Date: 1997
- Subjects: Medical anthropology -- South Africa -- Eastern Cape , Traditional medicine -- South Africa -- Eastern Cape
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MSocSc
- Identifier: vital:2096 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1002659 , Medical anthropology -- South Africa -- Eastern Cape , Traditional medicine -- South Africa -- Eastern Cape
- Description: In medical anthropology there has been a tendency to dichotomize western biomedical . healtb services, on the one hand, and traditional health care practices on the other. Much attention has been focused on the comparison between these two approaches in the hope that they might be reconciled. The problem with this approach is twofold. In the first place, it has not always acknowledged the local, historic~1, political and economic contexts in which different approaches to health care have evolved and in the second place, health care services which belong to neither the western nor traditional healing spheres and which are driven by commercial interests have been almost completely neglected because they fall outside of the basic dichotomy. Amayeza stores have been a feature of South African towns and cities for many years. They mayor may not be run by Africans, but their clientele is almost exclusively African in this region. They deal in a bewildering variety of products and remedies, from untreated herbal and animal products to pharmaceuticals specially prepared for the African market, to Dutch and Indian Remedies. These stores both reflect transfonnations in indigenous perceptions of health care and, by virtue of the choices they offer, generate change. In this empirical study three stores in the Eastern Cape are selected for detailed study - two in King William's Town, the regional capital, and one in the small town of Peddie. The approach is holistic, emphasizing the social, political and economic context, the business histories and running of each shop, and, in particular, the perceptions and choices of a sample of the customers in each case. The success of the amayeza phenomenon derives from its eclecticism and syncretism. These stores impose neither a western nor a traditional model of health care on their clients, but offer them a range of choices that reflects the complex multicultural history of their own South African society.
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- Date Issued: 1997
Opportunity and constraint : historicity, hybridity and notions of cultural identity among farm workers in the Sundays River Valley
- Authors: Connor, Teresa Kathleen
- Date: 2007
- Subjects: Agricultural laborers -- South Africa -- Relocation Addo Elephant National Park (South Africa) Xhosa (African people) -- South Africa -- Eastern Cape -- Ethnic identity Forced migration -- South Africa -- Eastern Cape Land settlement -- South Africa -- Government policy
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Doctoral , PhD
- Identifier: vital:2117 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1008367
- Description: This thesis focuses on relationships of opportunity and constraint among farm workers in the Sundays River Valley (SRV), Eastern Cape Province. Relationships of 'constraint' include those experiences of displacement and forced removal and war, including forced removals by the apartheid state in 1960 and 1970. Relationships of 'opportunity' include the ways in which residents in the SRV have contested their experiences of upheaval and domination, and the formation of a regional sense of place and belonging/ investigate how farm workers actually draw elements of locality and identity from their experiences of upheaval, and how displacement bolsters feelings of belonging and place. Instead of viewing displacement as a once-off experience, this thesis investigates displacement in historical terms, as a long-term, 'serial' experience of human movement, which is continued in the present- specifically through the creation of the Greater Addo Elephant National Park. I concentrate on developing a spatialised and cultural notion of movemenUplacement. 'Place' is investigated as a term that refers to rather indeterminate feelings of nostalgia, memory and identity, which depend on a particular connection to territory (ie: 'space'). I emphasise that elements of place in the SRV are drawn from and expressed along dualistic lines, which juxtapose situations of opportunity and constraint. In this way, farm workers' sense of connection to farms and ancestral territory in the SRV depends on their experiences of stable residency and work on farms, as well as their memories of removal from land in the area. I emphasise that those elements of conservatism (expressed as 'tradition' and Redness) among Xhosa-speaking farm workers are indications of a certain hybridity of identity in the region, which depend on differentiation from other groups (such as so-called 'coloured' farm workers and 'white' farmers), as well as associations between these groups. This thesis lays emphasis upon those less visible and definable 'identities' in the Eastern Cape Province, specifically by shifting focus away from the exhomeland states of the Ciskei and Transkei, to more marginal expressions of identity and change (among farm workers) in the Province. I point out that labourers cannot solely be defined by their positions as farm workers, but by their place and sense of cultural belonging in the area. In this sense, I use the idea of work as a loaded concept that can comment on a range of cultural attitudes towards belonging and place, and which is firmly embedded in the private lives of labourers - beyond their simple socio-economic conditions of farm work. I use Bourdieu's conception of habitus and doxa to define work as a set of dispositions that have been historicised and internalised by workers to such an extent, that relationships of domination are sometimes inadvertently obscured through their apparent 'naturalness'. Moreover, I point out that work can be related to ritualised action in the SRV through the use of performance and practice-based anthropological theory. Both work and ritual are symbolic actions, and are sites of struggle within which workers express themselves dualistically. Rituals, specifically, are dramatic events that combine disharmonious and harmonious social processes - juxtaposing the powerlessness of workers (on farms), and the deep sense of belonging and place in the SRV. I argue that the deep historical connections in the SRV have largely been ignored by conservationists in the drive to establish new protected zones (such as the Greater Addo Elephant National Park), and that a new model of shared conservation management is needed for this Park.
