KovsieJournals - University of the Free State (UFS)
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Re-imagining early childhood education: A Freirean critique of eco-pedagogy’s absence in South Africa’s foundation phase
Get PDFThe escalating ecological crisis demands a rethinking of early childhood education, particularly within South Africa’s Foundation phase. This paper presents a conceptual analysis that draws on Paulo Freire’s critical pedagogy, eco-pedagogy, and play-based learning theories to examine the absence of eco-pedagogical practices in current curricula. Despite the Curriculum and Assessment Policy Statement (CAPS) including elements of environmental awareness, its treatment remains largely fact-based and disconnected from learners’ lived experiences. We argue that this approach reinforces a “banking” education model, limiting opportunities for children to develop ecological consciousness and agency. As a theoretical contribution, this paper proposes a framework for embedding play-based eco-pedagogy within the constraints of CAPS by: (a) integrating experiential activities such as nature walks, gardening, and environmental storytelling into life skills; (b) using guided play to link ecological concepts with literacy and numeracy outcomes; and (c) encouraging teachers to adopt dialogical, inquiry-driven practices that connect classroom content with local environmental realities. By situating eco-literacy at the intersection of play, critical pedagogy, and social justice, this paper outlines a transformative approach to early childhood education. The contribution is conceptual and practical: it provides a theoretical rationale for eco-pedagogy in the foundation phase. It illustrates how play can be a pedagogical vehicle for nurturing young learners’ capacity to engage with ecological and social challenges critically
Editorial: Selected readings on education development challenges in developing countries
Get PDFOverview
Although the terms developed / underdeveloped countries have become very controversial, it cannot be denied that there are differences between countries with high levels of economic and social development and countries at the lower end of the economic spectrum. In this series of articles, we want to explore education in countries facing various challenges in terms of their development, social and economic life, stability and instability in the country and other factors that mitigate against the offering of education. There are significant social and economic differences between developed and developing countries. Many of the underlying causes of these differences are rooted in the long development history of such nations and include social, cultural and economic variables, historical and political elements, international relations, and geographical factors
Labour and capitalism from the perspective of Giorgio Agamben’s inoperativity
Get PDFIn this article, Ramond Geuss’s theory of work is presented as a productionist model, which, as Honneth critiques, reduces labour to wage and product, thereby reducing the person, through capitalist logic, to an instrument who is disconnected from being and activity. In response, some scholars have drawn on Jean-Luc Nancy’s concept of inoperativity (désœuvrement) and being-with (être-avec), which challenges the means-to-an-end logic of capitalism by insisting that community is defined by productivity and the completion of a task. Work does not represent the community or person; therefore, the inoperative community unworks teleological modes of being. However, Nancy’s view, while ontologically rich and opening a space for community beyond a task-oriented mode, requires a more explicit biopolitical perspective. Giorgio Agamben offers such a more radical and politically potent concept of inoperativity (inoperosità). For Agamben, all work (as ergon or opera) is bound to a dualistic teleological structure – activity and inactivity for the sake of an end. Inoperativity suspends this structure, not to negate work or non-work, but to render the duality inoperative, opening it to new uses and freeing human activity from the constraints of market-driven productivity by imploding the ontology and history of control and resistance. This is not a withdrawal from work, but a transformation of its meaning in which life and labour become forms of life, being, and activity that subvert economic utility. From this perspective, inoperativity is transformative because its resistance is not framed in terms of debt or guilt, but as a potentiality that opens the possibility for happiness and freedom beyond obligation. Agamben’s broader critique of biopolitics situates inoperativity as both ontological and political, moving beyond Nancy’s being-with beyond function to a form of life that resists through potentiality, not through productivity
Reading Ubuntu relationality through a Levinasian lens
Get PDFUbuntu philosophy is a moral framework rooted in African traditions, emphasising interconnectedness, community, and a shared humanity that is based on a relational conceptualisation of the subject. In this article, I argue that Levinas’s radically passive ethical agent that operates through affective relationality rather than reason may be employed as instructive lens to lay bare the metaphysical dynamics at play in Ubuntu relationality – something which existing Ubuntu scholarship fails to do. While Ntibagirirwa (2018) argues in favour of conceiving of Ubuntu as a metaphysical concept he does not elucidate how exactly relationality may be accounted for. In other words, he fails to explain how and on what basis the metaphysical interconnectedness of the Self and the Other can be realised in the ethical obligation of altruism, which Ubuntu insists upon. A Levinasian reading of Ubuntu, I argue, finds its justification in their common contention that the humanness of the human being can only be verified in moral acts.
