MGS / Institute for Gender and Youth Studies

DEd / Department of Curriculum Studies and Educational Management

This study is about the gender dimensions of land reform in South Africa. The case study is that of a housing and resettlement project in Daggakraal, Mpumalanga Province. The aim of the study was to describe and analyse empirical realities for rural women, in relation to land, in Daggakraal. The focus was on the research questions for the study namely the nature of land reform practice; whether gender issues were central in land reform at all stages of the project; whether or not participation of women was truly genuine; and the constraints that were faced in the process of land reform delivery. The study was conducted in Daggakraal, a rural town in Mpumalanga province, South Africa. Research methods employed were both quantitative and qualitative with more emphasis on the latter. A total of 100 respondents participated in the study. This number included 10 key informants 3 of whom were trained as research assistants. The findings indicate that there was very little gender analysis carried out prior to land reform. For this reason land reform has not benefitted the women and men of Daggakraal. Land reform policies and other legislation put in place were not followed to the letter in Daggakraal and in other areas of the country where land reform was implemented; the first land reform (SLAG) has not benefitted the poor, especially women; the rural terrain is an area of contestation and competing interests between women and men. There is also a lack of institutional arrangements to implement a gendered approach to land reform. This study demonstrates the need to tackle and transform the existing power relations at the household level, if government is serious about the gender dimension of land reform in South Africa. In a small way it is hoped that this study will contribute to the limited writing on land reform and gender and also provide a gendered critique of the land reform programme in South Africa. The Gender Analysis Framework (GAF) and the feminist and gender perspectives have helped the researcher to understand and explain the gender dynamics in Daggakraal. / Development Studies / D. Litt. et Phil. (Development Studies)

Denna avhandling hade två syften. 1. Att i ett organisations-, professions- och pedagogiskt samverkansperspektiv studera några förskollärares möjligheter och hinder för utvecklingen av en genusmedveten pedagogik. 2. Att bedriva kvalita-tiv forskning utifrån antaganden om forskning för social rättvisa, som ett bidrag till metodologiutveckling. Följande frågeställningar belyste dessa syften: Hur skapar förskollärare utrymme för reflektion och kunskapsprocesser över tid; vil-ka individuella och kollektiva handlingar utför förskollärare över tid; vilka bi-drag till verksamhetsutveckling kan en studie av detta slag göra? Med feminis-tisk pragmatism som vetenskapsteoretisk grund tillämpades feministisk aktions-forskning som satte förskollärarnas frågeställningar i centrum. Under tre års tid ägde regelbundna träffar rum för gemensamma reflektioner, utvärderingar och planeringar av pedagogiska handlingar. Enskilda och gruppintervjuer, deltagande observationer samt en stor mängd mejl-, telefon- och brevutbyten kompletterade datainsamlingen. Den analytiska forskningsberättelsen växte fram under åter-koppling till förskollärares handlingar och i ljuset av förskollärares diffusa pro-fessionstillhörighet. Handlingarna tolkades utifrån de i feministisk aktionsforsk-ningsmetodologi inneboende principerna vad, vem och kritiska händelser över tid. Organisations- och professionsteoretiska analyser visade att förskollärarnas handlingar varken erkändes som professionella av den kommunala arbetsgivaren eller föräldrarna. Förskollärarnas behov av professionell erkänsla var stort, men när den uteblev, visade sig det långsiktiga utvecklingsarbetet vara av stort värde, därför att förskollärarna lyckades åstadkomma pedagogiskt sett meningsfulla förändringar, vilket understryker den temporala aspekten av organisatoriska för-ändringar underifrån. Förskollärarnas kollektiva handlingar började rota sig i en gemensam värdegrund. Formen av utvecklingsarbetet - att samarbeta med en al-lierad utifrån - var avgörande för skapandet av utrymme för reflektion och kol-lektiva handlingar. Kollektiva handlingar möjliggjordes i hög utsträckning tack vare enskilda deltagares mod att bryta tystnader om orättvisor i den egna verk-samheten. En slutsats är att det är möjligt att åstadkomma organisatoriska för-ändringar över tid genom en radikal öppenhet för agency. Transformativa kun-skapsprocesser kan åstadkommas om erbjudanden till ett genuint deltagande i ett förändringsarbete lämnas och mottas. Genom en problematisering av termer som handling, deltagande, emancipation, social rättvisa och kunskap gjordes ett me-todologiskt bidrag till feministisk aktionsforskning. / This doctoral thesis had two purposes. 1. To study some preschool teachers’ possibilities to develop a gender aware pedagogy by applying theories of organisation, profession and collaboration. 2. To do qualitative research by drawing on principles of research for social justice, as a contribution to the development of methodology in feminist educational action research. The following research questions helped elucidate these purposes: How do preschool teachers create space for reflection and knowledge processes over time? What individual and collective actions do preschool teachers take over time? How can this study contribute to organisational development? Feminist pragmatism served as the philosophical underpinning for feminist action research (FAR) as a methodology and method. The preschool teachers were regarded as agents for change in their own pedagogic and organisational practices. Over a three-year period meetings were conducted on a regular basis. One-on-one interviews, group interviews, numerous emails, telephone calls and some observations completed the data collection. The analytical research narrative emerged by linking the preschool teachers’ actions to their ambiguous professional status. Actions were interpreted by applying the principles inherent in FAR, what, who and critical incidents over time. The absence of professional recognition from the municipal employer and parents for the preschool teachers was evident. Since the preschool teachers needed professional recognition, they experienced the collaborative nature of this study of great value as it conferred legitimacy for their professional development. There emerged meaningful pedagogic change over time, which emphasised the temporal aspect of organisational change from the bottom up. Collective actions began to take root in a shared value system. The design of the project – to collaborate with an outside ally – was decisive in regard to creating space for reflection and collective actions. Collective actions were possible due to the courage of individual participants who dared break silences surrounding organisational injustices. In conclusion, it can be stated that organisational change over time is indeed possible by practising radical openness for agency. Transformative knowledge processes can be achieved provided that genuine offers of participation are issued and well received. By elaborating on terms such as action, participation, emancipation, social justice and knowledge, a methodological contribution could be made to feminist action research.

