Dismembered by Colonialism: On Nadine Gordimer’s July’s People and Its Engagement with the Dynamics of a Black Family Structure under Apartheid South Africa

Imbizo ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Siyasanga M Tyali
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Family Structure ◽  
Black Family ◽  
Negative Impact ◽  
Settler Colonialism ◽  
Community Relations ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Family Structures ◽  
Racial Relations ◽  
Black South African

Nadine Gordimer’s much celebrated novel, July’s People (1981), largely narrates the story of white and black community relations a decade before South Africa’s post-apartheid moment (1994). Whilst overtly focusing on various themes of racial relations, one of the passing, yet key thematic, concerns of the novel revolves around settler colonialism, including its apartheid chapter and how it dismembered black family structures in South Africa. Thus, the focus of this article is on July’s People and its capacity to register and pinpoint some of the continuities and discontinuities that have rendered black biological fathers absent from their families, especially from their young and growing children. The article concentrates on the novel’s ability to unmask the lasting negative impact of colonialism on the institution of fatherhood among black South Africans who have been subjected to settler colonialism. Whether these fathers were dismembered from their families as a result of employment migration systems or the alienation that developed as a result of their extended absences from home is a question this article addresses by analysing the novel in relation to such forms of family disintegration. Lastly, by juxtaposing the “perfect” family structure of the Smales against that of July’s (Mwawate), the article grapples with the way in which the novel acts as a register of how settler colonialism, including its apartheid moment, dismembered black South African families. 

scholarly journals The Association between Family Structure Changes and High School Completion in South Africa

2020 ◽  
Vol 9 (8) ◽  
pp. 133
Author(s):  
Annah Vimbai Bengesai ◽  
Nompumelelo Nzimande
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
High School ◽  
Young People ◽  
Educational Attainment ◽  
Family Structure ◽  
National Income ◽  
High School Completion ◽  
Family Structures ◽  
School Completion ◽  
Using Data

Over the past few years, family structures have been dramatically transformed, yet limited research from South Africa has assessed the effect on children’s developmental outcomes. Using data from the National Income Dynamics Study, we aim to contribute to the literature by examining the relationship between family structure disruption and high school completion in South Africa. Our sample consisted of 1649 young people who were aged 12, 13 and 14 in 2008 and their educational attainment was tracked through to 2017. The results from the logistic regression analysis demonstrate that family structure disruption is negatively associated with high school completion. After controlling for variation in household income change, the child’s educational factors and socio-demographic controls, young people who experienced a change from a co-resident family or were in stable non-resident parent family structures were up to 50% less likely to complete high school relative to those from undisrupted co-resident parent family structures. Given that family structure disruption is a widespread phenomenon in South Africa, research should consider it as a key determinant of educational attainment and policymakers should come up with holistic interventions to support families as well as allocate public resources in ways that can help reduce educational inequalities.

The Socio-Economic Challenges of South African Indigenous Musicians: A Case Study of Venda-Based Vho-Ntshengedzeni Mamphodo

2019 ◽  
Vol 29 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
N G Mugovhani ◽  
Lebogang Lance Nawa
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
South African ◽  
Empirical Data ◽  
Cultural Policy ◽  
Qualitative Case Study ◽  
Arts Management ◽  
Black South African ◽  
Indigenous Music ◽  
Entire Country

This article discusses and raises awareness about the socio-economic plight of indigenous musicians in South Africa. Through a qualitative case study of the Venda musician, Vho-Talelani Andries Ntshengedzeni Mamphodo, dubbed the “Father of mbila music,” the article highlights the fact that the welfare of Black South African artists, particularly indigenous musicians in South Africa, is generally a precarious affair. Their popularity, at the height of their careers, sometimes masks shocking details of exploitation, neglect, and the poverty they are subjected to, which are exposed only after they have died. Empirical data identifies this as a symptom of, among other things, cultural policy and arts management deficiencies in the promotion of indigenous music. The article aims to find ways to redress this unfortunate situation, which is partially a product of general apathy and scant regard that these artists have perennially been subjected to, even by their own governments, as well as some members of their societies. All these factors mentioned are compounded by ignorance on the part of South African artists. Part of the objective of this study was to establish whether the exposition of the Vhavenda musicians is a typical example of all Black South African indigenous musicians and, if this is the case, whether the suggested ways to redress this unfortunate situation could contribute to or play a role in alleviating the plight of such artists in the entire country.

