scholarly journals Subtitling and the promotion of multilingualism: the case of marginalised languages in South Africa

Author(s):  
Jan-Louis Kruger ◽  
Haidee Kruger ◽  
Marlene Verhoef

This article investigates the role that subtitling may play in the promotion of multilingualism in South Africa. After a reflection on the current language-political situation in the country, in particular as it pertains to the public broadcaster, the findings of a pilot study focusing on the role of subtitling in promoting multilingualism and language rights in South Africa are presented. The research involves aspects such as language status, attitudes and acquisition, focusing on two of the more marginalised languages in the country, namely Tshivenda and Xitsonga. It also touches on the impact of subtitling on comprehension.

2020 ◽  
Vol 23 (1) ◽  
pp. 355-385
Author(s):  
Brynne Guthrie

The Constitutional Court of South Africa has played a unique role in the country’s constitutional transition. This paper starts by detailing the historical and political context of the Interim Constitution which created the Constitutional Court and the constitutional principles. The article describes the approach of the Court in the First Certification Judgment (1996), analysing the impact of the Constitutional Court’s decision on the drafting of the final Constitution and the public more generally, before briefly outlining the role that the Court continues to play in protecting constitutional democracy as a ‘Guardian of the Solemn Pact’.


2015 ◽  
Vol 12 (4) ◽  
pp. 517-528
Author(s):  
Maxwell Agabu Phiri ◽  
Degracia Khumalo

This study was aimed at investigating the effectiveness of the social marketing goal in the implementation of Operation Gcin’amanzi (OGM) in Mofolo North, Soweto, South Africa. The paper is based on a quantitative in nature, although qualitative data was collected to confirm and clarify issues identified in the survey questionnaire. A process-based research approach was pursued in order to measure the impact of social marketing as a phenomenon that has been explored in changing consumer behaviour for the public good. Due to unsuccessful telephone calls to the Johannesburg Water’s communication centre (JW) there is a lack of information from them on specific studies or surveys conducted specifically on OGM since its inception. It is anticipated that the findings from this study will add value to the knowledge in the public sector by elevating the significant role of social marketing in the delivery of basic services projects. These projects are complex in nature as issues of equity, access and the impact on development have to be considered, unlike in traditional marketing approaches where it is the benefit and satisfaction of an individual consumer that is key.


2013 ◽  
Vol 16 (3) ◽  
pp. 285-306 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sifiso Mxolisi Ndlovu

The football unity talks which formally began in October 1976 were important because sport was integral to the debate about the national question in South Africa. At the time, football as a sport code was designated in negative and racist undertones as a ‘sport for blacks’ and rugby, golf, athletics, hockey, cricket and swimming were regarded as sporting codes reserved for white South Africans. These sports benefited immensely in terms of generous funding, infrastructure and facilities provided by the apartheid regime. This paper will be based on the following themes. First, it will focus on the broad legislative measures which reinforced separate development and racism in South Africa and how these laws impacted on the development of sport. Second, it will scrutinize the role of the multilateral, worldwide antiapartheid movement and boycott movement, Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA) and the Confederation of African Football (CAF) in using football sanctions as a tool to fight apartheid and racism in sport. Third, the football unity talks of 1976 will be analysed. This discussion will focus on issues inside the boardroom, the football field and what took place outside the boardroom and off the football field. Lastly, the impact of the unity on the players and the public at large-including the development of professional football since 1976 will be reviewed. A major theme which runs through the different sections is defined by the use and abuse of football as a tool for public and sport diplomacy. This was because the football unity talks in South Africa were as a result of what was taking place in the world of international, continental, national and local politics.


Author(s):  
Tamara Smovzhenko ◽  
Oryslava Korkuna ◽  
Ivan Korkuna ◽  
Ulyana Khromyak

Nowadays, according to decentralization and current legislation (Land Code of Ukraine, Resolution of the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine and the Law of Ukraine «On Self-Governance»), the public lands have been transferred to the CTCs since 1 February 2018. In 2018/2019, 788 CTCs received communal ownership of 1.68 ha of public lands. According to the Draft Law «On Amendments to Several Legal Documents of Ukraine on Agricultural Lands Turnover», the consolidated territorial communities become the legal entities and can acquire property rights to agricultural land plots. Therefore, transferring the lands to be used by the newly created CTCs is currently an urgent issue that requires extended scientific and practical research. The paper aims to research the role of land reform in Ukraine and its impact on increase of CTCs’ budget revenues. The stages of land reform and the development of the land reform in Ukraine as well as its implementation strategy are outlined. The disparities of the integrated satellite map and the data of the Land Cadaster of Ukraine in terms of unregistered lands are defined. The amount of a CTC budget’s increased revenues due to the reform is estimated. Statistical data on small, medium, and large farmers and their interest in the land reform are analyzed. The terms of selling the land to foreign investors and conditions of participation in land auctions are examined. The mechanisms of land purchase, selling, and lease in line with the land reform are suggested. Generalizing the presented aspects of the land reform in Ukraine and their impact on economic activity of the newly created CTCs, it can be argued that the process is quite positive and necessary for both communities and businesses in order to get additional budget revenues for CTCs. The land reform improves the living standards of Ukrainian people through the disclosure of the country’s agricultural capacity.


