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18 November 2020 | Story Eugene Seegers
Prof Daniel Green - Guest speaker at UICSJ webinar
Prof Daniel Green is the guest speaker at the UICSJ webinar.

Signs, symbolism, and statues at universities often recall colonial and apartheid legacies. In South Africa – since students at the University of Cape Town marched to topple a statue of Cecil John Rhodes – a so-called ‘Fallist Movement’ emerged that aims to decolonise universities. In 2020, catalysed by the death of George Floyd, the Black Lives Matter Movement has emerged, with a strong emphasis on removing symbols and practices that perpetuate segregationist legacies and harms of slavery, apartheid, and colonialism. Fallist and Black Lives Matter protests are against injustice and for dignity, equality, freedom, peace, and justice in society. As with other South African and global universities, the University of the Free State is a site of slow, complicated, and often conflict-ridden struggles for transformation. 

The Unit for Institutional Change and Social Justice (UICSJ) will be hosting a webinar with the theme (Re)moving, (Re)naming, (Re)forming, and (Re)presenting: Towards Dignity, Care, and Social Cohesion in Higher Education, on 24 November 2020.

This webinar will ask pluriversal questions with the aim of restoring dignity within new, dense notions of communities that are capable of the kinds of care that grant dignity and worth to all. In particular, this virtual conference will speak to experiences and struggles related to changing how spaces, symbols, artefacts and other oppressive accoutrements endure at universities, conveying meanings, narratives, and cultures that must be overcome. The webinar will (re)centre critical and creative voices. Local and international participants will present multiple dimensions on the struggles involving naming and renaming, as well as the removal, recontextualisation, or replacement of statues and memorabilia, within a broader effort towards social justice.  

What the webinar seeks to address

  1. How do we address signs, symbolism, and statues in public spaces that misrepresent or degrade an individual/group with a view to restoring (collective) dignity?
  2. How do we address signs, symbolism, and statues that memorialise/celebrate people or representations of history that are controversial?
  3. How do we deal with the strong emotive/affective aspects of history and heritage, culture, and the loss thereof, in a way that enhances dignity and justice?
  4. What are the best processes for reconstructing public spaces and who should be involved in broad-based consultations?

Speakers and panel experts

Speaker: Prof Daniel Green (University of Wisconsin-La Crosse)

For an interesting background, please feel free to access and watch Prof Green’s YouTube video titled Racism and Native American Statuary, which you can find at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k70-xc811Po.

Panellists:

Facilitated by Dr Dionne van Reenen (Unit for Institutional Change and Social Justice, UFS).

 

Hosted by: The Unit for Institutional Change and Social Justice, University of the Free State

24 November 2020 at 16:00 (CAT; UTC + 02:00)

Join on your computer or mobile app
Click here to RSVP
Learn More | Meeting options
 Enquiries to: SizepheXK@ufs.ac.za

 

Format of webinar

  • Facilitators and speakers sign on at 15:45; participants to join.
  • Dr Dionne van Reenen (from the Unit for Institutional Change and Social Justice) opens the session and introduces the guest speaker and panellists (five minutes).
  • Prof Green presents (for 20 minutes).
  • The four panel members respond to the theme for five minutes each (for a total of 20 minutes) in the following order: Dr Tumubweinee, Prof Legêne, Mr Magume, Prof Steyn.
  • Facilitated questions and comments will be fielded from the live chat (about 30 minutes).
  • Closure at 17:20.

A student gazes up at the statue of President MT Steyn during the Vryfees
held on the UFS Bloemfontein Campus in 2014, during which this and other
statues on campus and in the city were wrapped in plastic.
Photo: Image sourced from Cigdem Aydemir (Plastic Histories)

News Archive

CTL experiments with mobile technology in teaching and learning
2016-05-23

Description: CTL experiments with mobile technology Tags: CTL experiments with mobile technology

On the left is Nokukhanya Nkosi, Researcher and Project manager at the Centre for Teaching and Learning presenting Annah Nggoepe her brand new laptop as part of the project which assesses the impact of personal mobile devices on teaching and learning.
Photo: Supplied

Video clip

Same curriculum. Add technology. Wait and see what happens. This research project which is funded by the Department of Higher Education and Training (DHET) seeks to understand the impact of personal mobile devices (PMD) in teaching and learning.

The University of the Free State (UFS), in conjunction with the University of Cape Town, the University of the Witwatersrand, the University of Johannesburg, and Sol Plaatje University, was approached by the DHET to spearhead this national collaborative project. Investigating whether the financial investment of a PMD on either the part of a university or of students adds value to the teaching and learning experience is the overall objective of the project.

Contemporary education
The Centre for Teaching and Learning (CTL) at the UFS have been taking an active part in the project since 2015, focusing specifically on the use of personal mobile devices in teaching and learning by both staff and students.

At the student level, the study will focus specifically on not just the obstacles that first-generation students face in terms of using technology in teaching and learning, but how institutions can support these students through access to these devices.  “In 2015, the CTL conducted the Digital Identity Study of students which highlighted the view that students at the UFS deemed laptops to be the most important PMD in their studies,” said Nokukhanya Nkosi, Researcher and Project manager at the CTL.   

In April 2016, thirty students were presented with laptops funded by the project grant. For the next two years, the CTL will assess whether these laptops enable greater flexibility and effectiveness of teaching and learning, both inside and out of the classroom for these students.  

Rise of the digital classroom
Annah Ngoepe, a second-year Geography and Environmental Management student taking part in this study, commends the shift from using only textbooks in the past to incorporating technology. “The laptop has the latest applications and programmes, which are convenient for me as a student, because they help in my learning. I can also download textbooks, get summaries of the textbooks, and even other people’s views on a particular subject online.”

Tiana van der Merwe, Deputy Director at the CTL, anticipates that, after two years, the Centre would be able to make not only institutional recommendations, but also recommendations to the National Department of Higher Education.

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