Location of development NGOs providing HIV and AIDS services to young people in Cape Town, South Africa

Author(s):  
R Kareithi ◽  
A Flisher
2015 ◽  
Vol 26 (3) ◽  
pp. 369-384 ◽  
Author(s):  
Clara Rubincam

This article highlights how African men and women in South Africa account for the plausibility of alternative beliefs about the origins of HIV and the existence of a cure. This study draws on the notion of a “street-level epistemology of trust”—knowledge generated by individuals through their everyday observations and experiences—to account for individuals’ trust or mistrust of official claims versus alternative explanations about HIV and AIDS. Focus group respondents describe how past experiences, combined with observations about the power of scientific developments and perceptions of disjunctures in information, fuel their uncertainty and skepticism about official claims. HIV prevention campaigns may be strengthened by drawing on experiential aspects of HIV and AIDS to lend credibility to scientific claims, while recognizing that some doubts about the trustworthiness of scientific evidence are a form of skeptical engagement rather than of outright rejection.


2017 ◽  
Vol 14 (26) ◽  
Author(s):  
Kathrin Houmøller

Denne artikel undersøger, hvordan tavshed udspiller sig i hverdagslivet i Khayelitsha township i Cape Town, Sydafrika, og hvad der driver dens udbredelse. I Sydafrika lever 5,6 millioner mennesker med hiv, og landet har verdens største aids- behandlingsprogram. Et udbredt fravær af mellemmenneskelig kommunikation om hiv og aids har ført til, at aids-epidemien i Sydafrika har været beskrevet som en epidemi af tavshed. Mens tidligere studier har fokuseret på smittevejen mellem tavshed og den sociale betydning af hiv og aids som en dødelig og stigmatiserende sygdom, belyser artiklen, hvordan tavshed også skal forstås i dens forbindelse til Khayelitsha som et specifikt sted, der intensiverer særlige vilkår for tavshed som en form for socialitet, der ikke er særlig for hiv og aids. Med et perspektiv på social smitte er det således artiklens argument, at det også er selve stedet - et hverdagsliv i tvungen intimitet – der smitter. Place is Contagious: hiv, aids medicine and the social life of silence in KhayelitshaThis article explores practices of silence in Khayelitsha township in Cape Town, South Africa, and seeks to investigate what drives silence as a widespread phenomenon. In South Africa, 5,6 million people are currently living with hiv and the country has the largest aids treatment programme in the world. The aids epidemic has often been paralleled to an epidemic of silence with reference to a significant absence of direct verbal communication about the disease. While previous studies have focused on the connection between silence and the association of hiv with death and stigma, the article argues that the spread of silence cannot be understood disconnected from Khayelitsha as a particular place that intensifies silence as a form of sociality not specific to hiv and aids. From a perspective on social contagion, the article argues that it is also the place itself – an everyday life in enforced intimacy – that is contagious. 


2006 ◽  
Vol 12 (26) ◽  
pp. 149-183 ◽  
Author(s):  
Steven Robins

The paper is divided into three sections. The first section focuses on the contested nature of the sexual politics that surrounded the Jacob Zuma rape trial. This sexual politics was not simply the background to the "real" politics of the leadership succession battle between pro-Mbeki and pro-Zuma factions. The rise of sexual politics after apartheid, this paper argues, has largely been due to the politicization of sexuality and masculinity in response to HIV/AIDS. Section two examines the ways in which ideas about "traditional" Zulu masculinity were represented and performed in the Zuma trial, introducing the tension between universalistic sexual rights and particularistic sexual cultures. The third section of the paper is concerned with innovative attempts by a group of young men in Cape Town to create "alternative masculinities" (Connell, 1996) in a time of HIV and AIDS.