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- Date Issued: 2007
Interaction and transaction : a study of conciliar behaviour in a Black South African township
- Authors: De Jongh, Michael
- Date: 1980
- Subjects: Social interaction -- South Africa -- Port Elizabeth , Black people -- South Africa -- Politics and government , Local government -- South Africa -- Eastern Cape
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Doctoral , PhD
- Identifier: vital:2118 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1009437
- Description: The recent history of Africa is one of rapid chance. This process is still continuing and even accelerating. The peoples of Africa are being drawn from a subsistence way of life to a money economy and, more often than not, from a rural to an urban environment. South Africa is no exception to this pattern. In fact, as the most developed country on the continent it is in the front-line of this transformation. Various facets of this problem have held the attention of anthropologists world-wide. Southern Africa specifically has produced some of the earliest urban studies (Hellman, 1948), as well as some of the classical contributions to the field (Mitchell, 1956, 1960, 1966, 1969, 1970; Epstein, 1958; Mayer, 1961, "(1971), 1962; Pauw, 1963). Complex as the urban problems are, anthropologists have obviously not been alone in this field. Workers from many disciplines have been and still are required to contribute to the understanding of the process or urbanization as well as the urban process. Partly for this reason no attempt has been made in the present study to illuminate all the varied facets of the urban field. In general, the focus has been on the urban process and more specifically, on part of a local-level political system. Thus only a limited problem has been selected for analysis.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 1980
Interaction and transaction: a study of conciliar behaviour in a Black South African township
- Authors: De Jongh, Michael
- Date: 1979
- Subjects: Social interaction , Conciliary behaviour , Black people , Townships , Port Elizabeth , Eastern Cape (South Africa) , Government , Local government
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Doctoral , PhD
- Identifier: vital:2086 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1001603
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 1979
An analysis of the social and economic consequences of residential relocation arising out of the implementation of an agricultural development scheme in a rural Ciskei village
- Authors: De Wet, C J
- Date: 1986
- Subjects: Black people -- Relocation -- South Africa -- Ciskei Ciskei (South Africa) -- Social life and customs Agricultural development projects -- South Africa -- Ciskei Chatha (Ciskei, South Africa) Ciskei (South Africa) -- Social conditions
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Doctoral , PhD
- Identifier: vital:2116 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1008090
- Description: From preface: This dissertation is concerned with the impact of the implementation of a particular kind of agricultural development project, viz. Betterment Planning, upon a rural Black village in the Keiskammahoek Magisterial District of the Ciskei, in South Africa. The project was implemented in the mid-1960s, and involved the re-organisation of the village environment into demarcated arable, grazing and residential areas, which necessitated the villagers moving from their old, scattered residential clusters to several new, concentrated residential areas. This dissertation seeks to trace the consequences of this development project, and particularly the socio-economic consequences of the residential relocation that it involved.
