UWCScholar :: Browsing by Author "Ngabaza, Sisa"

Browsing by Author "Ngabaza, Sisa"

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"Access to tertiary education": Exploring the experiences of women with physical disabilities in Kamwala, Zambia
(University of the Western Cape, 2017) Matambo, Luyeye Hope; Ngabaza, Sisa
Women with disabilities are marginalised in many aspects of societal participation. The majority of women with disabilities in Zambia do not have access to education and this has placed them amongst the poorest of people in the country. The study focuses on the experiences of women with physical disabilities and investigates the challenges they encounter in accessing education at tertiary level. The study comes at a time when the fight for gender equality has gained momentum and aims at promoting economic participation for all members of society without discrimination on the basis of sex or disability. The study engaged ten participants from a tertiary institution in Kamwala, Lusaka. I conducted a feminist qualitative research, which focused on the experiences of 19-30 year old female students with physical disabilities. I used semi-structured interviews in order to collect the data and drew on a qualitative thematic analysis to analyse the data. All standard ethical procedures were adhered to, including anonymity and confidentiality with respect to participants. The results of the study revealed that women with disabilities were often �othered� due to myths and misconceptions that surrounded disability especially in the African- traditional context. The study also revealed that families played a very important role in ensuring that women and young girls with disabilities had a strong self-image, strong self-esteem and a strong sense of self and ensuring that they felt included within the homes and especially when accessing education. The study further revealed that where family support was lacking, participants faced challenges in accessing education compared to participants who received such support. More so, that educational opportunities in Zambia are generally gendered with more males than females in the education system, across the multiple levels. Access to the tertiary level for this group of women is compromised because challenges in accessing education start at the lower levels and have spill over effects in to the higher levels of education. Financial challenges experienced by women with disabilities and their families also led to fewer women with disabilities being able to participate in schooling. This is because where there were limited resources within the family, women, and girls with disabilities getting an education was not an option.
"Access to tertiary education": Exploring the experiences of women with physical disabilities in Kamwala, Zambia
(University of the Western Cape, 2017) Matambo, Luyeye Hope; Ngabaza, Sisa
Women with disabilities are marginalised in many aspects of societal participation. The majority of women with disabilities in Zambia do not have access to education and this has placed them amongst the poorest of people in the country. The study focuses on the experiences of women with physical disabilities and investigates the challenges they encounter in accessing education at tertiary level. The study comes at a time when the fight for gender equality has gained momentum and aims at promoting economic participation for all members of society without discrimination on the basis of sex or disability. The study engaged ten participants from a tertiary institution in Kamwala, Lusaka. I conducted a feminist qualitative research, which focused on the experiences of 19-30 year old female students with physical disabilities. I used semi-structured interviews in order to collect the data and drew on a qualitative thematic analysis to analyse the data. All standard ethical procedures were adhered to, including anonymity and confidentiality with respect to participants. The results of the study revealed that women with disabilities were often 'othered' due to myths and misconceptions that surrounded disability especially in the African- traditional context. The study also revealed that families played a very important role in ensuring that women and young girls with disabilities had a strong self-image, strong self-esteem and a strong sense of self and ensuring that they felt included within the homes and especially when accessing education. The study further revealed that where family support was lacking, participants faced challenges in accessing education compared to participants who received such support. More so, that educational opportunities in Zambia are generally gendered with more males than females in the education system, across the multiple levels. Access to the tertiary level for this group of women is compromised because challenges in accessing education start at the lower levels and have spill over effects in to the higher levels of education. Financial challenges experienced by women with disabilities and their families also led to fewer women with disabilities being able to participate in schooling. This is because where there were limited resources within the family, women, and girls with disabilities getting an education was not an option.
