Despite the noble goals of the new South Africa and its ideals of racial harmony, racial tensions remain a major problem in the country. Prejudice and bigotry persists even in universities.
More than two decades after apartheid ended, South African universities still tend to offer a view of the country and continent that is rooted in colonial and apartheid thinking.
Universities are so busy trying to make ends meet that there’s no time to listen to their communities’ stories. It’s crucial to develop safe spaces where tough conversations can happen.
Student activists are losing faith in the legacies of anti-apartheid heroes like Nelson Mandela. Perhaps all South Africans should do the same. It may just be what the country needs for its future.
The system of apartheid is long gone. But its legacy of poor funding for historically black universities - and of planning that banished black universities to cities’ margins - remains.
Yusuf Sayed, Cape Peninsula University of Technology
Teachers in South Africa need far more high quality professional development, policy direction and support to take social cohesion from concept to classroom
Decolonising the curriculum is far more nuanced than replacing theorists and authors. Universities first need to define how they approach the development and dissemination of curricula.
South Africa’s university students have shown that they can have an impact on the political landscape. That’s why it’s so important that they exercise their right to vote.
In South Africa there’s a value judgment attached to students who take part in universities’ English for Academic Purposes programmes. This shouldn’t be the case.
Decolonisation of the curriculum doesn’t have to mean the destruction of Western knowledge, but it’s decentring. Such knowledge should become one way of knowing rather than the only way.
Taking stock of modernist buildings and their potential for reuse is a necessary public project in Johannesburg. A new book that tells the stories of reuse in this African metropolis can help do that.
Sections of South Africa’s student movements regard transformation as a complete failure. Responding to this perceived failure, some have adopted an anti-democratic stance.
South Africa needs to build a mental infrastructure that will allow people to individually and collectively engage in a bold, courageous and trutfhul dialogue.
Chief Research Specialist in Democracy and Citizenship at the Human Science Research Council and a Research Fellow Centre for African Studies, University of the Free State
South African Research Chair in Teacher Education; Director of Centre for International Teacher Education (CITE) & Professor of International Education and Development Policy (University of Sussex, UK), Cape Peninsula University of Technology