Traversing Doctoral Borderlands: Black doctoral students’ experiences of identity construction in South Africa
- Authors: Hwami, Rudo Fortunate
- Date: 2021-10-29
- Subjects: Doctoral students South Africa , College students, Black South Africa , Marginality, Social South Africa , Public spaces Social aspects , Culture Social aspects , Rhythm , Identity (Psychology) , Borderlands Theory
- Language: English
- Type: Doctoral theses , text
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/191062 , vital:45055 , 10.21504/10962/191062
- Description: Doctoral studies are described as a process of formation and becoming. This is an in-between space between unknowing and knowing, within and without the ivory tower of academia. In this in-between space the doctoral candidate takes the role of a novice and apprentice unlearning the student/unknowing past and learning to become a professional in academia. This project utilises the borderlands theory to understand the experiences of doctoral students as they undergo the process of becoming and intellectual identity formation. Whilst ‘journey’ and other metaphors that have been used to understand doctoral student experiences capture the process of becoming as a progression through the liminal stages – proposal, literature review, context, writing, reading etc. These stages presuppose temporality of being leading to stasis/completion. I argue that such conceptualisation of doctoral studies, although useful, depict one side of the story and provide a limited, monolithic, and homogenising understanding of the spatial configurations of doctoral space and intellectual identity formation. The dominant discourses of doctoral conceived and perceived space, liminal stages and understanding of doctoral student experiences, mask the more latent and intimate liminal stages of intellectual identity formation. Drawing from borderlands theory, I firstly argue for a holistic approach to understanding the spatiality of doctorate studies. Secondly, I argue that liminality is an everyday process integral to human existence where one is always in a state of ideological transition. An important state of liminality is the awareness of ‘Self’ in perpetual motion, caught between two worlds dominated/dominator and two ideologies of oppression/resistance. If this side of liminality is not made visible, institutional spaces, such as the doctorate, privileged with the power to disseminate and position onto-epistemologies as universal can be used to reproduce and reinforce exclusionary onto-epistemologies that subsequently impact intellectual identity formation. Using Lefebvre’s (1991) rhythmanalysis method, I use student experiences not as mere data for analysis, but as an act of envisioning, reinventing and coknowledge production to propose borderlands as a new metaphor to study doctoral spatial realities and the experiences of the students that traverse through it. , Thesis (PhD) -- Faculty of Humanities, Politics and International Studies, 2021
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2021-10-29
- Authors: Hwami, Rudo Fortunate
- Date: 2021-10-29
- Subjects: Doctoral students South Africa , College students, Black South Africa , Marginality, Social South Africa , Public spaces Social aspects , Culture Social aspects , Rhythm , Identity (Psychology) , Borderlands Theory
- Language: English
- Type: Doctoral theses , text
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/191062 , vital:45055 , 10.21504/10962/191062
- Description: Doctoral studies are described as a process of formation and becoming. This is an in-between space between unknowing and knowing, within and without the ivory tower of academia. In this in-between space the doctoral candidate takes the role of a novice and apprentice unlearning the student/unknowing past and learning to become a professional in academia. This project utilises the borderlands theory to understand the experiences of doctoral students as they undergo the process of becoming and intellectual identity formation. Whilst ‘journey’ and other metaphors that have been used to understand doctoral student experiences capture the process of becoming as a progression through the liminal stages – proposal, literature review, context, writing, reading etc. These stages presuppose temporality of being leading to stasis/completion. I argue that such conceptualisation of doctoral studies, although useful, depict one side of the story and provide a limited, monolithic, and homogenising understanding of the spatial configurations of doctoral space and intellectual identity formation. The dominant discourses of doctoral conceived and perceived space, liminal stages and understanding of doctoral student experiences, mask the more latent and intimate liminal stages of intellectual identity formation. Drawing from borderlands theory, I firstly argue for a holistic approach to understanding the spatiality of doctorate studies. Secondly, I argue that liminality is an everyday process integral to human existence where one is always in a state of ideological transition. An important state of liminality is the awareness of ‘Self’ in perpetual motion, caught between two worlds dominated/dominator and two ideologies of oppression/resistance. If this side of liminality is not made visible, institutional spaces, such as the doctorate, privileged with the power to disseminate and position onto-epistemologies as universal can be used to reproduce and reinforce exclusionary onto-epistemologies that subsequently impact intellectual identity formation. Using Lefebvre’s (1991) rhythmanalysis method, I use student experiences not as mere data for analysis, but as an act of envisioning, reinventing and coknowledge production to propose borderlands as a new metaphor to study doctoral spatial realities and the experiences of the students that traverse through it. , Thesis (PhD) -- Faculty of Humanities, Politics and International Studies, 2021
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2021-10-29
Researching research culture: a case study of Rhodes University Humanities Faculty research culture
- Authors: Hwami, Rudo Fortunate
- Date: 2017
- Subjects: Rhodes University. Humanities Faculty , Rhodes University -- Graduate work , Rhodes University. Humanities Faculty -- Research , Research -- South Africa -- Makhanda
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MSocSc
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/7522 , vital:21269
- Description: This thesis explores the idea of research having organisational characteristics which are affected by the institutional culture but can not be defined as a subculture of the institutional culture. In particular, it examines how research culture(s) can be exclusionary and reproduce discriminatory practices. Using quantitative data in the form of Rhodes University Annual Reports and interviews conducted with 11 participants, the thesis documents the current research practices of the Faculty of Humanities at Rhodes University. Such practices incorporate multiple dimensions, including how research is done, who does research, what research is done and research funding rituals. The purpose of this study is to reveal how research cultures are constructed through the seemingly mundane and everyday research practices within a research community. Through the analysis of these everyday practices, participants’ experiences and theoretical arguments, this thesis found that research culture and institutional culture are separate entities, and that research culture plays a vital role in the formation of research practices.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
- Authors: Hwami, Rudo Fortunate
- Date: 2017
- Subjects: Rhodes University. Humanities Faculty , Rhodes University -- Graduate work , Rhodes University. Humanities Faculty -- Research , Research -- South Africa -- Makhanda
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MSocSc
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/7522 , vital:21269
- Description: This thesis explores the idea of research having organisational characteristics which are affected by the institutional culture but can not be defined as a subculture of the institutional culture. In particular, it examines how research culture(s) can be exclusionary and reproduce discriminatory practices. Using quantitative data in the form of Rhodes University Annual Reports and interviews conducted with 11 participants, the thesis documents the current research practices of the Faculty of Humanities at Rhodes University. Such practices incorporate multiple dimensions, including how research is done, who does research, what research is done and research funding rituals. The purpose of this study is to reveal how research cultures are constructed through the seemingly mundane and everyday research practices within a research community. Through the analysis of these everyday practices, participants’ experiences and theoretical arguments, this thesis found that research culture and institutional culture are separate entities, and that research culture plays a vital role in the formation of research practices.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2017
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