An exploratory study of experiences of parenting among a group of school-going adolescent mothers in a South African township
(University of the Western Cape, 2010) Ngabaza, Sisa; Shefer, Tamara; Women and Gender Studies; Faculty of Arts
This study explored adolescent girls' subjective experiences of being young mothers in school, focusing on their personal and interpersonal relationships within their social contexts. Participants included 15 young black mothers aged between 16 and 19 years from three high schools in Khayelitsha, Cape Town. Conducted within a feminist social constructionist framework, the study adopted an exploratory qualitative structure. Data were collected through life histories that were analysed within a thematic narrative framework. The narratives revealed that the young mothers found motherhood challenging and overly disruptive of school. Although contexts of childcare emerged as pivotal in how young mothers balanced motherhood and schoolwork, these were also presented as characterised by notions of power and control. Because of the gendered nature of care work, the women who supported the young mothers with childcare dominated the mothering spheres. The schools were also experienced as controlled and regulated by authorities in ways that constrained the young mothers balancing of school and parenting. Equally constraining to a number of adolescent mothers were structural challenges, for example, parenting in spaces that lacked resources. These challenges were compounded by the immense stigma attached to adolescent motherhood. The study recommended that the Department of Education work closely with all the parties concerned in ensuring that pregnant learners benefit from the policy. It is necessary that educators are encouraged to shift attitudes so that communication with adolescent mothers is improved.
'And I have been told that there is nothing fun about having sex while you are still in high school': Dominant discourses on women's sexual practices and desires in Life Orientation programmes at school
(University of the Free State, 2015) Shefer, Tamara; Ngabaza, Sisa
Young women's sexuality is a contested terrain in multiple ways in contemporary South Africa. A growing body of work in the context of HIV and gender-based violence illustrates how young women find it challenging to negotiate safe and equitable sexual relationships with men, and are often the victims of coercive sex, unwanted early pregnancies and HIV. On the other hand, young women's sexuality is also stigmatised and responded to in punitive terms in school or community contexts, as is evident in research on teenage pregnancy and parenting in schools. Within both these bodies of work, women's own narratives are missing, as well as their agency and a positive discourse on female sexuality. Female desires are absent in heteronormative practices and ideologies, as pointed out by feminist researchers internationally. A body of work on young women who parent at school has shown that a key component of the moralistic response to women's sexuality hinges on the way in which childhood, adolescence and adulthood are popularly understood, together with dominant notions of masculinity and femininity within heteronormative and middle-class notions of family. Such discourses are also salient in the responses and understandings of sexuality education in Life Orientation, particularly the way in which young women are represented. This paper draws from qualitative research conducted with teachers, school authorities and young people on sexuality education in the Life Orientation programme at schools in the Western and Eastern Cape. Key findings reiterate disciplinary responses to young women's sexuality, often framed within 'danger' and 'damage' discourses that foreground the denial of young women's sexual desire and practices within a framework of protection, regulation and discipline in order to avoid promised punishments of being sexually active.
Call centres: Anonymous �safe spaces� for women�s experiences of abortion stigma
(University of Western Cape, 2021) Xaba, Nonkosi; Ngabaza, Sisa
In South Africa, abortion became a right in 1996 in terms of the Choice on Termination of Pregnancy Act, 92 of 1996 (CTOP). However, despite this legal dispensation, debates between pro-life (those against abortion) and pro-choice (those supportive of the law) have continued unabated in liberal South Africa. These debates have resulted in severe stigma for women who choose to terminate their pregnancies. The discourse is shaped by an array of personal, religious, cultural and other social beliefs that differ from community to community. Research shows that access to free post-abortion services is further complicated for women, especially young women, by privacy concerns, the negative attitudes of institutional service providers, and stigma.
Constructions of identity among young students living with visual or physical disabilities at a university in Cape Town
(University of the Western Cape, 2019) Steyn, Inga Dale; Ngabaza, Sisa
Not all disabilities are the same and the way that society may respond to people with disabilities depends on their �disability� and how their body deviates from the appearance norms of society. People with disabilities constitute a significant portion of the South African population. A body of research and physical evidence shows that people with disabilities may face certain obstacles or limitations in fulfilling a normal life. Obstacles include perceptions of disabilities, negative stigma and attitudes, barriers to an environment which is accessible for people with disabilities, and constructions of ableism. In a way, these obstacles influence the way people with disabilities construct their identity. Beyond this, the voices of people with disabilities are not always heard and their personal experiences are not always given political recognition. This research aimed to explore how a group of students living with a physical or visual disability constructed their identities in their environment or society. A feminist qualitative method was conducted. The study focused on the experiences and perceptions of nineteen to twenty-seven year old female and male students with disabilities. Out of the six participants, two were coloured, three were black and one participant is classified as coloured, but identifies as biracial. A semi-structured interview was used for data collection and a Qualitative Thematic Analysis was used to analyse the data. Social constructionism and intersectionality were useful theoretical approaches adopted in exploring the lived experiences of students with disabilities. The results of this study revealed that students with disabilities find living with a disability as not being a barrier to living a fulfilling life. Students with disabilities construct their identities in a way that frees them from ideologies which shape the experience of disability in a negative way. However, the study revealed that negative barriers to identity construction still exist. These barriers come in the form of negative perceptions and stigma of disability, ableism and the medical model. The study further revealed that when the lived experiences of students with disabilities are understood through the lens of gender, race and class, these social divisions overlap and are cumulative on the effects of student�s experiences. The one major barrier in identity construction that the study revealed is the negative social perceptions of disability. The way in which students feel that they belong in their society is representative of how they respond to negative social constructions of disability.