Author(s):  
Sunelle Fouche ◽  
Mari Stevens

MusicWorks is a non-profit organisation based in Cape Town, South Africa, and offers psycho-social support through music to young people growing up in marginalised communities. In South Africa three hundred years of colonialism paved the way for Apartheid which left a legacy of waste, nepotism, corruption and the oppression of the majority of our country’s citizens. Its impact is still visible today and the consequences of past and current political, social and economic challenges has led to perpetuated patterns of poverty, gangsterism[1], unemployment, and family violence that are endemic to communities such as Lavender Hill where this MusicWorks project is situated. Encouraging and strengthening the resilience of young people within this community can empower them to not only break this cycle but also be part of the solution as they become contributing members of their community and society at large. Ebersöhn’s (2012) generative theory of relationship resourced resilience proposes that when individuals use relationships as a way to access, link, and mobilise resources, an enabling ecology is shaped that can foster positive adjustment in a largely at-risk environment. Drawing on this social-ecological understanding of resilience, this paper outlines the MusicWorks project in Lavender Hill and discusses case vignettes of music work with young people and the broader school community. The aim of the project is to co-create musical spaces where young people and those around them can access resourced relationships.   For the purpose of this paper the use of the term “gangsterism” is located firmly within the South African context, were terminology around “gangs” and “gangsterism” refers to a specific grouping of people who are involved in highly structured gangs whose criminal activity revolve mainly around illicit drug trade, with links to local and international organized crime networks ( Chetty, 2015; Goga, 2014; Shaw and Skywalker, 2016; Goga, 2014; Wegner et al., 2018). Several authors have linked the proliferation of gangs, specifically in Cape Town, to the forced removals of people during 1960 to 1980 as part of the Apartheid government’s Group Areas Act ( Chetty, 2015; Goga, 2014; Kinnes, 2017; Steinberg, 2004).  


2018 ◽  
Vol 51 (1) ◽  
pp. 59-76 ◽  
Author(s):  
Annah V. Bengesai ◽  
Hafiz T. A. Khan ◽  
Russell Dube

SummaryAlthough young people in South Africa are growing up in an era where their socioeconomic circumstances are seemingly better than those of their parents’ generation, they face greater risks in their trajectory to adulthood. This is mainly because the environment in which they are making sexual decisions is also rapidly evolving. Currently, South Africa has the highest prevalence of HIV and AIDS in the world among young people aged 15–24. This study examined the effect of sexual behaviours initiated in adolescence on enrolment in post-secondary education. The analysis was conducted using data from the longitudinal Cape Area Panel Study (CAPS, Waves 1–5) conducted in 2002–2009, which focused on young people’s sexual behaviours in Cape Town, South Africa. The sample was restricted to 3213 individuals who reported sexual debut during adolescence. Using logistic regression models fitted separately for males and females, the results revealed that several factors acted as either hindrances or protective factors to enrolment in post-secondary education. Early sexual debut (by age 17) was negatively associated with participation in tertiary education. Other variables that had a negative effect included not using contraception at first sex, parenthood, engaging in risky behaviours such as illegal substance use, cigarette smoking and drinking alcohol and neglect of school homework (doing less than an hour a day). Higher levels of parental education (except for paternal education in the female model), urban residence and higher aspirations and analogous behaviours (studying) acted as protective factors and were positively associated with post-secondary education initiation. The paper also points to the relationship between early sexual debut and persistent socioeconomic inequality and provides empirical evidence for re-thinking policy development and implementation around schooling and sex education.


2012 ◽  
Vol 53 (4) ◽  
pp. 34-36
Author(s):  
Ulrike Reisach ◽  
Mitja Weilemann

