DOCSLIB.ORG

Digital Activism and #Feesmustfall a Discourse Analysis on Facebook

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text

Load more

Digital Activism and #FeesMustFall a discourse analysis on Facebook Word count: 34.392 Rhiannon Buyens Student number: 01505273 Supervisor(s): Prof. Dr. Vicky Van Bockhaven A dissertation submitted to Ghent University in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in African Studies Academic year: 2018 - 2019 Acknowledgements First of all I would like to thank some people whose assistance was indispensable in the writing of this thesis. I thank my supervisor Prof. Dr. Vicky Van Bockhaven for guiding me through the process of writing this Master thesis. She was always approachable and prepared to provide me with feedback. Her effort is very much appreciated. I am grateful for the funding that I received from Ghent University to travel to Cape Town for my Africa-semester in 2017, in which I spent one semester at the University of the Western Cape and conducted research for my Bachelor thesis. I thank all the informants from my former research for their enthusiastic cooperation and for sharing their opinions and knowledge with me. Especially Mthobisi Mngomezulu contributed to this former research, as he brought me into contact with students at the University of Cape Town. Finally, I would like to thank my parents, sister, boyfriend, friends and fellow students from African Studies for their infinite support, encouragement, help and offering a listening ear. 2 Table of contents List of abbreviations 4 1. Introduction 5 2. Conceptual-theoretical framework 7 3. Literature review and status quaestionis 13 3.1 Digital activism 13 3.1.1 Facebook 20 3.2 #FeesMustFall: background and contextualization 24 3.3 #FeesMustFall and social media 29 4. Methodology 33 5. Analysis 38 5.1 Personal communications 38 5.2 Digital fieldwork on Facebook 42 5.2.1 The #FeesMustFall community 43 5.2.2 The political identity 48 5.2.3 Addressed issues 55 5.2.4 Targets 62 5.2.5 Protest tactics 69 6. Discussion 85 7. Conclusion 93 8. References 96 3 List of abbreviations UWC University of the Western Cape UCT University of Cape Town CPUT Cape Peninsula University of Technology TUT Tshwane University of Technology PAC Pan Africanist Congress EFF Economic Freedom Fighters ANC African National Congress DA Democratic Alliance PASMA Pan Africanist Student Movement of Azania EFFSC Economic Freedom Fighters Student Command SASCO South African Students Congress DASO Democratic Alliance Student Organisation SASO South African Students' Organisation 4 Digital Activism and #FeesMustFall: a discourse analysis on Facebook 1. Introduction Activism, digital technologies and social media are increasingly becoming more characteristic of today’s societies. Dispersing and signing petitions online, engaging in political discussions online and changing your profile picture to express solidarity are all examples of digital activism.1 Even though not everyone will consider themselves to be an activist2, most people will unknowingly participate in this phenomenon in which digital technologies are used for political action. At the same time there are protest movements consciously employing these digital platforms for their cause. Some movements are well-known for the use of digital activism: the Arab Spring, the international Occupy movement, the Indignados in Spain and many more have successfully adopted ICTs to strengthen their visibility and impact. In this thesis I will look at another movement that is profoundly connected with digital technologies, and more specifically social media: the South African #FeesMustFall movement. What makes this movement so interesting is twofold: it is the biggest protest movement since the dawn of democracy in South Africa and it used social media extensively.3 Despite the end of Apartheid in 1994, the structures from that painful era are still present in the South Africa of today. This is especially felt by black citizens, who feel dissatisfied and disillusioned with the promise of the Rainbow Nation. Since October 2015, mostly black students demand the abolishment of fees in tertiary education in #FeesMustFall. Still, the vision of #FeesMustFall consists of much more than just the falling of fees; it functions as a banner for many other demands and addresses not only the issues on campus but also in society at large. Social media has been an indispensable aspect in the existence of this movement. Twitter, Facebook, WhatsApp and other platforms have augmented its expansion and success, which is why it is so important to regard it in relation to #FeesMustFall. 1 Amy Stornaiuolo and Ebony Elizabeth Thomas, “Disrupting Educational Inequalities Through Youth Digital Activism,” Review of Research in Education 41, no. 1 (March 2017): 337–57, doi: 10.3102/0091732X16687973. 2 Christina Neumayer and Jakob Svensson, “Activism and Radical Politics in the Digital Age: Towards a Typology,” Convergence 22, no. 2 (April 2016): 131–46, doi: 10.1177/1354856514553395. 