Constructions of identity among young students living with visual or physical disabilities at a university in Cape Town
(University of the Western Cape, 2018) Steyn, Inga Dale; Ngabaza, Sisa
Not all disabilities are the same and the way that society may respond to people with disabilities depends on their �disability� and how their body deviates from the appearance norms of society. People with disabilities constitute a significant portion of the South African population. A body of research and physical evidence shows that people with disabilities may face certain obstacles or limitations in fulfilling a normal life. Obstacles include perceptions of disabilities, negative stigma and attitudes, barriers to an environment which is accessible for people with disabilities, and constructions of ableism. In a way, these obstacles influence the way people with disabilities construct their identity. Beyond this, the voices of people with disabilities are not always heard and their personal experiences are not always given political recognition. This research aimed to explore how a group of students living with a physical or visual disability constructed their identities in their environment or society. A feminist qualitative method was conducted. The study focused on the experiences and perceptions of nineteen to twenty-seven year old female and male students with disabilities. Out of the six participants, two were coloured, three were black and one participant is classified as coloured, but identifies as biracial. A semi-structured interview was used for data collection and a Qualitative Thematic Analysis was used to analyse the data. Social constructionism and intersectionality were useful theoretical approaches adopted in exploring the lived experiences of students with disabilities. The results of this study revealed that students with disabilities find living with a disability as not being a barrier to living a fulfilling life. Students with disabilities construct their identities in a way that frees them from ideologies which shape the experience of disability in a negative way. However, the study revealed that negative barriers to identity construction still exist. These barriers come in the form of negative perceptions and stigma of disability, ableism and the medical model. The study further revealed that when the lived experiences of students with disabilities are understood through the lens of gender, race and class, these social divisions overlap and are cumulative on the effects of student�s experiences. The one major barrier in identity construction that the study revealed is the negative social perceptions of disability. The way in which students feel that they belong in their society is representative of how they respond to negative social constructions of disability.
Contestations of the meanings of love and gender in a university students' discussion
(UNISA Press, 2013) Ngabaza, Sisa; Daniels, Dominic; Franck, Olivia; Maluleke, Rhulani
Love is a fluid and complex concept that is difficult to define comprehensively. Its expressions, however, show that love is not only gendered but also influenced by one's social and economic positioning. Family upbringing, friends, race, culture and religion shape and constrain experiences of love. Third year students in a women's and gender studies class carried out a qualitative feminist study to explore how university students understood rights and responsibilities in romantic love. In a class of 127 students, each student conducted two semi-structured interviews with two university students of either sex. The findings were discussed in class through a panel discussion steered by five students. The students' findings revealed that contextualised relational power issues, economic factors and the role of sex had importance in the way romantic relationships were understood. This Briefing presents the discussion in which multiple issues are raised on the dynamics of love among some university students, as they strive to find the meaning of romantic love.
Empowering young people in advocacy for transformation: A photovoice exploration of safe and unsafe spaces on a university campus
(UNISA, 2015) Ngabaza, Sisa; Bojarczuk, Erika; Masuku, Michelle Paidamwoyo; Roelfse, Rudolf
Globally and locally, research conducted with young people about safety on university campuses focuses primarily on risk and danger, particularly sexual danger. In this body of scholarship, the voices of young people are often elided. Our study intends to address both of these concerns, firstly by foregrounding the voices of students themselves through a photovoice method, and secondly by emphasising the ways in which safe and unsafe spaces are mediated by group and social identities. The aim of the study was to explore how students' perceptions of safe and unsafe places are mediated by group and social identities. A group of third-year students at an urban South African university used photovoice, a methodology that encourages participation and empowerment of young people in transforming their communities, to conduct a study identifying and photographing spaces they perceived safe and unsafe in and around campus. Narratives explained these photographs. The paper draws from this project, whose findings show that the construction of safety on campus is mediated by different factors of marginality within the student body including gender, class, citizenship and race among others. These findings are not only significant in raising concern about issues of safety on campus, but they also draw the attention of university stakeholders to these concerns, giving students a voice to be agents of transformation.