Persistent gender disparity limits the available contributors to advancing some science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) fields. While higher education can be an influential time-point for ensuring adequate participation, many physics programs across the U.S. have few women in classroom or lab settings. Prior research indicates that these women face considerable barriers. For university students, faculty, and administration to appropriately address these issues, it is important to understand the experiences of women as they navigate male-dominated STEM fields. This explanatory sequential mixed methods study explored undergraduate female physics majors’ experiences with their male-dominated academic and research spaces in the U.S. The conceptual framework consisted of physics identity, gender role congruity, assumptions about the “ideal” scientist, and self-reported plans to persist in the field (measured by bachelor’s degree completion, graduate school plans, and physics-related career plans). Utilizing the American Physical Society (APS) 2016 Conferences for Undergraduate Women in Physics (CUWiP) pre-conference survey data, responses from 900 females were analyzed using regressions followed by 18 semi-structured interviews with CUWiP sample participants. Physics identity was highly predictive of participants’ self-reported persistence plans. A factor analysis revealed that gender role congruity is comprised of three distinct social roles: extrinsic agentic (e.g., power, financial rewards, status), intrinsic agentic (e.g., self-direction, demonstrating skills, independence), and communal (e.g., working with people, helping others). Intrinsic agency was highly correlated with physics identity and long-term persistence (graduate school and career), and communal roles were negatively correlated with students’ short-term persistence (undergraduate physics degree completion). Extrinsic agency was correlated with neither identity nor persistence. The 18 interviews were phenomenographically analyzed revealing that participants experience relationships with the conceptual framework in five qualitatively different ways, called categories of experience. These categories are: The Assured, The Solitary, The Communal, The Reflective, and The Ambassadors. The categories elaborate on the quantitative results by providing nuanced explanations of how women negotiate aspects of their gender identity related to the conceptual framework. The results provide a broad vantage point of women’s experiences as physics majors which may aid university faculty and administration with gender equity goals for physics and other male-dominated STEM fields.

My study is focused on women in graduate Computer Science programs at two universities in Ontario, Canada. My research problem emerges from earlier feminist research addressing the low numbers of women in university Computer Science programs, particularly at the graduate level. After over twenty years of active feminist representation of this problem, mostly through large survey-based studies, there has been little change. I argue that rather than continuing to focus on the rising and falling numbers of women studying Computer Science, it is critical to analyze the specific socio-economic and socio-cultural conditions which produce gendered and racialized exclusion in the field. Informed by Institutional Ethnography – a method of inquiry developed by Dorothy Smith – and by Foucault’s work on governmentality, I examine how specific institutional processes shape the everyday lives of women students. Through on-site observation and interviews with women in graduate Computer Science studies, Computer Science professors and university administrators, I investigate how the participants’ everyday institutional work is coordinated through external textual practices such as evaluation, reporting and accounting. I argue that the university’s institutional practices produce ‘women in computing’ as a ‘problem’ group in ways that re-inscribe women’s outsider status in the field. At the same time, I show that professionalized feminist educational projects may contradict their progressive and inclusive intentions, contributing to the ‘institutional capture’ (Smith) of women as an administrative ‘problem’. Through ethnographic research that follows women students through a range of experiences, I demonstrate how they variously endorse, subvert and exploit the contradictory subject positions produced for them. I illustrate how a North American-based institutional feminist representation of ‘women in computing’ ignores the everyday experiences of ethnoculturally diverse female student participants in graduate Computer Science studies. I argue that rather than accepting the organization of universal characteristics which reproduce conditions of exclusion, North American feminist scholars need to consider the specificity of social relations and forms of knowledge transnationally. Finally, I revisit how women in the study engage with ‘women in computing’ discourse through their lived experiences. I suggest the need for ongoing analysis of the gender effects and changing socio-cultural conditions of new technologies.