Examining the entry of Walmart into South Africa: A stakeholder management perspective

2019 ◽  
Vol 38 (2) ◽  
pp. 78-89
Author(s):  
Tembinkosi Bonakele ◽  
Dave Beaty ◽  
Fathima Rasool ◽  
Drikus Kriek
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Trade Unions ◽  
Negative Impact ◽  
Stakeholder Management ◽  
Sources Of Information ◽  
Key Stakeholders ◽  
Management Perspective ◽  
Labour Standards ◽  
History Of ◽  
Primary Focus

The recent entry of the US multinational Walmart into South Africa has proved to be a source of controversy. Key stakeholders in South Africa objected to the merger and attempted to block it unless certain conditions were met. The aim of this study was to examine the controversy and the conditions surrounding the merger. The research employed a qualitative archival analysis to examine publicly available sources of information with regard to the merger. The findings revealed key stakeholders’ concerns that Walmart’s entry would lead to an increase in imports which would displace local producers, increase unemployment, marginalise trade unions and lower labour standards unless certain conditions were met. The results also revealed problems relating to the firm’s primary focus on “business” while neglecting “public interest” issues, naively relying on their “local retailer” to manage key stakeholders, and assuming that their perceived controversial reputation regarding treatment of trade unions and their views about unemployment as well as the controversies surrounding their history of entry into other global markets would not have the major negative impact it did on stakeholders in South Africa.

The Perpetuation of Gender Norms and White Hegemonic Patriarchy in the South African Defence Force as Represented in André van der Merwe’s Moffie (2006)

2020 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Bernard Nolen Fortuin
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Military Service ◽  
Well Being ◽  
The Novel ◽  
White Family ◽  
White Children ◽  
White Masculinity ◽  
Party Government ◽  
Compulsory Military Service ◽  
The Military

With the institution of compulsory military service in South Africa in 1948 the National Party government effected a tool well shaped for the construction of hegemonic masculinities. Through this, and other structures like schools and families, white children were shaped into submissive abiding citizens. Due to the brutal nature of a militarised society, gender roles become strictly defined and perpetuated. As such, white men’s time served on the border also “toughened” them up and shaped them into hegemonic copies of each other, ready to enforce patriarchal and racist ideologies. In this article, I look at how the novel Moffie by André Carl van der Merwe (2006) illustrates hegemonic white masculinity in South Africa and how it has long been strictly regulated to perpetuate the well-being of the white family as representative of the capitalist state. I discuss the novel by looking at the ways in which the narrator is marked by service in the military, which functions as a socialising agent, but as importantly by the looming threat of the application of the term “moffie” to himself, by self or others.  

scholarly journals Rethinking nineteenth-century literary culture: British worlds, southern latitudes and hemispheric methods

2021 ◽  
pp. 002198942098201
Author(s):  
Sarah Comyn ◽  
Porscha Fermanis
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
New Zealand ◽  
Literary Culture ◽  
Settler Colonialism ◽  
Indigenous Studies ◽  
Literary Cultures ◽  
History Of ◽  
Literary Canons ◽  
Methodological Position

Drawing on hemispheric, oceanic, and southern theory approaches, this article argues for the value of considering the nineteenth-century literary cultures of the southern settler colonies of Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa from within an interconnected frame of analysis. First, because of their distinctive historical and structural conditions; second, because of the density of their interregional networks and relations across intersecting oceanic spaces; and third, because of the long history of racialized imperialist imaginaries of the south. This methodological position rethinks current approaches to “British world” studies in two important ways: first, by decoupling the southern settler colonies from studies of settler colonialism in North America; and second, by rebalancing its metropolitan and northern locus by considering south-south networks and relations across a complex of southern islands, oceans, and continents. Without suggesting either that imperial intercultural exchanges with Britain are unimportant or that there is a culturally homogenous body of pan-southern writing, we argue that nineteenth-century literary culture from colonial Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa — what we call a “southern archive” — can provide a counterbalance to northern biases and provide new purchase on nation-centred literary paradigms — one that reveals not just south-south transnational exchanges and structural homologies between southern genres, themes, and forms, but also allows us to acknowledge the important challenges to foundational accounts of national literary canons initiated by southern theory and Indigenous studies scholars.