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- Date Issued: 1986
Responses to Western education among the conservative people of Transkei
- Authors: Deliwe, Dumisani
- Date: 1993
- Subjects: Xhosa (African people) -- Attitudes , Xhosa (African people) -- Social life and customs , Black people -- Education -- South Africa , Xhosa (African people) -- Education -- South Africa -- Transkei
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: vital:2099 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1002662 , Xhosa (African people) -- Attitudes , Xhosa (African people) -- Social life and customs , Black people -- Education -- South Africa , Xhosa (African people) -- Education -- South Africa -- Transkei
- Description: This thesis is concerned with the impact of Western education on the social life of the members of a Transkeian village. Various authors in the locally relevant literature, have for a long time commented that, due to Western education and Christianity, African societies became divided into 'school'people, who readily accepted Western education and culture, and 'red' people, who initially resisted these. Whilst the terms 'red' and 'school' became used as analytical constructs for the differing responses to Western culture, they were also used by African people. My findings at Qhude, Transkei, confirmed such a social division. I argue that this social division does not present an absolute distinction, but may best be conceived in terms of a continuum. Whilst the thesis considers interaction between the 'school' and the 'red' people of Qhude in various fields of life such as politics, law, religion (see Chapter Two) and education (see Chapter Six), the main emphasis is on the 'red' people. Thus, the thesis concerns itself, to a large degree, with an analysis of the 'red' people's experience and interpretation of Western education and Western educated people. The main argument is that the 'red' people's perception of Western education and Western educated people is ambiguous. That is, they see them in both positive and negative terms (see Chapter Five). This ambiguity is looked at here as a manifestation of the difficulties encountered by the 'red' people in adjusting to an institution (i.e Western education)that was initially foreign, and to which they were initially opposed. The perception of Western education as positive follows from the fact that it is seen as leading to economic empowerement by the 'red' people of Qhude, who are facing poverty, due to an economic decline (see Chapter Three). However, the economic contribution of the young (who are the ones receiving western education) and the knowledge they gather from school, threaten the authority of elders, as the young become increasingly independent from the elders. As a result of such independence, and other factors, Western education is seen in negative terms by the 'red' people. Such potential dangers of Western education are well recognised by the 'reds' of Qhude, and are dealt with culturally. That is, it is made clear to the young, in particular during occasions such as circumcision rituals, that education has to be made relevant to the building of the homestead, which is under the overlordship of parents whom the young are called upon to respect (see Chapter Six). In conclusion, it is argued that the use of culture in this way, shows how 'tradition' is employed to deal with crisis. Such use of culture necessitates a clarification of the opinion that uneducated Africans rejected Western education (see Chapter Seven).
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- Date Issued: 1993
The resurgence of tuberculosis in South Africa: an investigation into socio-economic aspects of the disease in a context of structural violence in Grahamstown, Eastern Cape
- Authors: Erstad, Ida
- Date: 2007
- Subjects: Tuberculosis -- South Africa -- Grahamstown Tuberculosis -- Patients -- South Africa -- Grahamstown Tuberculosis -- Treatment -- South Africa -- Grahamstown Community health services -- South Africa -- Grahamstown Medical anthropology -- South Africa -- Grahamstown Tuberculosis -- Economic aspects -- South Africa -- Grahamstown Tuberculosis -- Social aspects -- South Africa -- Grahamstown
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: vital:2090 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1002653
- Description: This thesis is an investigation into the socio-economic constraints that influence the decisions of tuberculosis sufferers in the health seeking process and therapeutic management of tuberculosis in Grahamstown, the Eastern Cape. It is shown that structural violence influences experiences and perceptions of tuberculosis at all levels. Management of tuberculosis in the formal health sector is explored at local levels and related to national and global strategies of health care. The role of health workers, and particularly voluntary health workers, is explored and it is shown that they work within a context of growing burden of sickness and co-infections and a lack of government commitment to deal with increasing TB and HIV incidences. Kleinman’s notion of explanatory models is explored and it is evident that although knowledge of the aetiology of tuberculosis is well-known to patients and general members of the communities, they are nevertheless victims of increased stigmatisation and marginalisation as a result of illness. The importance of social support in curing tuberculosis is explored using Janzen’s concept of therapy managing groups. Social capital is a fundamental component in adhering to biomedical therapy, but is commonly weak among the structurally poor. The availability of temporary social grants for people living with TB influences health seeking behaviour. In a context of structural poverty the sick are faced with what Nattrass terms “perverse incentives”, having to choose between the right to health and the right to social security, both guaranteed in the South African Constitution, for him/herself and dependants. Although adherence to biomedical therapy is essential in curing tuberculosis, it is shown throughout this thesis that ignoring wider structural causes of disease limits the patient’s ability to get well. The ethnography shows that the right to health is a social and economic right which is not the reality for most South Africans.
