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    Evaluating black women's participation, development and success in doctoral studies : a capabilities perspective
    (Stellenbosch University, 2016-01-01) Loots, S.; Ts'ephe, Lifutso; Walker, M.
    Although black women show an increased presence in doctoral study, the probability of intersecting gendered and racial disadvantage is often overlooked through relying on separate numerical transformation progress indicators for gender and race. To take a more active approach to furthering social justice for this marginalised group, we need to explore more holistic ways of mapping transformation. In this sense, we argue for the application of the capabilities approach as an evaluative framework which allows for an assessment of freedoms or capabilities students are able to make use of in pursuing the lives they have reason to value. Furthermore, factors impacting on students’ capability formation are also considered, thus providing a multidimensional, ethically individualistic exploration of lives. The experiences of seven black women speak of barriers they have experienced throughout their doctoral journeys, but the data also create a sense of optimism as the potential of capability expansion is addressed.
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    Can Using Online Formative Assessment Boost the Academic Performance of Business Students? An Empirical Study
    (Kamla-Raj, 2015) Oellermann, Susan Wilma; Van der merwe, Alexander Dawid
    The declining quality of first year student intake at the Durban University of Technology (DUT) prompted the addition of online learning to traditional instruction. The time spent by students in an online classroom and their scores in subsequent multiple-choice question (MCQ) tests were measured. Tests on standardised regression coefficients showed self-test time as a significant predictor of summative MCQ performance while controlling for ability. Exam MCQ performance was found to be associated, positively and significantly, with annual self-test time at the 5 percent level and a significant relationship was found between MCQ marks and year marks. It was concluded that students’ use of the self-test tool in formative assessments has a significant bearing on students’ year marks and final grades. The negative nature of the standardised beta coefficient for gender indicates that, when year marks and annual self-test time are considered, males appear to have performed slightly better than females.
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    Women in selected rural municipalities: Resilience and agency against vulnerabilities to climate change
    (Taylor and Francis, 2014-11-03) Meyiwa, Thenjiwe; Maseti, Thandokazi; Ngubane, Sizani; Letsekha, Tebello; Rozani, Carina
    The role of rural women in eradicating poverty and ending hunger has been recognised by both scholars and practitioners. There is an acknowledgement that women serve a critical role in the agricultural labour force, subsistence farming, and rural development in sub-Saharan Africa, yet their central role in food security has been largely ignored, particularly in policy (Govender, 2012). Although much of the labour of rural women is not nationally defined as economically active employment these women still spend long hours in undervalued productive and reproductive work to ensure the well-being of their households. Linked to this role is the challenge of dealing with rapidly changing climatic conditions. Women assume primary responsibility in fetching water and wood for meal preparation, and in tilling the ground. They are among the most vulnerable groups to climate change as a result of their precarious environmental livelihoods. Using data from a workshop with rural women to discuss climate change and qualitative interviews with rural women in selected rural communities in the Eastern Cape and KwaZulu-Natal we explore the meaning of climate change. We report on the way climate change is understood, its effects on rural livelihoods and some responses to climate change problems experienced by the women in the communities. The women in the rural communities highlight that there are also social problems that have arisen from water scarcity. As a result of the household division of labour, rural girls confront particular challenges as they need to search further from home for water and are exposed to the risk of gender violence.
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    Gendered naming and values attached to amaXhosa Amakrwala (Graduate-initiates)
    (Kamla-Raj, 2014) Meyiwa, Thenjiwe; Cekiso, Madoda
    This paper is based on a study that explored the gendered naming and values attached to the amaXhosa amakrwala, and the kind of behaviour expected from them after being ‘declared men’. Drawing from an empirical study that sought to understand the conceptual underpinnings of the practice, the paper presents the perceptual voices of both the graduate initiates and name-givers. The study was qualitative in nature and the participants were selected purposefully. Interviews of 40-50 minutes were conducted in the isiXhosa language which was the mother tongue of the respondents. The data was collected from10 graduate-initiates, 4 male name-givers and 2 female name-givers. The results revealed that the names given to amaXhosa graduate-initiates reflected social identity, values and social expectations.
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    Crossing from violence to nonviolence : pedagogy and memory
    (UKZN, 2012) Hemson, Crispin
    This qualitative case study addresses the use of memories of violence in a workshop with ten young student leaders in Durban. The pedagogy included the use of guidelines and gender-based groups as ways of enabling safety. A particularly direct discussion of gender and its relationship to violence followed, though violence in relation to other social identities was also explored. Walkerdine’s work (2006) on border crossing is used to analyse the data from the records of discussion and evaluation comments. The argument is that such a pedagogy enabled participants to address some of the sedimented connections that held them to relationships based on violence. Generally, if we understand violence as caught up in social identities, work on memories of violence will require attention to dynamics related to the identities present. While gender’s relation to violence is central in this context, further cases in which the pedagogy is structured around other social identities would extend our understanding.