My study is focused on women in graduate Computer Science programs at two universities in Ontario, Canada. My research problem emerges from earlier feminist research addressing the low numbers of women in university Computer Science programs, particularly at the graduate level. After over twenty years of active feminist representation of this problem, mostly through large survey-based studies, there has been little change. I argue that rather than continuing to focus on the rising and falling numbers of women studying Computer Science, it is critical to analyze the specific socio-economic and socio-cultural conditions which produce gendered and racialized exclusion in the field. Informed by Institutional Ethnography – a method of inquiry developed by Dorothy Smith – and by Foucault’s work on governmentality, I examine how specific institutional processes shape the everyday lives of women students. Through on-site observation and interviews with women in graduate Computer Science studies, Computer Science professors and university administrators, I investigate how the participants’ everyday institutional work is coordinated through external textual practices such as evaluation, reporting and accounting. I argue that the university’s institutional practices produce ‘women in computing’ as a ‘problem’ group in ways that re-inscribe women’s outsider status in the field. At the same time, I show that professionalized feminist educational projects may contradict their progressive and inclusive intentions, contributing to the ‘institutional capture’ (Smith) of women as an administrative ‘problem’. Through ethnographic research that follows women students through a range of experiences, I demonstrate how they variously endorse, subvert and exploit the contradictory subject positions produced for them. I illustrate how a North American-based institutional feminist representation of ‘women in computing’ ignores the everyday experiences of ethnoculturally diverse female student participants in graduate Computer Science studies. I argue that rather than accepting the organization of universal characteristics which reproduce conditions of exclusion, North American feminist scholars need to consider the specificity of social relations and forms of knowledge transnationally. Finally, I revisit how women in the study engage with ‘women in computing’ discourse through their lived experiences. I suggest the need for ongoing analysis of the gender effects and changing socio-cultural conditions of new technologies.

Submitted by Patrícia Silva de Sousa (patriciasousa9@gmail.com) on 2018-06-29T04:56:50Z No. of bitstreams: 1 Dissertação_Equidade de gênero no ambiente corporativo.pdf: 2054497 bytes, checksum: 3eacca7429b72606615457b7b05caff5 (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Diego Andrade (diego.andrade@fgv.br) on 2018-07-02T18:57:51Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 Dissertação_Equidade de gênero no ambiente corporativo.pdf: 2054497 bytes, checksum: 3eacca7429b72606615457b7b05caff5 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2018-07-16T20:08:55Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Dissertação_Equidade de gênero no ambiente corporativo.pdf: 2054497 bytes, checksum: 3eacca7429b72606615457b7b05caff5 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2018-05-30 / A abordagem da responsabilidade social e sua relação com a questão da diversidade no ambiente empresarial vem ganhando ressonância nos últimos anos em diferentes países. No Brasil, de forma análoga, muitas organizações já despertaram para o fato de que a diversidade afeta o ambiente organizacional, além de poder ser benéfica para o mesmo, inclusive se apresentando como uma vantagem competitiva frente aos concorrentes. Esta pesquisa visa contribuir com este debate por meio de um estudo de caso sobre a empresa Braskem, buscando abordar a evolução do programa de diversidade da mesma, com um olhar voltado especialmente para as ações relacionadas a gênero. / In recent years the perspective of social responsibility and its relation with the issue of diversity in the business environment has been gaining resonance in different countries. In Brazil, similarly, there are many organizations that have already awakened to the fact that diversity affects the organizational environment as well as can be beneficial to it. Organizational diversity can even become a competitive advantage over other competitors. The purpose of this research is to contribute to this debate through a case study about the company Braskem aiming to address the evolution of its diversity program to it with a focus on the actions related to gender.