3 Ndumiso Daluxolo Ngidi, Chumani Mtshixa, Kathleen Diga, Nduta Mbarathi and Julian Douglas May, “'Asijiki' and the capacity to aspire through social media: the #FeesMustFall movement as an anti-poverty activism in South Africa,” in Proceedings of the Eighth International Conference (June 2016): 1-11, doi: 10.1145/2909609.2909654. 5 My encounters with #FeesMustFall at the University of The Western Cape in Cape Town awoke my interest for the movement. For my Bachelor thesis I researched the views of four student parties on #FeesMustFall in both UWC and UCT: PASMA, EFFSC, SASCO and DASO. I concluded that despite the great contrast between UWC and UCT in terms of media attention, prestige and addressed issues in #FeesMustFall, the same student parties have the same views regardless of the university in which they are located. After this, I decided to continue researching about #FeesMustFall from a different angle, and I chose social media due to its crucial role for the movement. Even though I got good answers on my questions about social media and #FeesMustFall in my former research, it occurred to me that there was more to be learned about it. In addition, the presence of #FeesMustFall on the social media platform Facebook had not been the object of research yet, which is why I felt the need to explore this further to possibly discover new knowledge about the movement. The discourse on the Fees Must Fall Western Cape Facebook page and its role in the movement at large will be the focus of this thesis. Through digital fieldwork I will attempt to answer the research question: “What is the role of social media on the #FeesMustFall movement when looking at the discourse of the Fees Must Fall Western Cape Facebook page?” To be clear: Facebook is not the only social media medium that is used in #FeesMustFall. It is part of a broader spectrum of communication technologies. Nevertheless, I focus on this specific platform in order to fill a gap in the literature on #FeesMustFall and social media. After this introduction, which also introduced my research question, I will give an overview and explanation of the most relevant theories and concepts that fit into this research in the conceptual-theoretical framework. This concerns the explanation of concepts and theories that have to do with activism in general and digital activism specifically. I will also give a first glimpse at the ideologies that characterize #FeesMustFall. After that, the literature review and status quaestionis will present the insights on digital activism, #FeesMustFall and its connection with social media that have been formulated by scholars up until today. With regards to digital activism, I will explain three debates: the positive and negative effects that digital technologies can have for activism, the ‘technological’ or ‘contextual’ view on digital activism and the debate on the ‘digital divide’. Because it is central in my research, I will explain some theories on the role of Facebook in digital activism in the section ‘Facebook’. In #FeesMustFall: background and contextualization I will explain what #FeesMustFall is and where it comes from, after which I will focus on the role of social media in this movement. 6 In the methodology my research methods will be outlined, which are qualitative: my background knowledge coming from my experiences at UWC and the interviews that I conducted for my former research, and the new digital fieldwork on the Fees Must Fall Western Cape Facebook page that will be central in this thesis. I will explain why I chose these approaches, how I collected the data and analysed it, and justify why this is the best method. Following on the methodology, I will set out my findings of the interviews shortly and elaborate on the digital fieldwork in the analysis section. The analysis of the digital fieldwork is divided in five sections: the #FeesMustFall community, addressed issues, the political identity, targets and protest tactics. Each of these sections will contribute to the question of the discourse on the page and its impact on the movement at large. The section ‘protest tactics’ is an explanation of how this discourse is enacted. My answer to the research question coming from the insights from the literature and analysis will be compiled in the discussion chapter. In this chapter I will also display the possible limitations of this research and proposals for further research on the subject. Following on the discussion, the conclusion chapter will finalize this thesis by offering a summary of my findings. 2. Conceptual-theoretical framework In this chapter I will explain some of the central concepts and theories that will give direction and shape the further course of this research. The selected concepts and theories relate to activism, digital activism and the philosophies behind #FeesMustFall. It functions both as a framework and a preface to my literature review. Charles Tilly and Sidney Tarrow formulated the concept of ‘contentious politics’, which serves as an umbrella for all sorts of activism.
Recommended publications
  • Feesmustfall and Student Protests in Post-Apartheid South Africa Dillon Bergin University of Pennsylvania