Shooting from the Hip: The critical discourse analysis of Setswana language spoken by ‘deculturalised’ presidents Ian Khama and Mokgweetsi Masisi Botswana
Get PDFFormer President of Botswana, Ian Khama (2008-2018), and his chosen successor, Mokgweetsi Masisi (2018- 2024), are said to be poor in the Setswana language and culture, owing to their perceived “deculturalisation”. To analyse these assumptions, the article employs Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) as its contextual framework. CDA uses a three- dimensional approach to discourse: as text, discursive practice, and social practice. These are influenced by factors such as sociocultural, power relations, struggle for power, ideology, hegemony, domination, and manipulation. The article draws from historical insights and analyses Khama and Masisi’s selected political utterances. In its analysis, it maintains that a case for “deculturalisation” can be made for the biracial and English-speaking Khama. Even if so, it posits that at the end of his presidency in April 2018, Khama’s spoken Setswana was reasonably good. Yet, it notes that during his political feud with Masisi (2018-2024), he knowingly used some discourteous words and phrases contravening the Setswana ethos of botho (civility). For Masisi, some claim that being a product of Botswana’s elite private English-medium schools, where Setswana language and culture are allegedly shunned and discouraged, has deleteriously affected his Setswana. In rejecting this view, the article contends that Masisi grew up, worked, and was immersed in a milieu of Setswana language and culture. Thus, he is extremely versed in nuanced Setswana. Despite this, some of his public utterances in Setswana are dysphemistic and against botho. Masisi has the propensity for overreaction and lacks public diplomacy and intuitive wisdom. Some suggest that these traits contributed to the Botswana Democratic Party’s loss in the 2024 general elections, after 58 years in power
Foreword
Get PDFReimagining the church and society in South Africa means facing the unfinished struggle between memory and hope. Our churches stand on the fault lines of history, in places scarred by race and poverty, where even the language of faith carries the residue of both hope and despair. The essays in this volume do not treat history as a mere backdrop; they engage it as something alive, shaping the language of faith and the imagination of the church. This helps us develop a grammar whereby we reimagine our relationship with God, our neighbour and our community. Together, the following contributions by leading South African theologians open a theological conversation where imagination becomes a site of transformation. Through this meeting of imagination and practice, a renewed public witness begins to take shape
A spatial network analysis of Da Lat City, Vietnam: Insights for sustainable urban growth
Get PDFThe General Master Plan for Da Lat City and its surrounding areas to 2030, with a vision to 2050, outlines a polycentric development strategy that seeks to balance heritage preservation, ecological protection, and urban expansion. However, the implementation of such strategies often encounters challenges, due to subjective evaluations and limited use of spatial evidence in planning processes. This study applies the Space Syntax theory to quantitatively assess Da Lat City’s urban spatial configuration, using four key metrics, namely connectivity, choice, integration, and depth. The results show that the central core demonstrates high levels of accessibility, whereas peripheral areas remain fragmented, due to steep terrain and disconnected street networks. The analysis suggests that enhancing internal connectivity provides a more sustainable approach to growth than outward expansion. The study also evaluates the alignment between the proposed Heritage and Landscape Axes and the existing street network. Findings indicate that both axes have the potential to structure movement and reinforce urban identity, although they require integration with traffic and land-use management, in order to be effective. By combining spatial network modelling with an assessment of statutory planning frameworks, this research supports evidence-based, heritage-sensitive, and topographically responsive planning strategies. It offers practical insights for medium-sized cities undergoing rapid urbanisation within culturally and ecologically sensitive landscapes
\u27Say no genocide\u27: discursive constructions of violence and identities around Gaza