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- Date Issued: 2007
A new approach to the Zulu land tenure system: an historical anthropological explanation of the development of an informal settlement
- Authors: Fourie, Clarissa Dorothy
- Date: 1993
- Subjects: Land tenure -- South Africa -- Kwazulu Kwazulu (South Africa) -- Economic conditions Zulu (African people) -- Social conditions Kwazulu (South Africa) -- Social conditions
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Doctoral , PhD
- Identifier: vital:2098 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1002661
- Description: Mgaga, an informal settlement in KwaZulu, south of Durban, on Cele-Zulu polity land, had an indigenous, albeit urban, system of Zulu land tenure in 1980. Mgaga's transformation, from an area with scattered homesteads in 1959 to an informal settlement, was linked to local and external factors. The external factors were, regional industrialisation, urbanisation and apartheid policies which involved, the division of South Africa into ethnically based 'homelands'; controlled Black access to 'White' cities; an urban management system for 'homeland' townships, like Umlazi township which abutted Mgaga. Umlazi's development and urban management system involved, the resettlement of members of the polity; the removal of their office bearers from their posts; and the phased building of the township; which caused cumulative effects in Mgaga. I link these external factors to the behaviour of Mgaga's residents, who transformed the area's land tenure system, by using Comaroff's dialectical model (1982), where the internal dialectic interacts with external factors to shape behaviour at the local level. I analyze the Zulu ethnography to show that the internal dialectic in Zulu social organisation, and in Mgaga, is centred around fission and integration; and that the integrating hierarchy associated with Zulu social organisation and the Zulu land tenure system is composed of groups with opposed interests in the same land. Within this hierarchy entrepreneurship and coalition formation influence the transfer of land rights. Also, rather than rules determining the transfer of land in the land tenure system, processes associated with the interaction of external factors with the internal dialectic, within terms of the cultural repertoire associated with the system, shape local behaviour; and the system's rules are manipulated within this cultural repertoire by individuals striving for gain. This results in different manifestations of the internal dialectic in the Zulu land tenure system, i.e. a range of variations in the Zulu land tenure system, including different local level kinship groups; a variety of terminology and rights held by office bearers; and communal and individualised land rights. The external factor of urbanisation interacted with the internal dialectic in Mgaga, manifested in terms of an ongoing izigodi (wards) dispute -including its boundaries, to shape residents' behaviour, so that some introduced an informal settlement and others resisted its geographical spread. This informal settlement development, where eventually purely residential land rights were transferred for cash to strangers by strangers, with no role for polity officials, was an urban variation of the Zulu land tenure system, because of the continued existence of the internal dialectic in Zulu social organisation in the local system, with the integration side being expressed by the community overrights. Characteristics found in Mgaga, such as kinship diminution; the individualisation and sale of land rights; and the ongoing influence of polities; are found elsewhere in Africa where informal settlements have developed on indigenous land tenure systems. Therefore the transformation of Mgaga's land tenure system to urban forms is not an isolated phenomenon, and my dialectical ransactional approach may have an applicability beyond the context of the Zulu land tenure system.
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- Date Issued: 1993
Izit? Hoe lyk hulle? Kom ons ǂXoa – A South African Khoe-San narrative
- Authors: Gabie, Sharon
- Date: 2023-03-30
- Subjects: San (African people) , Khoikhoi (African people) , Identity politics , Self-perception , Convention for a Democratic South Africa , Free, prior, and informed consent (Indigenous rights) , Epistemic injustice
- Language: English
- Type: Academic theses , Doctoral theses , text
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/409790 , vital:70630 , DOI 10.21504/10962/409790
- Description: The foundation of the South African narrative is framed by identity politics; a politics instituted at the intersection of race and class to exclude all people considered non-White concerning the socioeconomic and political landscape of the country. The preamble of the Freedom Charter signed in 1955 declared that the country belongs to all who live in it: Black and White people. The dominant constructivist narratives of addressing the racial dichotomy obliterate the injustice suffered by the Khoe-San people whose identity was overshadowed under the homogeneous term, Coloured people. Following the first democratic elections, at the negotiations of the Convention for a Democratic South Africa (CODESA) in 1996, Khoe-San people were once again excluded and played no significant role in deciding the future of the new South Africa. The epistemic injustice suffered by the Khoe-San people, the loss of land, language, and cultural heritage were glanced over in the new democratic dispensation. In this thesis, I hone into the