    Feesmustfall and Student Protests in Post-Apartheid South Africa Dillon Bergin University of Pennsylvania

    University of Pennsylvania ScholarlyCommons Penn Humanities Forum Undergraduate Research Undergraduate Humanities Forum 2018-2019: Stuff Fellows 5-2019 Writing, Righting, and Rioting: #FeesMustFall and Student Protests in Post-Apartheid South Africa Dillon Bergin University of Pennsylvania Follow this and additional works at: https://repository.upenn.edu/uhf_2019 Part of the Arts and Humanities Commons Bergin, Dillon, "Writing, Righting, and Rioting: #FeesMustFall and Student Protests in Post-Apartheid South Africa" (2019). Undergraduate Humanities Forum 2018-2019: Stuff. 8. https://repository.upenn.edu/uhf_2019/8 This paper was part of the 2018-2019 Penn Humanities Forum on Stuff. Find out more at http://wolfhumanities.upenn.edu/annual-topics/stuff. This paper is posted at ScholarlyCommons. https://repository.upenn.edu/uhf_2019/8 For more information, please contact [email protected]. Writing, Righting, and Rioting: #FeesMustFall and Student Protests in Post-Apartheid South Africa Disciplines Arts and Humanities Comments This paper was part of the 2018-2019 Penn Humanities Forum on Stuff. Find out more at http://wolfhumanities.upenn.edu/annual-topics/stuff. This thesis or dissertation is available at ScholarlyCommons: https://repository.upenn.edu/uhf_2019/8 University of Pennsylvania Spring 2019 Department of Comparative Literature and Literary Theory Honors Thesis Thesis Adviser: Rita Barnard Writing, Righting, and Rioting: #FeesMustFall and Student Protests in Post-Apartheid South Africa Submitted by: Dillon Bergin 4043 Iriving St. 19104 Philadelphia, PA [email protected] 2018–2019 Wolf Humanities Center Undergraduate Research Fellow If the university does not take seriously and rigorously its role as a guardian of wider civic freedoms, as interrogator of more and more complex ethical problems, as servant and preserver of deeper democratic practices, then some other regime or ménage of regimes will do it for us, in spite of us, without us.
  • Dr Max Price Bio.Pages

    Dr Max Price Bio.Pages

    Dr Max Price began his term of office as Vice Chancellor of the University of Cape Town in July, 2008. Previous to his appointment he was an independent consultant in the fields of public health, health policy, medical education, and human resources for health planning, as well as consultant to the national Department of Education regarding financing of tertiary education of health professionals. Dr Price has a strong transformation record, built primarily during his tenure as Dean of the Faculty of Health Sciences at the University of the Witwatersrand from 1996 to 2006. As Dean and member of the senior executive team, he spearheaded a series of transformation initiatives, including the Internal Reconciliation Commission. He established a new graduate entry medical degree, academic programs in rural health, bioethics, sports medicine, emergency medicine, and biomedical sciences. He also founded South Africa's first university-owned private teaching hospital, and the first university research company and raised over R130 million for new initiatives in the Faculty of Health Sciences. He has an MBBCh degree from the University of the Witwatersrand which he obtained in 1979; a BA (Hons) PPE (Oxon 1983); an M.Sc in Community Health from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine; and a Diploma in Occupational Health from Wits. A former Rhodes Scholar at Oxford University, Four Outstanding Young South Africans Award winner (1992), and Student Representative Council president, Dr Price's professional work has included clinical work in hospitals and rural primary health care; he was a research fellow in health economics at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine from 1986 to 1987; a senior researcher at the Centre for Health Policy and Director of the Centre for Health Policy at Wits University as well as a visiting Takemi Fellow in International Health at the Harvard School of Public Health from 1994 to 1995.
  • Narratives of Contradiction: South African Youth and Post-Apartheid

