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30 October 2018
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Story Rulanzen Martin
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Photo Peet van Aardt
Some of the student writers who contributed to the anthology that tells their stories in Sesotho, isiXhosa, isiZulu, English and Afrikaans.
How do you transform the higher education curriculum? You involve the exact people the curriculum is intended for. The book, Initiative for Creative African Narratives (iCAN,) illustrates how decolonisation can be achieved through literature for students by students.
iCAN is an initiative by the Centre for Teaching and Learning (CTL) at the University of the Free State (UFS) to mentor students in creative and narrative writing. Under the mentorship of Dr Peet van Aardt, project coordinator, and Ace Moloi, author and UFS alumnus, iCAN Volume 1 was recently launched with 47 short stories written by UFS students.
“The project is a response from the centre for the ever-increasing need for decolonised curricula, steeped in the local cultural perspective of ubuntu,” said Dr Van Aardt.
“This book is an example for how decolonisation can be implemented,” said Prof Francois Stydrom, Senior Director of CTL. The overall aim of the iCAN project is to have the content that materialised from it to be included in the curriculum of first-year students at UFS in the near future.
Book provides multiple voices
Starting in May 2018, CTL presented a series of creative writing workshops on all three of the UFS campuses. “It’s a medium that allows a diverse range of students to express their views and develop their voices as writers,” said Prof Strydom.
It is a form of empowerment, to pass the baton to students to improve the UFS curriculum by writing and publishing their own stories, thereby contributing to larger bodies of knowledge through their lived experiences.
“I believe we as a university need to enable students so that they move away from just being users to becoming contributors to the curriculum,” Dr van Aardt concluded.
It's almost time for Rag procession 2012
2012-01-25
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| This year Rag is bigger and better. |
This year’s Kovsie Rag of our universities Bloemfontein Campus promises to stand out head and shoulders above all previous years.
Kovsie Rag and Kovsie Community Service joined hands and is now known as Kovsie Rag Community Service.
For this reason, during this year’s Rag Procession in Heidedal and Mangaung, Kovsie Rag Community Service will distribute food parcels in this community.
The processions in Heidedal and Mangaung will both take place on Saturday 28 January 2012 at 10:00.
In Heidedal participants in the Rag Procession will distribute food parcels at the Twin City Shopping Centre and in Mangaung food parcels will be distributed at the Kenilworth Shopping Centre.
The programme for the Rag Procession is also well underway and first-years are eagerly building floats for this year’s Rag Procession on Saturday 28 January 2012
At 18:00 the main procession will start from the UFS and move to the final destination at Old Greys where DJ Black Coffee and Die Heuwels Fantasties will perform.
For the first time in Rag history, a Mr Rag will this year be crowned together with Miss Rag at the Crowning Ceremony Ball on Friday 3 February 2012.
The purpose of Kovsie Rag Community Service is to raise funds for charity and it is currently the biggest of its kind in South Africa.
“We are in the process of exceeding all expectations” says Pieter Badenhorst, Kovsie Rag officer.