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Emerging Adults in Search of Self

26 September 2022 | Story Michelle Nöthling | Photo Stephen Collett

Prof Luzelle Naude — Prof Luzelle Naudé, Professor in the Department of Psychology, delivered her inaugural lecture on the topic: In Search of Self: Emerging Adults as Actors, Agents and Authors.

How do people endeavour to answer the question: Who am I? This is the central question that Prof Luzelle Naudé – professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of the Free State (UFS), has built her academic career on. Under the title of her inaugural lecture, In Search of Self: Emerging Adults as Actors, Agents and Authors, delivered on14 September 2022, Prof Naudé traced the arc of her academic career over the past three decades.

Development as a Scholar

Prof Naudé started by giving an overview of her research as an early scholar, investigating students’ learning experiences and predictors of student success, followed by an exploration of the adolescence stage within the context of South Africa. Prof Naudé’s research interest then led her to investigating the third decade of life: emerging adulthood.

Interestingly, from the turn of the century, the group of 18- to 25-year-olds take longer to transition into adulthood. This group finds themselves in an in-between space, “not being an adolescent anymore, but definitely not being an adult either,” Prof Naudé explained. This has sparked an interesting scholarly debate: is emerging adulthood indeed a new developmental stage, or is it something only applicable to a minority of Western, affluent middle-class, university students? The answer is the former. There are actually many emerging adulthoods – also among our South African youth.

Current Research Focus

Currently, Prof Naudé is interested in the narratives of emerging adults at the intersection of self and society. The self, she pointed out, unfolds through different layers, namely the actor, the agent, and the author. “Our South African emerging adults are acting in an increasingly complex and transitioning social world. As agents, they advance through this complexity by telling redemptive stories of generativity, upward mobility, and of liberation. And as authors, they reconstruct their past, present, and future into a coherent life story and a narrative identity,” Prof Naudé said.

Naude Inaugural From the left; Dr Edwin du Plessis, Head of Department of Psychology; Prof Heidi Hudson, Dean of the Faculty of The Humanities; Prof Luzelle Naudé , and Prof Corli Witthuhn, Vice-Rector: Research and Internationalisation. Photo: Stephen Collett.

The Way Forward

“I’ve became convinced,” Prof Naudé emphasised, “about South Africa and the Global South’s ability to contribute to global knowledge production.” Prof Naudé and her team are therefore adding a South African voice to several multicultural, multinational projects, including the African Long-Life Study – in collaboration with the University of Zurich – and the Selves within Selves project. Prof Naudé’s vision, however, is to ultimately establish an Identity Research Hub at the UFS to consolidate research activities in this field and to formalise interdisciplinary partnerships.

Watch recording video below:

News Archive

Kovsie hockey achieves

2010-07-22

Gregg Clark

Three players from the University of the Free State (UFS) Womens Second Hockey Team, Theane Guthrie, Ayesha Samuels and Chantelle Deere, were selected for the South African Country Districts A Team. Theane, Ayesha and Chantelle played for Free State B Team when they participated in the recent SA Country Districts Hockey tournament. The Free State B Team also won the Tournament.

Jason Klinkradt, coach of the UFS Womens Second Team, was also the coach for the Free State B Team.

Eight Kovsies were also included in the Free State Hockey Team that will participate in the National Interprovincial Hockey Tournament in East-London from 19-24 July 2010. The players are Lesley Ann George (captain), Berne van Wyk, Jo-Nelka Swanepoel, Felicia Shongwe, Orpah Pretorius, Cardeux Nel, Nicole Kemp and Hettie Oosthuizen. The Protea under-captain, Lesley Ann is the captain of the Free State Team. Elsie Coetzer, the Kovsie womens hockey coach, is also the coach of this team.

More news from Kovsie hockey is that the national mens coach, Mr Gregg Clark, presented a very successful training camp for the Free State womens and mens teams on the Kovsie Astros. The training camp was open to all Free State coaches and was amongst others attended by Elsie Coetzer and Des Donald, Kovsies mens hockey coach.

Mr Clark was also course leader at the hockey course for schools, attended by 900 learners, presented by the Kovsie Hockey club earlier this year, said Mr Frans van der Watt from KovsieSport.

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