    Narratives of Contradiction: South African Youth and Post-Apartheid

    Narratives of Contradiction: South African Youth and Post-Apartheid Governance By Elene Cloete Ó 2017 Submitted to the graduate degree program in Anthropology and the Graduate Faculty of the University of Kansas in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy ________________________________ Chairperson John M. Janzen, Ph.D. ________________________________ Hannah E. Britton, Ph.D. ________________________________ Donald D. Stull, Ph.D. ________________________________ Elizabeth L. MacGonagle, Ph.D. ________________________________ Byron Caminero-Santangelo, Ph.D. Date Defended: May 17, 2017 The Dissertation Committee for Elene Cloete certifies that this is the approved version of the following dissertation: Narratives of Contradiction: South African Youth and Post-Apartheid Governance _______________________________ Chairperson John M. Janzen Date approved: May 17, 2017 ii Abstract South Africa’s heralded democratic transition digressed from its 1994 euphoric optimism to a current state of public discontent. This stems from rising unemployment, persistent structural inequality, and a disappointment in the African National Congress-led government’s inability to bring true social and economic transformation to fruition. While some scholars attribute this socioeconomic and political predicament to the country’s former regimes, others draw close correlations between the country’s post-apartheid predicament, ANC leadership, and the country’s official adoption of neoliberal economic policies in 1996. Central to this post-euphoric moment is the country’s Born-Free generation, particularly Black youth, coming of political age in an era of supposed political freedom, social equality, and economic opportunities. But recent student movements evidence young people’s disillusionment with the country’s democratic transition. Such disillusionment is not unfounded, considering the 35% youth unemployment rate and questionable standards in primary education.
  • Pathways to Critical Literacy: a Memoir of History, Geography and Chance. Hilary Janks University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg

    Pathways to Critical Literacy: a Memoir of History, Geography and Chance. Hilary Janks University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg

    Pathways to critical literacy: a memoir of history, geography and chance. Hilary Janks University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg I was born in 1949, four years after the end of World War II and one year after the Nationalist Party came to power in South Africa, bringing with it apartheid policy and ideology. I was fortunate in that my grandparents had left Lithuania before the outbreak of the war. Those that remained, their parents and sisters did not survive the holocaust, except for one sister and her two daughters, whose concentration camp tattoos intrigued and horrified me as a child. It has never surprised me that many of the 1940s Afrikaner Nationalists were Nazi sympathisers, and as such subscribed to theories of racial purity and superiority. My maternal grandfather was the oldest in his family. He found work in a bakery at first and slept under the table. Bit by bit he earned enough money to bring my grandmother to South Africa. They then worked with each successive brother to bring the others out, one by one. My mother was born in South Africa, and by the time I was born my grandfather was able to afford a nice house. We lived with him in a three-generation extended family including my uncle and cousins at different times until I was eleven. My paternal grandfather left Lithuania for South Africa after he turned thirteen. His three brothers eventually joined him. At first he earned a living travelling around the country as a trader taking goods to the rural areas. He eventually settled in an isolated Karoo town in the Northern Cape with my South African born grandmother and two of his brothers.
  • Not Yet Uhuru” - the Usurpation of the Liberation

    Not Yet Uhuru” - the Usurpation of the Liberation

    “Not Yet Uhuru” - The Usurpation of the Liberation Aspirations of South Africa’s Masses by a Commitment to Liberal Constitutional Democracy By Sanele Sibanda A thesis submitted to the School of Law, University of Witwatersrand, Johannesburg in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy under the supervision of Professor Heinz Klug and Professor Stuart Woolman. 21 November 2018 Declaration I declare that this thesis is my own unaided work. It is submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy, in the Faculty of Commerce, Law and Management at the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg. It has not been submitted before for any other degree or examination at any other university. ___________________________________ Signature __________________________________ Student number 21 November 2018 ii Abstract At the heart of this study is the idea of constitutionalism; its promise, conception and deployment in South Africa’s post-apartheid constitutional discourse; and ultimately the need for its re-imagination if it is to be part of advancing a truly decolonising liberatory project. A core premise of this study is that there exists, in post-apartheid South Africa, a stark discursive disjuncture between what has emerged as a hegemonic liberal democratic constitutional discourse and the discourse of liberation that served as the ideological pivot of the anti- colonial struggles. Animated by this premise, this study asks why it is that liberation as a framing set of ideas has either played no part or exerted so little obvious influence on how post-apartheid South Africa self-comprehends and organises itself in constitutive terms? Recognising that the formal end of colonial-apartheid as a system in 1994 inaugurated a seismic shift in the country’s constitutional discourse as the notion of constitutionalism took centre stage, this study seeks to problematize this idea by examining its underlying assumptions, connotations and import as deployed in mainstream South African academic and public discourses.
  • Thecathartic ALUMNI MAGAZINE | FACULTY of HEALTH SCIENCES | 2010 of Football and Faculty