The Mpumalanga Education Department has put in place various mechanisms aimed at promoting equity and equality between male and female educators and learners within the education system. Such initiatives were established from a position of strength that sociocultural stereotypes such as patriarchy, lack of access to resources and the sexual division of labour have been internalised and reinforced as acts of discrimination within the school system, community, home and workplace. Within the school system, gender stereotypes are used to determine and perpetuate the educational provisioning for learners as separate groups (boys - girls) through the school curriculum and the educators' classroom practices of "masculine" and "feminine" activities. Equally so, senior management positions are mostly occupied by males whilst females are relegated to lower positions of the management echelon. The focus of this study was to identify the root causes of inequalities in senior management positions between male and female managers. The Participatory Action Research (PAR) method using a case study and a literature review were used as data collection techniques. Affirmative Action policies and programmes are recommended as strategies for empowering women and girls with an aim of preparing them to be competent in the labour market. There are diverse interpretations of the affirmative action concept and different people attach different meanings to its definition. It (Affirmative Action) impacts differently on different groups under different conditions. The study also suggests that education, training and development (ETD) are dependent variables of affirmative action in the sense that they create an environment where individuals who were (under)privileged can learn to accept and understand one another as partners. AFRIKAANS : Die Mpumalanga Onderwysdepartement het verskeie meganismes daargestel om billikheid en gelykheid tussen manlike en vroulike opvoeders en leerders binne die onderwysstelsel te bevorder. Sodanige inisiatiewe is gevestig vanuit 'n aanname dat sosio-kulturele stereotipes soos patriargie, gebrek aan toegang tot hulpbronne en verdeling van werk op geslagsgrondslag gei'nternaliseer en versterk is as diskriminerende handelinge binne die skoolstelsel, gemeenskap, huis en werkplek. Binne die onderwysstelsel word geslagstereotipes gebruik om onderwysvoorsiening vir leerders as afsonderlike groepe (seuns dogters) te bepaal en te laat voortbestaan deur die skoolkurrikulum en die klaskamerpraktyk van die opvoeders wat "manlike" en "vroulike" aktiwiteite gebruik. Insgelyks word senior bestuursposisies gewoonlik deur mans beklee terwyl vroue gerelegeer word na laer posisies in die bestuurskader. Die doe I van hierdie studie was om die hoofoorsake van ongelykhede in senior bestuursposisies tussen manlike en vroulike bestuurders te identifiseer. Die PAR-metode wat van 'n gevallestudie gebruik maak en 'n literatuurstudie is aangewend as data-insamelingstegniek. Die beleid van regstellende aksie, asook programme met betrekking daarop, word aanbeveel as strategiee om vroue en dogters te bemagtig met die doel om hulle voor te berei om bevoeg te wees in die arbeidsmark. Daar is 'n verskeidenheid vertolkings van die begrip regstellende aksie en verskillende mense koppel verskillende betekenisse aan die definisie. Regstellende aksie het verskillende invloede op verskillende groepe onder verskillende omstandighede. Die studie dui ook aan dat Onderwys, Opleiding en Ontwikkeling (000) afhanklike veranderlikes van regstellende aksie is in die sin dat hulle 'n omgewing skep waar individue wat (minder)bevoorreg was kan leer om mekaar te aanvaar en te begryp as vennote. / Dissertation (MEd (Education Management))--University of Pretoria, 2005. / Education Management and Policy Studies / unrestricted

It has been claimed that since the dawn of democracy, there have been remarkable strides which were made to deal with the inequalities and disparities of the previous years. Former South African Police was reformed into a formidable South African Police Service that recognises the importance of women in the police. However, the SAPS is still one of the male-dominated organisations in this country. The inclusion and the retaining of women within operational policing and in management as well as leadership positions is still not yet successful. This research aimed to explore the causes for underrepresentation of policewomen in operational policing in Tshwane. The aim of this study was attained by gathering information through literature review, interviews and document analysis. In this qualitative study, semi-structured one-on-one interviews were conducted with twenty policewomen from four different identified police stations in Tshwane. Each identified police station was represented by five participants who directly perform operational policing. The findings of this study show that the organisation is still very unbalanced with the scale favouring males in operational policing. It is therefore recommended that SAPS should empower women in operational policing with the appropriate knowledge, skills and competencies through providing opportunities for career development and growth to successfully realise the SAPS’ dream of including and retaining women in operational policing, as well as in management and leadership positions and providing all women in the SAPS with the necessary support. The development and review of a regulatory framework and strategies that promote gender equality are also paramount. / Police Practice / M. Tech. (Policing)