identity politics and identity formation of the Khoe-San people, after 1994. The self-identifying Khoe-San people became visible to the democratic state through various forms of activism and networking across provinces foregrounding the concept of indigeneity to address issues of exclusion and marginalisation. The phenomenon of indigeneity, bestowed on Khoe-San people by the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People (UNDRIP) created a path for the Khoe-San people to be in conversation with state organs to address their plight of the loss of land linked to identity, language, culture, heritage, and other social ills experienced in their communities. The thesis illustrates the vagueness of Coloured identity under the Apartheid state, and the preconceived narrative that Coloured people were a privileged group; precludes and obliterates the epistemic injustice suffered by Khoe-San people. The transnational conceptualisation and global politics of indigenous peoples; the particularity of indigeneity in relation to First Nation Status, in the South African context, destabilises identity politics and the four-tier racial categorisation system used by the Apartheid state carried through by the national government under democracy. The conceptualisation of this global discourse on indigeneity brought a new consciousness in sections of the Coloured community where self-identifying Khoe-San people question their place in the democratic dispensation. , Thesis (PhD) -- Faculty of Humanities, Anthropology, 2023
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- Date Issued: 2023-03-30
Frontier heartland : analysing the impact of forestry and tourism on 'white' identity in Maclear
- Authors: Griffin, Donna-Lee
- Date: 2006
- Subjects: Agriculture -- South Africa -- Maclear Agriculture -- Economic aspects -- South Africa -- Maclear Economic development -- South Africa -- Maclear Tourism management -- South Africa -- Maclear Forests and forestry -- Economic aspects -- South Africa -- Maclear Whites -- South Africa -- Maclear -- Economic conditions
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: vital:2115 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1008066
- Description: The North Eastern Cape in South Africa is part of a larger province that is in desperate need of job creation and economic development. In light of these needs, efforts have been made by members of the community and outside investors to generate new forms of income in the area. These economic developments emerged in the form of small-scale tourism initiatives and commercial forestry. The impact of these developments on the small community of Maclear differs in nature and is bringing about social change and influencing identity. In this thesis, I explore the effects of each of these developments on the local farming community, particularly the established white English-speaking farmers. For various important reasons, such as the changes to land use patterns occurring around them in terms of forestry and tourism initiatives, I chose to examine the situation of this minority. In general discussions and portrayals of white farmers, it is hypothesized that whites living in small farming communities are resistant to change, politically stagnant and socially conservative. In this thesis I test this hypothesis and investigate what South Africans might see as the core, or whether there is a core of, white settler identity. TIle idea of 'frontiers' being heartlands was emphasized in Maclear as residents spoke about the pioneering efforts of their forefathers and discussed these efforts as the essence of their identity. Forestry is a contemporary ' frontier' encroaching on these white Settlers. A dynamic concept of landscape is central to these identity construction efforts. In this thesis I explore, through different articulations of landscape, how residents, recent arrivals and investors attempt to embed their identity and resources in the community. I ask whether it is possible for members of the white community to produce an alternate and politically viable interpretation of landscape in post-apartheid South Africa. Can land and landscape offer them a sense of belonging and identity? What is their experience in view of the impositions of major investors who see land purely as an economic unit? The research does not explicitly investigate how 'new' black farmers and farming groups perceive and experience land and landscape. What is noted is the imagined passivity of black labourers on white-owned land. This thesis touches on issues inlportant to democratic change and progress in South Africa. How will the new government deal with the thorny issue of land redistribution in the face of competing claims for land and identity? How will the various sections of the white community (in this case the farming community) negotiate their identity in the new South Africa? Also, what do ' frontier' towns like Maclear reveal about the nature of white identity in post-apartheid South Africa? This thesis relies on gender and constructionist theories of landscape as developed by Appadurai (1996) to explain the dynamic nature of landscape in Maclear. It also explores and appraises the idea of ' frontier'. In the analysis of identity, I take into account that white settlers 'success' relies in part on the settlers ability to adapt to the ' frontier' and their ability to construct a new identity in their newfound 'homeland' (simliar to Paul Gilroy's (1993) "double consciousness). Keywords: South Africa, Maclear, Farming, White Identity, Landscape and Tourism.
