(Individual) Responsibility in decolonising the university curriculum

Abstract

Since the “#RhodesMustFall” and “#FeesMustFall” student protests of 2015 and 2016 there has been much written about decolonisation in South Africa, particularly in relation to the curriculum. However, not much has been written about individual responsibility in the process of decolonisation, which Fanon (1967) argued is a necessary condition for decolonisation. In this article I argue that the autobiographical method, currere is one form of decolonisation. I use currere to document my own journey of decolonisation. I conclude that taking individual responsibility in decolonising the university curriculum involves a lifelong affair of unlearning and relearning from which no one is exempt because even those leading the decolonial project take in coloniality on a daily basis. Such a lifelong affair will involve multiple cycles of currere’s four steps so that currere, as a form of decolonisation, becomes a spiral of multiple cycles.

Downloads

Download data is not yet available.

Author Biography

L. Le Grange, Stellenbosch University

Prof. Lesley Le Grange is Distinguished Professor in the Department of Curriculum Studies at Stellenbosch University, South Africa. He has 230 publications to his credit and serves on editorial boards of nine peer-reviewed journals. He has delivered more than 170 academic presentations and is recipient of several academic awards and prizes, the most recent the SAERA Honours Award (2019). Lesley Le Grange is President of the International Association for the Advancement of Curriculum Studies (IAACS), a Fellow of the Royal Society of Biology (UK), a member of the Academy of Science of South Africa and rated as an internationally acclaimed researcher by the National Research Foundation.

 

 

References

Adhikari, M. 2005. Not white enough, not black enough: Racial identity in the South African coloured community. Athens: Ohio University Press.

Apple, M. W. 1979. Ideology and curriculum. London: Routledge and Paul.

Constandius, E., O. Nell, N. Alexander, M. Mckay, M. Blackie, R. Malgas, and E. Setati. 2018. “#FeesMustFall and decolonizing the curriculum: Stellenbosch University students’ and lecturers’ reactions.” South African Journal of Higher Education 32(2): 65‒85.

CHE see Council on Higher Education.

Chilisa, B. 2012. Indigenous research methodologies. Los Angeles, CA: Sage.

Council on Higher Education. 2017. “Decolonising the curriculum: Stimulating the debate.” BrieflySpeaking Number 3(November 2017).

Christie, P. 1985. The right to learn: The struggle for education in South Africa. Braamfontein: Ravan Press.

Deleuze, G., and F. Guattari. 1994. What is philosophy? Translated by Hugh Tomlison and Graham Burchell. New York: Columbia University Press.

De Lange, J. 1981. The provision of education in South Africa (the De Lange Report). Pretoria: HSRC.

Disemelo, K. 2015. “Student protests are about much more than just #FeesMustFall.” Mail&Guardian. http://mg.co.za/author/katlego-disemelo (Accessed 28 April 2016).

Etheridge, J. 2018. Decolonising education: How one SA university is getting it done. News24. https://www.news24.com/news24/analysis/decolonising-education-how-one-sa-university-is-getting-it-done-20180507 (Accessed 10 June 2020).

Fanon, F. 1967. Towards the African revolution. Translated by H. Chevalier. New York, NY: Grove Press.

Freire, P. 1972. Pedagogy of the oppressed London: Penguin.

Giroux, H. 1979. “Schooling and the culture of positivism: Notes on the death of history.” Educational Theory 29(4): 263‒284.

Goldie, T. 1999. “Saint Fanon and homosexual territory.” In Frantz Fanon: Critical perspectives, ed. A. C. Alessandrini. London, UK: Routledge.

Grosfoguel, R. 2007. “The epistemic decolonial turn.” Cultural Studies 21(2‒3): 211‒223.

Haraway, D. J. 2000. How like a leaf: An interview with Thyrza Nichols Goodeve. New York: Routledge.

Hendricks, C. 2005. “Debating coloured identity in the Western Cape.” African Security Studies 14(4): 117‒119.

Isaacs-Martin, W., and T. Petrus. 2012. “The multiple meaning of coloured identity in South Africa.” Africa Insight 42(1): 87‒102.

Kamanga, E. 2019. Lived experiences of hidden racism of students of colour at a historically white university. Master of Arts in Psychology dissertation. Stellenbosch: Stellenbosch University.

Kelley, R. D. G. 2000. A poetics of anticolonialism. New York: Monthly Review Press.

Le Grange, L. 2000. “Is there a ‘space’ for enabling disparate knowledge traditions to work together? Challenges for science (education) in an African context.” South African Journal of Education 20(2): 114‒117.

Le Grange, L. 2004a. “‘Multicultural’ science in South Africa’s National Curriculum Statement.” Africa Education Review 1(2): 204‒219.

Le Grange, L. 2004b. “(South) African(a) philosophy of education: A reply to Higgs and Parker.” Journal of Education 34: 143‒154.

Le Grange, L. 2005. “Guattari’s philosophy of education and its implications for environmental education in (post)colonial Africa.” Southern African Journal of Environmental Education 22: 33‒45.