    Thecathartic ALUMNI MAGAZINE | FACULTY of HEALTH SCIENCES | 2010 of Football and Faculty

    TheCATHARTIC ALUMNI MAGAZINE | FACULTY OF HEALTH SCIENCES | 2010 Of football and Faculty ... Contents our mandate for redress and ensuring a diverse and representative student body, or responding Features to yet another media query about how we select Something of an Accidental Doctor __ 2 our students. Letter from the Trenches ____________ 4 In this issue of the Cathartic, you will read about a recent visit by a group of journalists, Healing in Haiti ___________________ 6 including a reporter from the New York Times, Taking Life 2 the Limit _____________ 7 really served to highlight not only how far we Humanitarian … Without Borders ___ 10 have come as a Faculty, but also how far our Admissions Policy ________________ 12 students have come—sometimes literally, but more often in terms of the difficulties that they Faculty News have overcome in order to study at UCT, and more importantly, to flourish as a student in the Ikeys go down to Maties ____________ 9 Faculty. Apartheid Health Exhibit for Biko Day 13 We were able to gather together a small Lance Armstrong visits ____________ 14 group of students, of different races, economic New 3-D Temporal Lobe Simulator Trains backgrounds and geographical origins, to spend a ENT surgeons ____________________ 15 few hours with a selected cohort of journalists Winning Research ________________ 16 from a range of media, both print and electronic. One of the main topics of discussion was the Professional Standards Committee is support that we offer students, which makes our watchdog for Faculty ______________ 16 faculty unique and gives students from all SHAWCO education in action ______ 17 As we take leave of 2010, it’s time to reflect backgrounds a fair opportunity to succeed.
  • LEGACY of the PAST #Feesmustfall and the Politics of Language in Student Activism at Stellenbosch University

    LEGACY of the PAST #Feesmustfall and the Politics of Language in Student Activism at Stellenbosch University

    LEGACY OF THE PAST #FeesMustFall and the Politics of Language in Student Activism at Stellenbosch University Word count: 26,305 Lis Zandberg Student number: 01714189 Supervisor: Dr. David Mwambari, Academic Dissertation A dissertation submitted to Ghent University in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in Global Studies Academic year: 2018-2019 Deze pagina is niet beschikbaar omdat ze persoonsgegevens bevat. Universiteitsbibliotheek Gent, 2021. This page is not available because it contains personal information. Ghent Universit , Librar , 2021. ‘In 1994 my parents were sold a dream. I am here for my refund!’ (Protest Slogan #FeesMustFall, South Africa, 2015 & 2016) Legacy of the Past 1 Abstract Over the course of 2015 and 2016, student movements at different South African universities under the large label #FeesMustFall challenged the political order of university management as well as South Africa as a whole. Though largely focused on avoiding more increases of tuition fees, the movements at different universities also focused on ‘decolonizing the campus’ tying in with campaigns like #RhodesMustFall that led to the removal of a statue of the controversial colonizer from the UCT campus. This research will consider these protests at South African Universities in the larger societal context by focusing on the language debate at Stellenbosch University through the Open Stellenbosch Collective as well as the larger decolonization project. It will do so to shed light on how this movement ties in with the structural underlying problems South Africa is facing today – including its socioeconomic reality, discrepancies between intention and performance, and corruption – and the importance and challenge of such contentious politics.
  • Affective Politics and Colonial Heritage, Rhodes Must Fall at UCT and Oxford