2021 ◽  
Vol 56 (1) ◽  
pp. 18-33
Author(s):  
Lucky Mathebe

After almost 25 years of what could justifiably be called transformative change in South Africa, a truism is that the country’s new legal order, established by the Constitution in 1993 and 1996, provides the critical foundation of peace and security upon which its freedom has been built. The Constitutional Court was one of the most important of the new democratic institutions in the shaping of the country’s position as a constitutional democracy, upholding the values for which millions of people, black and white, had fought. This article is a brief reflection on the role of the Court in establishing the meaning of this democracy and giving it effect. The main goal of the article is to understand how the Court’s new jurisprudence works in particular contexts, how its work is related to crime and punishment, and what it means for the rights of marginalised groups in society. Using the examples of the Court’s decision in Makwanyane on the death penalty, and the Court’s decision on the findings of the Public Protector’s report on Nkandla, the article finds that the Court’s new jurisprudence takes quite a different view of legal developments in South Africa, insofar as the jurisprudence entrusts broad discretion to the Court and emphasises the need for sustained leadership of the Court to advance the battle for fundamental human rights, the rule of law, and democratic accountability.


2014 ◽  
Vol 80 (4) ◽  
pp. 709-725 ◽  
Author(s):  
Calliope Spanou

The nature of the relationship between the public administration and politics and the subsequent role of the administration appear to be incompatible with the emergence of an administrative elite. After analysing the reasons for this incompatibility, the article explores the impact of the measures taken in the wake of the economic crisis on the civil service and its reform, and also the prospects for the development of a senior civil service. The key, and also the challenge, to any change in this direction remains the rebalancing of the relationship between the public administration and politics. Points for practitioners What might interest practitioners is the issue of the conditions of effectiveness of civil service reform in times of economic crisis and significant pressure.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Zhenyu Zhang ◽  
Patrick Laux ◽  
Joël Arnault ◽  
Jianhui Wei ◽  
Jussi Baade ◽  
...  

<p>Land degradation with its direct impact on vegetation, surface soil layers and land surface albedo, has great relevance with the climate system. Assessing the climatic and ecological effects induced by land degradation requires a precise understanding of the interaction between the land surface and atmosphere. In coupled land-atmosphere modeling, the low boundary conditions impact the thermal and hydraulic exchanges at the land surface, therefore regulates the overlying atmosphere by land-atmosphere feedback processes. However, those land-atmosphere interactions are not convincingly represented in coupled land-atmosphere modeling applications. It is partly due to an approximate representation of hydrological processes in land surface modeling. Another source of uncertainties relates to the generalization of soil physical properties in the modeling system. This study focuses on the role of the prescribed physical properties of soil in high-resolution land surface-atmosphere simulations over South Africa. The model used here is the hydrologically-enhanced Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF-Hydro) model. Four commonly used global soil datasets obtained from UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) soil database, Harmonized World Soil Database (HWSD), Global Soil Dataset for Earth System Model (GSDE), and SoilGrids dataset, are incorporated within the WRF-Hydro experiments for investigating the impact of soil information on land-atmosphere interactions. The simulation results of near-surface temperature, skin temperature, and surface energy fluxes are presented and compared to observational-based reference dataset. It is found that simulated soil moisture is largely influenced by soil texture features, which affects its feedback to the atmosphere.</p>


2021 ◽  
pp. 133-149
Author(s):  
I. Vietrynskyi

The paper focuses on the initial stage of the formation of the Commonwealth of Australia, and the process of its establishing as an independent State. The international political context for the development of the country, from the period of creation of the Federation to the beginning of the Second World War, is primarily viewed. The Commonwealth’s international position, its place and role in the regional and global geopolitical processes of the early XX century, in particular in the context of its relations with Great Britain, are analyzed. The features of the transformation of British colonial policies on the eve of the First World War are examined. The specifics of the UK system of relations with Australia, as well as other dominions, are being examined. The features of status of the dominions in the British Empire system are shown. The role of the dominions and, in particular, the Commonwealth of Australia in the preparatory process for the First World War, as well as the peculiarities of its participation in hostilities, is analyzed. The significance of the actions of the First World War on the domestic political situation in Australia, as well as its impact on dominions relations with the British Empire, is revealed. The history of the foundation of the Australian-New Zealand Army Corps (ANZAC) and its participation in imperial forces on the frontline of the First World War is analyzed. The success and failure of its fighters, as well as the role of ANZAC, in the process of formation an Australian political nation are analyzed. The economic, humanitarian and international political consequences of the First World War for the Commonwealth of Australia are examined, as well as the influence of these consequences on the structure of relations between the dominions and the British Empire. The socio-economic situation of the Commonwealth of Australia on the eve of World War II, in particular the impact of the Great depression on the development of the country as a whole and its internal political situation in particular, is analyzed. The ideological, military-strategic and international political prerequisites for Australia’s entry into the Second World War are being considered.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lydia Reid

In popular culture the relationship between science and religion has often been portrayed as one of conflict. The impact of the conflict thesis can be observed in church leaders’ hesitancy in talking about science and religion in the public domain. It was this finding that led Revd Professor David Wilkinson (cosmologist and theologian) and Professor Tom McLeish (physicist and Anglican lay reader) to form the project ‘Equipping Christian Leadership in an Age of Science’ funded by The Templeton World Charity Foundation. The data presented in this article (collected during 2015-2018) is derived from two discreet pieces of research. The first consisting of a survey of over 1,000 church leaders and interviews with 20 senior church leaders and, the second, with a strategic focus on ministerial training comprised of 12 interviews with church educationalists. This paper reflects on the findings from both pieces of research – covering topics such as church leaders’ enthusiasm towards science, how church leaders view the relationship between science and religion and the role of compartmentalisation in ministerial training. The article is unique in providing sociological analysis on the relevant data and including a personal reflection by David Wilkinson – the project’s director – on the implications of the research for ministerial training and science.


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