�Girls need to behave like girls you know�: the complexities of applying a gender justice goal within sexuality education in South African schools
(Taylor & Francis, 2016) Ngabaza, Sisa; Shefer, Tamara; Catriona, Ida Macleod
Sexuality education, as a component within the Life Orientation (LO) programme in South African schools, is intended to provide young people with knowledge and skills to make informed choices about their sexuality, their own health and that of others. Key to the programme are outcomes relating to power, power relations and gender. In this paper, we apply a critical gender lens to explore the ways in which the teaching of sexuality education engages with larger goals of gender justice. The paper draws from a number of ethnographic studies conducted at 12 South African schools. We focus here on the data collected from focus group discussions with learners, and semi-structured interviews with individual learners, principals and Life Orientation (LO) teachers. The paper highlights the complexities of having gender justice as a central goal of LO sexuality education. Teaching sexuality education is reported to contradict dominant community values and norms. Although some principals and school authorities support gender equity and problematize hegemonic masculinities, learners experience sexuality education as upholding normative gender roles and male power, rather than challenging it. Teachers rely heavily on cautionary messages that put more responsibility for reproductive health on female learners, and use didactic, authoritative pedagogical techniques, which do not acknowledge young people�s experience nor facilitate their sexual agency. These complexities need to be foregrounded and worked with systematically if the goal of gender justice within LO is to be realised.
Human trafficking across a border in Nigeria: Experiences of young women who have survived trafficking
(University of the Western Cape, 2017) Oyebanji, Kemi Fisayo; Ngabaza, Sisa
Human trafficking is a global issue that most countries have battled to control and combat in recent times. It is exploitative, abusive and violates human rights. Research showing the prevalence of human trafficking in mostly underdeveloped and developing countries with slack border controls and ineffective immigration activities seem to foreground women as victims in most cases. Although men, women and children are all prone to trafficking, young women and girls are more vulnerable due to political, economic and social factors. This study focuses on the experiences of young women who survived trafficking. Working within a qualitat ive feminist framework, this study explores the lived experiences of trafficked young women across a border in Nigeria. Five participants aged twenty to twenty-five were selected through convenience and snowballing sampling. Narrative thematic analysis was used as a methodology for data analysis. Findings from this study clearly show multiple factors which contribute to young women's vulnerability to trafficking. Some of the factors included family instability, feminization of poverty and gender inequality, which saw male children preferred over their female counterparts. Low levels of education and lack of care and support from the family further emerged as a source of vulnerability to trafficking for young women due to their low level of education. Gender and sexuality played a role in the reason for trafficking in this case, because all of the survivors were trafficked for the purpose of commercial sex work.
Parents resist sexuality education through digital activism
(SAGE Publications, 2022) Ngabaza, Sisa
South Africa has high rates of HIV infection among its young population, high rates of unintended pregnancy among the youth, and extremely high rates of gender-based violence. Given all this, it is essential that young people be taught skills that will enable them to manage their sexuality. Schools have been shown to be best placed to provide accurate and relevant information on young people�s sexualities. Through the Life Orientation (LO) curriculum, the Department of Basic Education (DBE) offers age-appropriate sexuality education as a response to these concerns. However, research in sexuality education shows that there is a lack of guidance and preparedness by educators, and this hampers how sexuality education is delivered in South African schools. A recent attempt by the DBE to upscale and strengthen the sexuality education curriculum in South African schools was met with resistance from parents and other lobby groups. This resistance was driven across many different media platforms, and particularly through an online hashtag #LeaveOurKidsAlone, largely on Facebook and Twitter. Through this resistance, we are introduced to parents/adult response to the teaching and learning of comprehensive sexuality education (CSE) in South African schools, a voice that has been missing to a great extent in this debate.