    Affective Politics and Colonial Heritage, Rhodes Must Fall at UCT and Oxford

    Affective Politics and Colonial Heritage, Rhodes Must Fall at UCT and Oxford By: Britta Timm Knudsen (Aarhus University) Casper Andersen (Aarhus University) INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF HERITAGE STUDIES 2019, VOL. 25, NO. 3, 239 –258 https://doi.org/10.1080/13527258.2018.1481134 Affective politics and colonial heritage, Rhodes Must Fall at UCT and Oxford Britta Timm Knudsen a and Casper Andersen b aSchool of Culture and Communication, ARTS, Aarhus University, Denmark; bSchool of Culture and Society, ARTS, Aarhus University, Denmark ABSTRACT ARTICLE HISTORY The article analyses the spatial entanglement of colonial heritage strug- Received 29 September 2017 gles through a study of the Rhodes Must Fall student movement at the Accepted 17 May 2018 University of Cape Town and the University of Oxford. We aim to shed KEYWORDS light over why statues still matter in analyzing colonial traces and Colonial heritage; social legacies in urban spaces a nd how the decolonizing activism of the RMF movements; social media; movement mobilizes around the controversial heritage associated with affective politics; Cecil Rhodes at both places – a heritage that encompasses statues, decolonization buildings, Rhodes scholarship and the Rhodes Trust funds. We include a comparative study of the Facebook use of RM F as it demonstrates signi ficant di fferences between the two places in the development of the student movements as political activism. Investigating in more detail the heritage politics of RMF at UCT we fledge out what we call an affective politics using non-representational bodily strategies. We argue that in order for actual social movements to mobilize in current political controversies, they need to put a ffective tactics to use.
  • Leaders in the Civic Engagement Movement: South Africa October

    Leaders in the Civic Engagement Movement: South Africa October

    Leaders in the Civic Engagement Movement: South Africa Co-edited by Lorlene Hoyt and Amy Newcomb Rowe October signals the tenth edition of the expanded series and the first of three South African special editions in preparation for the #TNLC2014 to be held outside Cape Town in December 2014. This issue includes an introduction to South Africa and the University of Cape Town (UCT). Featured interviews include Dr. Max Price, Vice-Chancellor of UCT; Ms. Elli Yiannakaris, Director of the Raymond Ackerman Academy (RAA); and Ms. Samantha Mtinini, alumna of RAA and business owner. South Africa Located at the most southern tip of the African continent, the Republic of South Africa (RSA) is home to approximately 53 million people and several ethnic groups with 11 official languages. The Atlantic Ocean borders to the west, the Indian Ocean to the south and east, and Botswana, Zimbabwe, Mozambique and Swaziland share the northern border. The independent kingdom of Lesotho is located in the eastern central plain and entirely enclosed by the Republic. The landscape is diverse with open savanna of the Eastern Transvaal, rolling sand dunes of the Kalahari Desert and high peaks of the Drakensberg Mountains.1 Bantu-speakers from the Xhosa and Zulu groups were the first people to settle South Africa as early as 1000 BC. They slowly mixed with other Khoisan groups creating a shared linguistic feature of click consonants. From 1200 AD, they established tribal leaders and built the region’s first economic trade that reached as far as the Arabian Gulf and China. The first Europeans to arrive were the Portuguese in 1488, but permanent white settlement did not begin until 1652 when the English and Dutch established new colonies near the Cape.
  • Cape Town, South Africa DUKEENGAGE in SOUTH AFRICA

    Cape Town, South Africa DUKEENGAGE in SOUTH AFRICA

    DUKEENGAGE IN SOUTH AFRICA – CAPE TOWN Learning justice in post-apartheid South Africa Dates: June 11, 2020 – August 7, 2020 (Dates subject to change up until the point of departure) Service Themes: Human Rights & Civil Liberties Public Policy Women’s Advocacy & Women’s Empowerment Immigration & Refugees Program Focus Assisting social agencies seeking to improve life in townships, advocating for affordable housing access in the city, documenting the life histories of retired factory workers, and promoting health and economic reform. Program Leader(s) Anne-Maria Makhulu, Associate Professor of Cultural Anthropology and African & African American Studies. Anne-Maria’s research and teaching interests cover the history and anthropology of South Africa and specifically South Africa’s economic history, the migrant labor system, urbanization, “the right to the city,” as well as decoloniality in the university, and the student campus movements including #FeesMustFall and #RhodesMustFall. Program Overview The program begins with a two-day tour of the city and its environs. Students will visit monuments, institutions, and neighborhoods in order to better understand South Africa’s history of colonial settlement, apartheid, political struggle, and liberation. Following an initial orientation, students will dedicate the remainder of the program to working at a variety of social agencies. These are organizations seeking to advocate for and improve the lives of ordinary Capetonians. While some of the organizations focus on direct service work in Cape Town’s surrounding communities, others focus on creating a more just South Africa by pushing for structural changes in South Africa’s social, economic, and political system. These partners advocate for worker’s rights, socioeconomic, racial, and gender justice, women’s health and empowerment.
  • Pray for South Africa!