scholarly journals Pandemic Prevention: Lessons from COVID-19

Encyclopedia ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 433-444
Author(s):  
Mario Coccia
Keyword(s):  
Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome ◽  
Infectious Diseases ◽  
Health System ◽  
Negative Impact ◽  
Lessons Learned ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Policy Responses

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is caused by the novel severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), which appeared in late 2019, generating a pandemic crisis with high numbers of COVID-19-related infected individuals and deaths in manifold countries worldwide. Lessons learned from COVID-19 can be used to prevent pandemic threats by designing strategies to support different policy responses, not limited to the health system, directed to reduce the risks of the emergence of novel viral agents, the diffusion of infectious diseases and negative impact in society.

South Africa’s increasing climate variability and its effect on food production

2021 ◽  
pp. 003072702110049
Author(s):  
Mashudu Tshikovhi ◽  
Roscoe Bertrum van Wyk
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Climate Variability ◽  
Food Production ◽  
Fixed Effects ◽  
Crop Yields ◽  
Negative Impact ◽  
Secondary Data ◽  
Mean Annual Temperature ◽  
Fixed Effects Panel Regression ◽  
The Impact

This study examines the impact of increasing climate variability on food production in South Africa, focusing on maize and wheat yields. A two-way fixed effects panel regression model was used to assess the climate variability impacts, analysing secondary data for the period 2000 to 2019 for nine provinces in South Africa. The study found that increasing climate variability has a negative impact on maize and wheat production in South Africa. Specifically, the results indicated a negative correlation between mean annual temperature with both maize and wheat yields. A decrease in precipitation affected maize yields negatively, while the impact on wheat yields was positive, although insignificant. This analysis, therefore, depicted that crop yields generally increase with more annual precipitation and decrease with higher temperatures. The study recommends that funding initiatives to educate farmers on increasing climate variability and its effects on farming activities in South Africa should be prioritised.

Mixed-gender ownership and financial performance of SMEs in South Africa

2016 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 117-136 ◽  
Author(s):  
Beatrice Desiree Simo Kengne
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Financial Performance ◽  
Negative Impact ◽  
Firm Survival ◽  
Industrial Sector ◽  
Individual Characteristics ◽  
Small Sample ◽  
Gender Composition ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Mixed Gender

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to investigate whether the presence of women among owner-stakeholders affects firms’ financial performance. Particularly, it extends the corporate governance literature by linking stakeholder theory and gender differences to explain why gender composition of ownership matters for firms’ performance. As the management of small and medium-scale enterprises (SMEs) revolves around owner-managers and their individual characteristics that are likely to affect their achievements, the study further investigates the relationship between the gender composition of ownership and the firm survival. Design/methodology/approach Using survey data on SMEs for 2007 and 2010, this study uses a panel-level heteroskedasticity technique and a probit methodology to assess the effect women’s presence among owners may exert on SMEs performance and survival, respectively. Findings Results indicate that firms jointly owned by men and women appear to perform better than those owned by men although the presence of women among owners does not correlate with firm survival. Research limitations/implications While the findings of this study shed some light on the performance impact of gender composition of firm ownership, reports based on the presence of women among owners may not present the full picture. Whether the ownership is shared equally between different genders might provide further insides on the magnitude and/or robustness of such effect. Moreover, a small sample period (T = 2) was used to analyse a single industrial sector (manufacturing), and even though the Hausman test confirmed the use of random-effects specification, caution should be taken when generalizing the findings to other cases. Practical implications The findings suggest that the leadership in mixed-gender context propels a perspective of women as a valuable resource within SMEs, but relying on it to sustain the survival would be unwise. Social implications South Africa scores particularly high on positive actions towards women entrepreneurship, and this is compounded in the SMEs sector by managerial attitudes that could offer positive developments for women. Originality/value The positive and significant relationship between women’s presence among owners and SMEs financial performance in South Africa complements the almost exclusively reported negative impact of gender diversity on firm performance. Consequently, mixed-gender owners’ team can be used as a fulcrum to promote SMEs growth in South Africa.

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