Die sozialen Probleme Südafrikas können nicht von der Politik alleine gemeistert werden. Das haben die großen intern internationalen Unternehmen in Südafrika längst erkannt und engagieren sich bei der Förderung von Schulen und Universitäten. Sie versorgen Schulen mit Mitteln und Ausstattung, um die nächste Generation mit dem auszustatten, was notwendig ist, um die großen gesellschaftlichen Herausforderungen dieses afrikanischen Landes zu bewältigen. Der Artikel basiert auf einem Projekt eines Team von der Hochschule Neu-Ulm, das sie in der Township von Khayelitsha in Kapstadt durchgeführt haben, und auf Interviews mit den verantwortlichen Unternehmensvertretern. Er erklärt wie BMW und T-Systems die Ausbildung von jungen Menschen unterstützen und ihnen ermöglicht, für ihre berufliche und persönliche Entwicklung zu lernen. Die Hürden, wie dabei zu überwinden sind, werden genauso aufgezeigt wie die Erfolge, die bereits erreicht wurden. The societal problems in South Africa cannot be mastered by politics alone. Foreign big companies are pace setters of progress in schools and universities. They provide schools with the skills and equipment to teach the next generation in what is necessary to overcome the huge societal and digital divide in the rainbow nation. The article is based on the research of a team from Neu-Ulm University of Applied Sciences in the township of Khayelitsha in Cape Town and on interviews with the responsible company representatives. It explains how BMW and T-Systems support the education of young people and enable them to learn for their professional and personal development. The hurdles which have to be overcome are shown as well as the achievements that have been accomplished. Keywords: „basic living skills“, t systems südafrika, cosat center for science and technology


2019 ◽  
Vol 16 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Mercy Magdalene Brown-Luthango

South Africa is experiencing a youth bulge, with much public debate about whether this spells success or disaster for the country’s future. Some of the critical debates highlighted in the literature on youth, centre on youth transitions to adulthood, socio-economic and spatial mobility linked to issues of identity, inclusion and citizenship as well as agency and negotiation of alternative transition pathways. This article explores some of these issues by tapping into the literature on youth transition pathways, and linking them to Castel’s notion of disaffiliation. The article argues that these sources of data allowed me to describe and make sense of the different dimensions of “stuckness” experienced by the youth, and of the impact that being stuck has on their sense of belonging, inclusion and notions of citizenship. I conducted interviews with 10 out-of-school, unemployed young people who reside in Tafelsig, Mitchells Plain, Cape Town. Participants were asked about their histories in the city, where they had lived, how they had ended up where they currently resided as well as their aspirations for their future, their neighbourhoods, the city and their country. The study’s findings were that short-term interventions might facilitate a slight shift in Castel’s continuum from disaffiliation to integration for at least some of the youth. However, in the long run, significant improvements in the education system, a restructuring of the economy to address unemployment, and a spatial reconfiguration of South African cities to reduce poverty and inequality will have a meaningful impact on the lives of young people in South Africa. These improvements must be accompanied by a broad range of social and cultural programmes, engaging youths from across different communities, in order to foster integration and social cohesion.


Author(s):  
Helen Oosthuizen ◽  
Sunelle Fouché ◽  
Kerryn Torrance

Music therapy in South Africa is slowly negotiating a practice that takes into account our continent's musical vibrancy, as well as contextual understandings of "health" and "illness." Although music therapy in the (so-called) developed world is situated within the paradigms of medicine, education, psychology and research - in the formal and often scientific sense - in South Africa, this practice needs to be re-defined to make it relevant to the contexts in which we work. The Music Therapy Community Clinic (MTCC) is a non-profit organisation whose aim is to provide music therapy services to previously disadvantaged communities in Cape Town, South Africa. Socio-political problems such as poverty, unemployment, gang violence and HIV and Aids have lead to the fragmentation and disintegration of many of these communities. The MTCC's Music for Life project emerged out of a need to provide after-school music activities and to reach a wider group of children than those seen for clinical music therapy sessions. As the project has developed and expanded, the music therapists have drawn in community musicians to offer an increasing range of musical activities to children. The collaboration between music therapists and community musicians has led to many questions about the roles and identities of each. This article is based on a presentation given by the MTCC at a Symposium for South African Arts Therapists held in Cape Town in June 2007. The article discusses the merits and challenges of the Music for Life Project and offers reflections from both community musicians and music therapists pertaining to our negotiated and changing roles as we continue to develop the project together.


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