    Pray for South Africa!

    Pray for South Africa! CHURCH INITIATIVE TOWARDS RECONCILIATION IN SOUTH AFRICA These notes are adapted from a Prayer Guide prepared by Jericho Walls Prayer Network with contributions by Prof. Piet Meiring. Digital copies of prayer guide are available on www.jwipn.com _________________________________________________________________________________________ Introduction The turmoil and unrest and protests in our country, the recent broadening of racial tension, especially highlighted in the social media, as well as economic challenges ─ like the #Feesmustfall’ movement ─ are all legitimate concerns of South Africans. In the midst of all of this, the potential is high to lose hope, to start accusing each other, defend ourselves, and to use acts of violence as solutions to problems. The Church, as the Body of Christ, is an important vehicle to bring healing to a country’s people suffering and divided by a torrid history. Despite this we believe emphatically that God has a specific purpose for and with the country and its diverse people. We often fail to recall the 1994 miracle when South Africa managed to change to a democratic dispensation virtually without violence. Courageous leadership and much prayer undoubtedly aided the political transformation. Regrettably deep seated pain and distrust remains prevalent. At the same time, distressing social pathologies ─ e.g. high levels of corruption, unemployment, poverty, xenophobia, farm murders ─ torment most South Africans. The Church played a dynamic role during the transformation period. The prevailing precarious situation in our nation, again summons the Church of Jesus Christ to rise up, stand firm and lead prophetically! In our nation’s calendar June 16 is a day that symbolises and personifies past oppression, division, conflict, violence, distrust and agony.
  • Pathways to Free Education Pamphlet Volume 2

    Pathways to Free Education Pamphlet Volume 2

    Contents Pathways to Free Education: vol. ii: STRATEGY AND TACTICS 1 Nkosi sikelel' iAfrika Sethembile Msezane 3 Understandings the basics of the United Front Strategy Dinga Sikwebu with Brian Kamanzi 7 The Role of Popular Education in Movement Building Asher Gamedze & Julie Nxadi 9 How to write a memorandum Thabang Bhili 10 Chairing Meetings/Plenaries Rouen Thebus 12 Lessons on organising with High Schools Noncedo Madubedube & Nishal Kotecha Robb with Nyiko Maroleni 14 Comments on engaging with communities In dialogue with Ihsaan Bassier 16 Lessons on community organizing Ebraheim Fourie in dialogue with Kalila Hercules 19 Community and struggles and the tactics of land occupations in conversation with Petrus Brink Simon Rakei 24 On photography in social movements Zara Julius 26 The role film and documentaries in popular struggle: what you can do to practically get involved Nadine Cloete with Aaliyah Vayej & Aisha Hamdulay 30 Afrikan Music, Education and Being Together Ernie Koela and Asher Gamedze 31 Working With Community Media (then and now) Zubeida Jaffer talks to Brian Kamanzi 33 Policy as rules of the economic game. We are the players Kamal Kweku Yakubu 34 On the Working Class in Free Education Faisal Garba 36 Dureyah Abrahams on navigating her disability alongside campus protests Aisha Hamdulay 38 Pamphleting tactics: Model for Pathways to Free Education Pathways to Free Education Dinga Sikwebu, Sethembile Msezane, Thabang Bhili, Asher Gamedze, Julie Nxadi, Ihsaan Bassier, Nishal Kotecha Robb, Noncedo Madubedube, Ebraheim Fourie,