Field Methods in the Study of Modern Culture Contacts

Africa ◽  
1935 ◽  
Vol 8 (3) ◽  
pp. 315-328 ◽  
Author(s):  
I. Schapera
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Field Study ◽  
Essential Elements ◽  
Culture Contact ◽  
Field Methods ◽  
Modern Culture ◽  
Short Statement ◽  
Opening Paragraph

Opening ParagraphPrevious contributors to this symposium have described in some detail the problem of culture contact as it appeared to them in their own fields, and the methods they employed in studying it there. I do not propose here to cover similar ground, particularly as I have already published a short statement of the lines along which I have been attempting during the last five years to inquire into the presentday culture of the Kxatla in Bechuanaland Protectorate. My purpose is rather to set down briefly what appear to me as the essential elements to be considered in any field study of modern culture contacts, as reflected, shall we say, in the relations between the European and Native inhabitants of South Africa.

scholarly journals Field study site selection, species abundance and monthly distribution of anopheline mosquitoes in the northern Kruger National Park, South Africa

2014 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 27 ◽  
Author(s):  
Givemore Munhenga ◽  
Basil D Brooke ◽  
Belinda Spillings ◽  
Leyya Essop ◽  
Richard H Hunt ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Field Study ◽  
Site Selection ◽  
National Park ◽  
Species Abundance ◽  
Kruger National Park ◽  
Monthly Distribution ◽  
Anopheline Mosquitoes

Theological Education and Missional Formation in the South African Context

2018 ◽  
Vol 35 (3) ◽  
pp. 179-191
Author(s):  
Jerry Pillay
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
South African ◽  
Theological Education ◽  
Essential Elements ◽  
South African Context ◽  
The South ◽  
African Context ◽  
Missional Formation

This article looks at theological education and missional formation in the South African context. It examines the understanding of theology and mission and connects it with theological education. It then proceeds to explore some of the essential elements that should constitute theological education in the South African context. The aim is to show that theological education in South Africa is in need of transformation.

A Uganda Secondary School as a Field of Culture Change

Africa ◽  
1952 ◽  
Vol 22 (3) ◽  
pp. 234-249 ◽  
Author(s):  
F. Musgrove
Keyword(s):  
Secondary School ◽  
Culture Change ◽  
Boarding School ◽  
Culture Contact ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Black And White ◽  
Opening Paragraph ◽  
Complementary Study

Opening ParagraphI Propose to examine the Uganda secondary boys' boarding-school, in which I teach, as an institution in culture contact; to consider how far its function must be interpreted in terms of its own dynamism and how far in terms of the parent cultures of the Black and White members of the community. The interpretation I make from data gained chiefly within the school is necessarily incomplete, and a complementary study by a field anthropologist, looking at the school from the point of view of outside society, is desirable. But within the limits of the data available to a schoolmaster I here offer a description and an analysis.

Social Aspects of First Fruits Ceremonies among the South-Eastern Bantu

Africa ◽  
1938 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 25-41 ◽  
Author(s):  
Max Gluckmann
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
East Coast ◽  
Social Aspects ◽  
The South ◽  
South Eastern ◽  
Fertile Soil ◽  
Actual Effect ◽  
Opening Paragraph

Opening ParagraphThe Zulu live on the south-east coast of South Africa, in a region of fertile soil, watered by fair summer rains which are occasionally interrupted by drought. Towards the end of the agricultural season they hold a great tribal ceremony, which Sir James Frazer cites as a typical first fruits sacrament, though the ceremony itself has many different rites. I hope in this paper to show that these, and the taboos on the early eating of the first fruits, together with the ritual approach to them, guard against socially disruptive forces. To the natives the importance of the ceremony is that it protects them against mystical powers; their actual effect must be sought by the anthropologist.

Prehistory and Ideology in Zimbabwe

Africa ◽  
1982 ◽  
Vol 52 (3) ◽  
pp. 1-19 ◽  
Author(s):  
P. S. Garlake
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Labour Force ◽  
Political Stability ◽  
Economic Prosperity ◽  
Great Zimbabwe ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Opening Paragraph ◽  
Stone Walls ◽  
The City

Opening ParagraphZimbabwe has adopted the name of the Shona state, centred on the city of Great Zimbabwe, which flourished between five and eight hundred years ago, and whose ruined stone walls are one of the most remarkable monuments in Africa. Great Zimbabwe was a considerable human achievement, evidence of the acquisition and management of a huge and docile labour force, of prolonged political stability and economic prosperity.When the British South Africa Company occupied the country in 1890 the monument became the subject of considerable settler polemic and controversy. While its origins were still uncertain Cecil Rhodes recognized the considerable propaganda value that evidence of ancient foreign settlement, preferably white and successful and with Biblical origins, would have. It would give a precedent and respectability to the conquest and a promise of similar prosperity to the settlers and investors in the new colony. Rhodes acquired many antiquities from Great Zimbabwe, and initiated excavations at the site and searches of the archives of Rome and Lisbon for documents referring to it. He himself sought parallels to its art in the museums of Cairo. He also commissioned eminent mining engineers to determine the origins and yield of the ‘ancient gold workings’ in the country. Finally, he had Richard Hall, an enthusiastic propagandist of the settler cause in newspapers, lectures and exhibitions, and a fanatical advocate of immensely old Biblical origins for Great Zimbabwe, appointed curator of the Ruins expressly to instruct important visitors in his theories.

scholarly journals Media and Information Literacy in South Africa: Goals and Tools