Participating unequally: Student experiences at UWC
(UNISA Press, 2017) Clowes, Lindsay; Shefer, Tamara; Ngabaza, Sisa
This paper uses Nancy Fraser�s concept of participatory parity to reflect on data gathered by and from third year students in a final year research module in the Women�s and Gender Studies Department at the University of the Western Cape in 2015. During the course students developed a research proposal, collected and shared data with other students, and then used this data to write a final (externally examinable) research report. Employing a participatory photovoice methodology, the students� research focused on ways in which social and group identities had shaped their experiences of feeling empowered and disempowered on campus. Each student took two photos representing experiences of feeling empowered and two of feeling disempowered on campus and wrote narratives of about 300 words explaining and describing the experience foregrounded by each image. Students shared these narratives and accompanying images with each other, their teachers and the wider university community through a public exhibition in the library. In the paper we draw on Fraser�s concepts of maldistribution, misrecognition and misrepresentation to highlight constraints to equal participation identified by students.
Pathways to healing from intimate partner violence: Voices of young women in the Western Cape
(University of the Western Cape, 2023) Magwaza, Lami Quixote; Ngabaza, Sisa
Research shows that there is a process of surviving after being violated by an intimate partner. However, it does not adequately address the pathways to healing and recovery from intimate partner violence (IPV). A research gap regarding the healing process after IPV exists; and, this research aims to contribute towards bridging this gap by exploring women�s recovery and healing process after experiencing IPV. Therefore, this research envisages contributing towards this gap by foregrounding the voices of women�s experiences and sharing insights on how women overcame the IPV experience and reconstructed their lives thereafter. The focus of the study was on women in the Western Cape between the ages of 20 and 45 years. A qualitative feminist approach was adopted to gain insight and understand participants� subjective views and experiences. The feminist standpoint theory was adopted as a theoretical framework, since it centralises the significance of women�s voices, in how they theorise and make sense of the world. I utilised snowball sampling to select participants from my social circles around Cape Town. Five women were identified and semi structured interviews were conducted with them and a qualitative thematic analysis was used for analysis.
Policy commitments vs. lived realities of young pregnant women and mothers in school, Western Cape, South Africa
(Elsevier, 2013) Ngabaza, Sisa; Shefer, Tamara
Reproductive rights in South Africa continue to be undermined for young women who fall pregnant and become mothers while still at school. Before 1994, exclusionary practices were common and the majority of those who fell pregnant failed to resume their education. With the adoption of new policies in 2007, young pregnant women and mothers are supposed to be supported to complete school successfully. Notwithstanding these new policies, there are incongruities between policy implementation and young women's lived experience in school. This paper explores the experiences of pregnancy and parenting among a group of 15 young women who fell pregnant and became mothers while attending three high schools in Khayelitsha township, a working-class community in the Western Cape of South Africa. Qualitative, in-depth interviews, conducted between 2007 and 2008, highlighted two key areas of concern: continuing exclusionary practices on the part of schools, based on conservative interpretations of policy, and negative and moralistic responses from teachers and peers. Such practices resulted in secrecy and shame about being pregnant, affecting the young women's emotional and physical well-being and their decisions whether to remain in school during pregnancy and return after having the baby. Further attention is required to ensure appropriate implementation of policies aimed at supporting pregnant and parenting young women to complete their education successfully.
Student accounts of space and safety at a South African university: implications for social identities and diversity
(SAGE Publications, 2018) Shefer, Tamara; Strebel, Anna; Ngabaza, Sisa; Clowes, Lindsay
Transformation efforts in South African higher education have been under increased scrutiny in recent years, especially following the last years of student activism and calls for decolonization of universities. This article presents data from a participatory photovoice study in which a group of students reflect on their experiences of feeling safe and unsafe at an urban-based historically disadvantaged university. Findings highlight the way in which historical inequalities on the basis of social identities of race, class, and gender, among others, continue to shape experiences, both materially and social-psychologically, in South African higher education. However, and of particular relevance in thinking about a socially just university, participants speak about the value of diversity in facilitating their sense of both material and subjective safety. Thus, a diverse classroom and one that acknowledges and recognizes students across diversities, is experienced as a space of comfort, belonging and safety. Drawing on feminist work on social justice, we argue the importance of lecturer sensitivity and reflexivity to their own practices, as well as the value of social justice pedagogies that not only focus on issues of diversity and equality but also destabilize dominant forms of didactic pedagogy, and engage students� diverse experiences and perceptions.