Le Grange, L. 2007a. “Integrating western and indigenous knowledge systems: The basis for effective science education in South Africa?” International Review of Education 53(5‒6): 577‒591.

Le Grange, L. 2007b. “The ‘theoretical’ foundations of community service-learning: Fom taproots to rhizomes.” Education as Change 11(3): 3-13.

Le Grange, L. 2011. “Sustainability and higher education: From arborescent to rhizomatic thinking.” Educational Philosophy and Theory 43(7): 742‒754.

Le Grange, L. 2012a. “Ubuntu, ukama, environment and moral education.” Journal of Moral Education 41(3): 329‒340.

Le Grange, L. 2012b. “Ubuntu, ukama and the healing of nature, self and society.” Educational Philosophy and Theory 44(S2): 56‒67.

Le Grange, L. 2016. “Decolonising the university curriculum.” South African Journal of Higher Education 30(2): 1‒12.

Le Grange, L. 2018. “The notion of Ubuntu and the (post)humanist condition.” In Indigenous philosophies of education around the world, ed. J. Petrovic and R. Mitchell. New York: Routledge.

Le Grange, L. 2020. “The (post)human condition and decoloniality: Rethinking and doing curriculum.” Alternation 31: 119‒142.

Le Grange, L. 2021. “Decolonising the university curriculum: The what, why and how.” In Transnational education and curriculum studies: International perspectives, ed. L. J. Chi-Kim and N. Gough. New York: Routledge.

Le Grange, L., and G. Aikenhead. 2017. “Rethinking the ‘Western Tradition’: A response to Enslin and Horsthemke.” Educational Philosophy and Theory 49(1): 31‒37.

Le Grange, L., P. Du Preez, L. Ramrathan, and S. Blignaut. 2020. “Decolonising the university curriculum or decolonial-washing? A multiple case study.” Journal of Education 80: 25‒48.

Levin, R. 1991. “People’s education and the struggle for democracy in South Africa.” In Apartheid education and popular struggles, ed. E. Unterhalter, H. Wolpe, T. Botha, S. Badat, T. Dlamini, and B. Khotseng, 117‒130. Johannesburg: Ravan Press.

Maldonado-Torres, N. 2006. “Cesaire’s gift and the decolonial turn.” Radical Philosophy Review 9(2): 111‒138.

Maldonado-Torres, N. 2007. On coloniality of being: Contributions to the development of a concept. Cultural Studies 21(2‒3): 240‒270.

McKinley, D. 2020. Coronavirus and capitalism: Structural foundations and opportunities for systemic change. Daily Maverick. https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/opinionista/2020-03-24trashed-2/ (Accessed 5 June 2020).

Mignolo, W. D. 2011. The darker side of western modernity: Global futures, decolonial options. Durrham & London: Duke University Press.

Mlamla, S. 2020. Stellenbosch University forges ahead with its decolonisation drive. https://www.iol. co.za/capeargus/news/stellenbosch-university-forges-ahead-with-its-decolonisation-drive-43055870 (Accessed on 26 June 2020).

Mosha, R. S. 2000. The heartbeat of indigenous Africa: A study of the Chagga education system. New York: Routledge

Ndlovu-Gatsheni, S. J. 2013a. Empire, global coloniality and African subjectivity. New York: Berghagn Books.

Ndlovu-Gatsheni, S. J. 2013b. “Why decoloniality in the 21st century?” The Thinker 48: 10‒15.

Omanga, D. 2020. Decolonization, decoloniality, and the future of African Studies: A conversation with Dr. Sabelo Ndlovu-Gatsheni. https://items.ssrc.org/from-our-programs/decolonization-decoloniality-and-the-future-of-african-studies-a-conversation-with-dr-sabelo-ndlovu-gatsheni/ (Accessed 10 June 2020).

Pinar, W. F. 1975. The method of currere. Paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Educational Research Association. Washington, D.C.

Pinar, W. F. 2004. What is curriculum theory? Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

Pinar, W. F. 2011 The character of curriculum studies: Bildung, currere and the recurring question of the subject. New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan.

Pinar, W. F., W. M. Reynolds, P. Slattery, and P. M Taubman. 1995. Understanding curriculum: An introduction to the study of historical and contemporary curriculum discourses. New York: Peter Lang.

Quijano, A. 2007. “Coloniality and modernity/rationality.” Cultural Studies 21(2–3): 168–178.

Schwab, J. J. 1969. “The practical: A language for curriculum.” The School Review 78(1): 1‒23.

Smith, L. T. 1999. Decolonising methodologies: Research and indigenous peoples. London, UK: Zed Books.

Tuck, E., and K. W. Yang. 2012. “Decolonization is not a metaphor.” Decolonization: Indigeneity, Education and Society 1(1): 1‒40.

Tyler, R. W. 1949. Basic principles of curriculum and instruction. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Published
2021-03-21
How to Cite
Le Grange, L. 2021. “(Individual) Responsibility in Decolonising the University Curriculum”. South African Journal of Higher Education 35 (1), 4-20. https://doi.org/10.20853/35-1-4416.
Section
Special Section