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- Date Issued: 2006
Negotiating impoverishment: Farm worker responses to displacement following land invasions in Zimbabwe's "Fast Track Land Reform Programme"
- Authors: Hartnack, Andrew Michael Carl
- Date: 2006
- Subjects: Uncatalogued
- Language: English
- Type: Master's theses , text
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/197076 , vital:45834
- Description: This thesis investigates the impacts of sudden, unplanned, and violent displacement on farm workers such as Frank Juwawo during Zimbabwe’s recent Fast Track Land Reform Programme. It seeks to illustrate how the members of a complex community were differentially impacted by displacement and displayed differing abilities to mitigate the resulting social and economic impoverishment. In order to illuminate this particular displacement scenario, this thesis uses theoretical and analytical tools developed in the field of displacement studies, adapting them to suit the kind of displacement experienced by Zimbabwean farm workers. , Thesis (MA) -- Faculty of Humanities, Anthropology, 2006
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- Date Issued: 2006
"Us" and "them": disagreement over the meanings of terms, ambiguity, contestability and strategy in the Zimbabwean House of Assembly
- Authors: Hasler, Arthur Richard Patrick
- Date: 1989
- Subjects: Politicians -- Zimbabwe -- Language , Zimbabwe -- Politics and government -- 1980- |xLanguage
- Language: English
- Type: text , Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: vital:2083 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1001600
- Description: This is a study of how certain value loaded political terms are used in Zimbabwean Parliamentary debate. Before 1980 it is argued that aspects of lexical choice and an individual's sociopolitical position were extremely closely related, especially in the case of "white Rhodesians". There was also a marked lack of ambiguity in the use of value loaded terms at this time. In contemporary Zimbabwean House of Assembly, however, terms which became popularized when the new government came to power in 1980 are used with considerable ambiguity and contestability in order to further specific strategies. Though correlations between the choice of lexical units and individuals' positions in the social structure have been identified as "sociolinguistic variables" (Downes 1984, 75), it is argued that an analysis of this type of correlation should lead us to an analysis of how these lexical units or "terms" are used by individual speakers in a micro-political process. I hypothesize that the ambiguity and contestability which encompass certain key terms used in the Zimbabwean House contribute to their being used as strategies to achieve individual or party goals. I show that the terms are manipulated by individuals in various contexts, and that the normative connotations of terms, that is what the terms "ought" to mean, is not consistent with the ways in which they are used. This, in turn, has an effect on how people think the terms should be used. This process of language change exposes the interface between language usage and social life. Though not reducible to a single "correct" interpretation, it does provide rich material for the analysis of culture.
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- Date Issued: 1989
“We are white”: oral tradition, documented history and molecular biology of Xhosa clans descended from non-African forebears and their expression of this ancestry through the idiom of ancestor religion
- Authors: Hayward, Janet M
- Date: 2018
- Subjects: Clans -- South Africa -- Eastern Cape , Patrilineal kinship -- South Africa -- Eastern Cape , Xhosa (African people) -- Genealogy , Oral history -- South Africa -- Eastern Cape , Genetic genealogy , Xhosa (African people) -- Rites and ceremonies , Xhosa (African people) -- Race identity
- Language: English
- Type: text , Thesis , Doctoral , PhD
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/62939 , vital:28312
- Description: Xhosa clan membership is symbolised by a clan-name (isiduko) and passed along the male line from father to son. This social indicator has a biological counterpart in Y chromosome DNA that passes through successive generations in the patriline. Both relate specifically to a distant patrilineal forebear or apical ancestor. The present study has involved the collection and documentation of oral-historical information relating to the descent of certain Cape Nguni clans from non-African forebears and (where possible) a review of documented accounts of such origins. The research has also included collection of buccal cells from male research participants and analysis of their Y chromosome DNA. This method indicates whether a man’s patrilineal forebear lived in Africa. Otherwise, it indicates the broad geographical region from which he originated, hence providing an additional, independent source of information relating to ancestry that can confirm or challenge claims made based on oral history. Ethnographic research into the performance of distinctive ancestor rituals by clan members explores the continuing relevance of foreign ancestry in the contemporary context of rural communities in the Eastern Cape, South Africa. The study heeds calls for the decolonisation of scholarship in various ways: methodologically, through transdisciplinary research; ontologically, by questioning the utility of the nature: culture and related dichotomies; and epistemologically, because instead of relying entirely on the western academic tradition, it takes account of other modes of knowledge production. In rejection of the notion that only one side of history is true, it records multiple voices – those of the powerful but also the ordinary. The study deals with race and racial identification, but confirms the superficiality of these constructed differences by offering evidence of their submergence in the unifying power of kinship and descent.
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- Date Issued: 2018