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UFS stakeholders reflect on multilingualism in education

14 May 2025 | Story Tshepo Tsotetsi | Photo Tshepo Tsotetsi

Multilingualism stakeholder engagement session — Prof Vasu Reddy, UFS Deputy Vice-Chancellor: Research and Internationalisation; guest speaker Prof Leketi Makalela; and Dr Nomalungelo Ngubane, Director of the UFS Academy for Multilingualism.

Multilingualism is not just a concept at the University of the Free State (UFS) – it is a growing practice, a challenge, and an opportunity all at once. This was made clear during a stakeholder engagement session on 7 May 2025, hosted by the Academy for Multilingualism at the UFS’s Bloemfontein Campus, where staff, academics, and strategic partners gathered to reflect on the university’s language journey.

In his reflections, the Deputy Vice-Chancellor for Research and Internationalisation, Prof Vasu Reddy, emphasised that, “Scholarly conversations such as these are not just simply intellectually important, but socially and politically, and it is critical to learn from each other, exchange ideas, and make change.” He described the Academy as a “novel intervention” and noted how engagements like this help “break silos that languages sometimes create” – a crucial step towards realising the promise of multilingualism and translanguaging in academic spaces.

Progress, challenges, and collective ownership

In her presentation, Dr Nomalungelo Ngubane, Director of the Academy for Multilingualism, provided an overview of the institutional language policy and its implementation status, now in its third year of a five-year plan. She highlighted key strides: the translation of 116 PhD abstracts into Sesotho, Afrikaans, and isiXhosa; the development of South African Sign Language terminology in psychology; and the training of 16 tutors in translanguaging, among others.

Dr Ngubane stressed the importance of shared ownership of the policy’s rollout. “It’s very important that the language policy is understood by all stakeholders. It’s a collective journey, and it becomes even more powerful when people own it and take it forward into their departments, faculties, and student spaces,” she said. While she acknowledged that meaningful development of African languages as academic mediums is costly and resource-intensive, she noted that small, deliberate steps are being taken.

Ubuntu translanguaging: rethinking the classroom

The keynote address was delivered by Prof Leketi Makalela, full professor and founding Director of the Hub for Multilingual Education and Literacies at the University of the Witwatersrand. A globally recognised scholar and the holder of the SARChI Chair in Advancing African Languages for Social Inclusion and Access, Prof Makalela added a powerful perspective rooted in research and teaching practice.

He began his address with a reflection: “I believe I landed on this little rock called Earth to ensure that human beings have deep access to the world in which they were born, and you can only be part of this greater world and make full sense of it through language.”

Later, he challenged the monolingual mindsets that dominate higher education. “People still want to treat languages as different entities, and that’s where the issue is. That’s where the education system is not aligning with the realities of multilinguality.”

Prof Makalela said multilingual students face dual disadvantages: compromised epistemic access [access to knowledge systems] due to monolingual bias, and diminished identity affirmation. His response? Ubuntu translanguaging – a model that embraces cohabitation of languages and student-led meaning-making.

“It’s a misconception that the lecturer must translanguage,” he said. “It is the student who should translanguage. The lecturer should only facilitate and respect that internal process.”

He outlined a clear, three-step translanguaging teaching method:

• Pre-lesson: Activate prior learning and scaffold vocabulary and concepts.

• During lesson: Create space for multilingual thinking – allow students to write, reflect, and engage in their own languages.

• Post-lesson: Validate understanding, and open the classroom to diverse linguistic expressions.

Prof Makalela stressed that the real innovation lies in normalising these practices institution-wide. “Existing multilingual tutorials are useful, but real transformation happens when every lecturer opens up their lessons to multilingual engagement.”

News Archive

Resource Manual on Trafficking in Persons for Judicial Officers sees the light

2012-03-27

Judge Connie Mocumi, President of the South African Chapter of the International Association of Women Judges (SAC-IAWJ), during the launch of the Resource Manual on Trafficking in Persons for Judicial Officers.
Photo: Leonie Bolleurs
27 March 2012

On Human Rights Day the Department of Criminal and Medical Law in the Faculty of Law at the University of the Free State (UFS) hosted the launch of the Resource Manual on Trafficking in Persons for Judicial Officers compiled by the South African Chapter of the International Association of Women Judges (SAC-IAWJ).

The manual, which will be used by members of the South African judiciary, will equip officials in adjudicating the multifaceted crime of human trafficking.

“Presiding officers must be sensitised about the complexity of the crime. Human trafficking has many faces and presents itself in different ways. A person may for example be trafficked for sexual exploitation, forced labour, the removal of body parts, as well as forced marriages. Expert knowledge is needed to handle these cases effectively in court,” said Dr Kruger, also responsible for the human trafficking initiative in the Unit for Children's Rights at the UFS.

Prior to the launch, a total number of 300 judicial officers, including six judges from the Southern African Development Community (SADC) received training on human trafficking. After receiving this training, the officers were sensitised to scrutinise domestic violence cases as well as inter-country adoption cases in order to identify possible human trafficking activities.

As keynote speaker at the launch, Dr Beatri Kruger from the Department of Criminal and Medical Law at the UFS, said that human traffickers were running operations like a well-oiled machine. They have abundant and sophisticated resources and often bribe corrupt officials to further their criminal activities. In South Africa, people combating human trafficking struggle with a lack of resources as well as comprehensive legislation. Most cases are prosecuted under the Children’s Act and the Sexual Offences Amendment Act of 2007. Unfortunately, this legislation still leaves a gap in the prosecuting of perpetrators. Only trafficking cases where where children are trafficked can be prosecuted under the Children’s Act. In terms of the Sexual Offences Amendment Act perpetrators can be prosecuted for trafficking persons for sexual exploitation only, and not for labour of other forms of trafficking. Therefore the comprehensive Prevention and Combating of Trafficking in Persons Bill 2010 needs to be finalised to cover all forms of trafficking.

There are more slaves today than at any time in the history of humankind. “To combat this serious problem, we need to follow a holistic approach,” said Dr Kruger. This includes prevention (raising awareness), effective prosecution and suitable punishment, the protection of victims, and partnering with all relevant stakeholders, including people in the communities. Community members are often whistle blowers of this crime.

The President of the SAC-IAWJ, Judge Connie Mocumi, handed copies of the manual, a three-year project, to judicial officers present at the launch. The manual covers, among others, the definition of trafficking in persons, trafficking in persons in South Africa and the Southern African region, a legislative framework, victims’ rights and criminal proceedings.

“It is critical that judicial officers appreciate the phenomenon of trafficking in persons in its broader socio-economic context. Therein lays the ability to deal competently with the often-nuanced manifestation of this scourge. The incapacity to recognise these nuances can deny victims access to justice. In that regard, the manual, amongst others, is to become an important empowering adjudication tool for judicial officers,” said Judge Mocumi.

More copies will be printed and be ready for distribution by the beginning of May this year.

Judge Belinda van Heerden, who also attended the launch, said: “There is progress on the judicial and legislative front to bring wrongdoers to book. This manual will go a long way in giving judicial officers insight into the problem.”

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