Comunicar ◽  
2012 ◽  
Vol 20 (39) ◽  
pp. 35-44
Author(s):  
Ibrahim Saleh
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Information Literacy ◽  
Social Inclusion ◽  
Cape Town ◽  
Essential Elements ◽  
The Media ◽  
Donor Agencies ◽  
University Of Cape Town ◽  
The University ◽  
Teachers Training

The South African government has emphasized the need to expand the role of media education to promote equal access, with a level of quality and relevance that will empower disadvantaged groups. However, it is a challenging, time-consuming process, as well as requiring considerable and consistent expenditure and partnerships between many donor agencies. There is little research on the causes behind unequal access to technology, or comparative studies of the barriers that impede the diffusion and adoption of media and information literacy in South Africa. It is thus not surprising that the media and information literacy component is still missing from the agenda that lists Africa’s myriad problems, as well as the absence of qualified teachers, training for the trainers and the presence of IT literacy in the curricula, all of which are essential elements for any future development. The UNESCO model of curricula could help close the digital divide and promote social inclusion. As a contribution to that goal, this study investigates some of the pertinent issues related to media and information literacy via a sample of students at the University of Cape Town. This research offers some practical solutions on how to help raise the levels of media and information literacy among the disadvantaged, in the case in South Africa. El gobierno de Sudáfrica ha realizado recientemente un enorme esfuerzo en la expansión del papel de la educación en medios, con el objeto de ofrecer un acceso equitativo y de calidad a toda la población, especialmente hacia los grupos desfavorecidos. Sin embargo, este proceso requiere tiempo y recursos ingentes y constantes, además de la necesaria colaboración de otras instituciones. Actualmente, existe en Sudáfrica escasa investigación sobre las causas de las desigualdades de acceso a la tecnología o los obstáculos que existen para la difusión y puesta en marcha de la alfabetización mediática en Sudáfrica. No es sorprendente, por ello, que entre los múltiples problemas que existen hoy en África todavía la alfabetización mediática e informacional no sea una prioridad. Siguen existiendo muchos maestros con escasos conocimientos en esta materia, la capacitación de formadores es muy pobre y su incorporación en programas de alfabetización muy anecdótica. El Currículum UNESCO MIL de Alfabetización Mediática es un reto para ayudar a superar esta brecha digital y promover la inclusión social. Con este objetivo, este estudio analiza algunas cuestiones relacionadas con la alfabetización mediática a partir de una muestra de estudiantes de la Universidad de Cape Town, proponiendo algunas soluciones prácticas sobre cómo ayudar a mejorar los niveles de alfabetización mediática e informacional en las sociedades menos favorecidas, como es el caso de Sudáfrica.

Culture Contact on the Fringe of Civilization

Africa ◽  
1935 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 163-170 ◽  
Author(s):  
A. T. ◽  
G. M. Culwick
Keyword(s):  
Social Order ◽  
Social Economic ◽  
Present Situation ◽  
Culture Contact ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
The Social ◽  
Opening Paragraph ◽  
Coil Method ◽  
Incomplete Picture ◽  
Careful Investigation

Opening ParagraphIt is natural that the urgent need for systematic study of culture contact should first and most forcibly be felt with regard to areas where the process of ‘civilization’ or modernization is already comparatively far advanced, whether it be in the form of detribalization in urban and industrial districts or of the adaptation of the tribal system among an important and powerful people like the Baganda. In the first place, those areas present the most pressing practical problems and exhibit the most acute symptoms of social, economic, and political strain. In the second place, as a corollary of their accessibility to exotic influences, they are the areas most easily accessible to observers trained and untrained, and their troubles often force themselves on the attention of the civilized world. They have, however, certain disadvantages from the point of view of the student of culture contact, in that, as Miss Mair has shown, the opportunity to study the stages in their development has gone for ever. By careful investigation a useful and reliable, if incomplete, picture can be drawn of the working of the social order just before the torrent of modern civilization broke in upon it, and the comparison between past and present which such a reconstruction makes possible provides us with knowledge which is both necessary for the explanation of existing phenomena and also of the greatest practical value. But just as one cannot tell by looking at the finished product whether a pot has been fashioned from the lump or by the coil method, so, in the absence of proper observation at the time, we cannot reconstruct a picture of the intermediate stages in the creation of the present situation, or ever know the details of the processes whereby native society adjusted itself to some innovations and was dislocated by others.

Sheep and Sheep-Herders in South Africa

Africa ◽  
1966 ◽  
Vol 36 (4) ◽  
pp. 432-438 ◽  
Author(s):  
A. R. Willcox
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
West Africa ◽  
Southern Africa ◽  
Roman Period ◽  
Middle Kingdom ◽  
Hair Sheep ◽  
South West ◽  
South West Africa ◽  
Opening Paragraph

Opening ParagraphIn a recent paper Mr. C. K. Cooke, F.S.A., discusses the questions of the introduction of sheep into Africa and their arrival in southern Africa (Cooke, 1965).Mr Cooke quotes Zeuner's conclusion (Zeuner, 1963) ‘that the first sheep in Africa were screw-horned hair sheep from Turkestan or Persia which reached lower Egypt about 5000 B.C. and Khartoum by 3300 B.C. This breed disappeared with the Middle Kingdom when it was replaced by a wool sheep and the fat-tailed sheep reached Africa only from the Roman period.’ Zeuner further asserts thatOne breed of sheep descended from the Egyptian hair-sheep had reached South-West Africa before the arrival of the Europeans. In these animals the profile is convex, the eyes are placed high on the skull and close to the drooping ears. The rams carry thick horns and a long ruff on the throat.

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