Students� narratives on gender and sexuality in the project of social justice and belonging in higher education
(South African Journal of Higher Education, 2018) Ngabaza, Sisa; Shefer, Tamara; Clowes, Lindsay
Student protests in South Africa flag the well-documented lack of progress in transforming universities which mirror deeply entrenched inequalities. The imperative to challenge a system of higher education that continues to rationalise and reproduce injustice is even more keenly felt. Efforts to understand the lived experiences of young people within diverse higher educational contexts are arguably especially important in this context. This paper draws on research with students at the University of the Western Cape (UWC) who engaged in a participatory photovoice research project in a feminist research methodology module. Students were asked to take photos on and around campus that represented un/safe spaces for them and to write short narratives on these. The paper unpacks key emerging themes that speak to how gender, intersecting with sexuality, informs experiences of belonging, while arguing the value of student voice in the project of social justice in higher education.
Students� narratives on gender and sexuality in the project of social justice and belonging in higher education
(Stellenbosch University Library and Information Service, 2018) Ngabaza, Sisa; Shefer, Tamara; Clowes, Lindsay;
Student protests in South Africa over the last few years have re-energized the project of social justice in higher education. While emphasis has been on decolonizing the curriculum and the university spaces, there has also been a powerful mobilization around the lived experiences of students, including sexual and gendered practices of exclusion and othering. Students� activism and a growing body of research speak to continued practices of exclusion, marginalisation and injustice, not only in the classroom, but in everyday experiences of un/belonging on the basis of intersectional raced, classed, gendered, sexualised and other forms of social identity and difference. Efforts to understand the lived experiences of young people within diverse higher educational contexts are arguably especially important in this context and this article seeks to explore such experiences with a particular focus on the entanglement of gender and sexuality with student citizenship. The article draws on research with students at the University of the Western Cape (UWC) who engaged in a participatory photovoice research project in a feminist research methodology module. Students were asked to take photos on and around campus that represented un/safe spaces for them and to write short narratives on these. In this article we apply a gendered lens to reveal the intersectional dynamics that shape students� experiences of un/belonging and un/safety on campus. The narratives and images generated by students in thinking about their sense of safety or unsafety on campus speak to a multiplicity of spaces, both symbolic and physical, that impact on experiences of belonging, either enhancing belonging or facilitating exclusion. Student narratives revealed the complex intersections between gender and sexuality in different locations, at different times, on and between campus (including, the campus bar, the sports field and commuter taxis), and how these operate in ways that validate heteronormative gender and sexual identities and practices, while marginalising alternative, non-conforming genders and sexualities. Taking these narratives seriously means acknowledging ways in which gender, sexual and intersectional injustices limit students� ability to participate as equal citizens in a higher education context and flags the value of student voice in the project of social justice in higher education.
�We don't really see a problem in music because that s**t makes you want to dance�: Reflections on possibilities and challenges of teaching gender through hip-hop
(Taylor and Francis, 2018) Hussen, Tigist Shewarega; Ngabaza, Sisa
Hip-hop culture has been criticised as sexist and misogynist. It is also condemned for being exploitative of black women�s identity and for perpetuating gendered and sexualised assumptions about female musicians. This perspective explores pedagogical possibilities and challenges of using popular culture, such as hip-hop music performances, in a gender studies course. We critically reflect on our experiences of working with second-year students exploring gender performances in music. We encouraged students to analyse music of their own choice within the hip-hop genre, interrogating gender performances beyond simplistic good/bad or right/wrong body and sexual conduct. Data collected in online chat rooms on the teaching and learning platforms show students� enthusiasm in engaging with hip-hop as subject matter. However, in their analysis quite often students struggled to move away from the dominant narrative of hip-hop as sexist and misogynist, their critique focusing on the exaggerated femininity and hypersexuality of female hip-hop artists. Students struggled to critically explore other counter-narratives and counter-representations of the performances. We reflect on the possibilities and challenges of using hip-hop as subject matter in feminist pedagogy.

Browsing by Author "Ngabaza, Sisa"

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