No full textFrom online flame wars, to hostile responses to international university protests, to contested legal cases at the International Criminal Court and International Court of Justice, it is clear that there is a profound breakdown on consensual understanding of what is taking place in "the Middle East". This analysis argues that rather than focusing only on the veracity of specific events, there is value in analysing the ongoing catastrophe in Gaza in terms of how competing discursive constructions of violence and opposing subject positions are being created, the technologies through which these are mediated, and the interests which they serve. The phrase \u27say no to genocide\u27 can be understood in three different ways: to resist the current genocide in Gaza; to resist a historical recurrence of the Holocaust; and to denounce the use of the term \u27genocide\u27 to refer to the unfolding situation in Palestine. The work here is to analyse how streams of competing digital accounts are not simply aggregations of information, but are better understood as shaped by the technological systems through which they are distributed, and the meaning they are given by already established narratives. They further both construct and reflect incompatible subject positions linked to deeper historical processes. Here the analysis attends to both the systems of power in which these interpellations occur and the intergenerational trauma, ranging from colonisation to the Holocaust, which invests them with affect. This helps to account for the seeming intractability of the conflict and radical incommensurability of the accounts offered, while suggesting a set of problems to be solved before peace and social justice can be achieved
Creating a CSR master narrative through archetypes and the spectacle: The case of a South African corporate advocacy campaign
Get PDFThis research follows the constitutive approach to corporate social responsibility (CSR) and examines the discursive dimension of CSR communication through visual culture studies. It analyses communication from the South African Sun International CEO SleepOut™ campaign (2015-2018) within a phenomenological paradigm to explore its overarching CSR discourse. Three types of texts (visual, verbal, and physical space) formed the data corpus, analysed through a hermeneutical reading and thematic analysis. The findings reveal that the campaign used archetypes to construct a master narrative signalling the organisation’s humanistic values. This narrative featured five distinctive stages of emplotment, incorporating visual spectacles. The CEO SleepOut events were portrayed as visually appealing, offering Sun International a platform to perform its corporate identity. The campaign’s visuality was enhanced through social media content, while themes like resilience, unity, and self-sacrifice dominated the verbal discourse. By executing events in historically and symbolically significant locations, a strong CSR discourse was created. This study underscores how archetypes, spectacles, and symbolic spaces contribute to crafting unique CSR narratives. Practitioners could integrate these elements, especially the spectacle, as a feature of hypermodern communication to design CSR campaigns that are narrative-driven, immersive, and visually expressive
Integrating content and influencer marketing to enhance brand engagement: Quantitative insights from Kenyan marketing agencies
Get PDFWith the rise of influencer marketing, brands are searching for new ways to connect with their audiences in an increasingly crowded digital landscape. In response, this study investigates how Kenyan marketing agencies strategically integrate content and influencer marketing to increase brand engagement on social media platforms. A web-based survey and purposive sampling were used to collect data from Kenyan marketing agencies in 2023, while descriptive, correlation, and regression analyses were used for data analysis. Validity and reliability were established through a pilot test and internal consistency measures. The results, based on a realised sample of 87 responses, highlight the benefits of integrating content and influencer marketing. In particular, content marketing attributes such as relevance, authenticity, and consistency were found to be closely associated with higher levels of brand engagement in influencer marketing campaigns. Strategic partnerships and collaborations between brands and influencers further enhanced brand engagement. Interestingly, influencer marketing on its own was not a strong predictor of brand engagement. Therefore, this was a synergistic relationship that, when used together, achieved a level of effectiveness that neither could attain alone. This study addresses the paucity of research in the East African marketing context by providing culturally and geographically specific insights into how these strategies are integrated to drive brand engagement, overcome consumer scepticism, and build long-term trust. These insights have significance for marketers looking to tailor content marketing strategies to local contexts while taking advantage of the global rise of influencer marketing