The aim of this thesis is to explore Namibian music and dance, to gain understanding of the character of different practices and through this, to provide teachers and learners in schools with materials suitable for use in the new arts curriculum in Namibia. In order to motivate the need for indigenous cultural materials, a brief historical background to Namibian arts education is sketched, highlighting the effects of colonialism on cultural identity and the separation of music from dance in education. In gathering examples of indigenous music and dance it became clear that for these practices to retain a measure of integrity in schools, new ways of thinking about performance in schools would be required. This leads to a discussion of an approach summarised within the term ngoma, which refers to holism, communality and orality among other things. It is suggested that music/dance as ngoma has a positive contribution to make to Namibian arts education. To support this suggestion in a practical way, I explore the indigenous traditions used to educate and socialise young people. Argumentation follows regarding possibilities of preparing teaching-learning materials in a manner appropriate to Namibian circumstances. A breakdown of diverse characteristics of indigenous music and dance is done in order to help the teacher identify and comprehend the individual characters of Namibian performances. In this way teachers should be better prepared to utilise the examples of music/dance events that follow. Various events are contextualised, described, transcribed and analysed with suggestions for use in the classroom. Finally the ngoma approach, the principles of Basic Education in Namibia, and the new arts syllabi are brought together by investigating some of the possibilities of music and dance as ngoma in schools. / Thesis (Ph.D.)-University of Natal, Durban, 1997.

No abstract available. / Thesis (Ph.D.)-University of Natal, Durban, 1982.

No abstract available. / Thesis (M.Mus.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, 2012.

This study aimed to intervene in the challenges emanating from the launch of a new primary schools Arts syllabus which is geared towards reflecting Batswana cultural values in Botswana primary schools. The launch was hurried, before all necessary provisions were made (Phuthego, 2007). Consequently, there is dire need of relevant resource materials, teaching/learning activities and qualified teachers, who can effectively translate the syllabus objectives and aims. The aim of this study was hence to devise learning activities based on Tswana children’s songs as the selected materials to realize the objectives of the existing primary school music syllabus for Botswana primary schools lower standards. This has been done through analysis of Tswana children’s songs, studying their nature and inherent values, on the basis of which culturally relevant teaching and learning activities have been designed for use in Botswana primary school music curriculum. In order to validate the need for a consideration of culturally relevant teaching and learning activities in Botswana primary schools, the study explored the music of the Batswana prior to and during colonialism and how it manifests itself in the current curriculum delivery. The study has also considered the current education policy’s aspirations of instilling cultural values in learners, as well as grooming a rounded citizen who can adjust to the challenges of the 21st century corporate world. The study employed content analysis through which twenty-four children’s songs were studied for their inherent values and musical concepts. Eclectic learning activities which take cognizance of the holistic approach prevalent in Tswana music making milieu, combined with the Rhythm Interval Approach (Akuno, 2005) which advocates the use of temporal and tonal elements of sound as the basic ingredients from which other musical elements such as form, texture, timbre harmony and dynamics are derived were employed. The activities were then tested in standards 1 to 4 to address the music syllabus. The results showed that the songs completely address the objectives stipulated in the syllabus and moreover, provide some extra-musical concepts which are embedded within them. The results also revealed that the Rhythm Interval Approach is applicable in Botswana lower primary schools, hence implicitly suggesting its further possible applicability to upper primary classes because the syllabus has been designed in a spiral fashion, where the same musical concept like ‘sound’ appears at different levels of intensity across all classes. The study recommended that The Revised National Policy on Education’s aim of grooming a locally and internationally compatible learner can be enhanced through learners’ awareness and appreciation of their culture on the basis of which they can later on spread their wings, to other world cultures. Tswana children’s songs have been observed to have a potential to act as a bridge to ease the transition of cultural pedagogy of rote learning to current paradigm of symbolic representation and abstraction of concepts. The study devised twenty learning activities to facilitate the use of these songs for curriculum delivery in standard 1-4. / Thesis (M.Mus.)-University of KwaZulu Natal, Durban, 2009.

No abstract available. / Thesis (M.Mus.)-University of Natal, 1987.

This study deals with the interplay of music and text in contemporary Durban rap. It / Thesis (M.Mus.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, 2009.

The aim of this study has been to locate a subcultural aspect of neotraditional music performance, and relate this to the broader historical, social, political, economic, and cultural processes of lived experience. In looking at the performance and compositional output of three township neotraditional musicians, I have attempted to focus on the individual construction and articulation of this lived experience. I have sought to link individuals to aspects of social and historical circumstance, perhaps to account for the undeniably social basis of performance generally. In this respect I have also recognised a common, overriding perception by the three township neotraditional performers, namely that of their pursuits as straddling a continuum of performance experience and epoch. In this way I have been led to examine elements which characterise this continuum in the urban black social experience. Thus, the bulk of the second chapter has been informed by existing archival documentary materials, scholarly studies of the socioeconomic, political, cultural and social performance developments among urban Africans in and around Durban prior to 1960. Several interviews with neotraditional performers of this era have also gone towards augmenting a backdrop for the emergent social performance practice of the townships since their consolidation from about the late 1950s onwards. It is from this melting pot of experience that I have attempted to pick up the threads that link the present subjects with what had unfolded before their time. However socially and culturally disjunctive the advent of the townships might be construed, it is as well the dynamics of such conjunctive and disjunctive experience in social performance practice which stand out clearly as symptoms in the course of urban black performance development. I have viewed the experience of the township as manifest in the lives of its citizens, here typified by the three subjects. I have sought the processing of the elements of the environment and its articulation in their individual compositional and performance styles. In the third chapter is delineated the influential aspect of learning and its effect upon the total expressive potential of the individuals. From a close scrutiny of contributing factors in the formative experiences of individual musicians, there emerge elements which highlight the intertextual and coeval nature of lived experience of the three subjects. The inclusion in the first chapter of my early musical consciousness acknowledges both the individual and the shared, social aspect of the musical performance experience. It is also in the intertwined careers of individual musicians that one of the most pertinent theoretical assumptions of this study finds resonance - namely the potential to be changed by, as well as to change, the experience of others (Jackson 1989). Chapter 4 seeks to account for the widespread employment of the guitar, especially in Natal and KwaZulu, as a primary instrument of neotraditional performance expressivity. The section on the tin-guitar exemplifies a general, grassroots understanding of the intervallic possibilities and rudimentary harmonies potentiated by neotraditional musical experiences. Chapter 5 deals with the stylistic approaches of the three subjects to performance and composition. An attempt is made to highlight their individual manipulation and understanding of the elements of form and structure, melody, harmony and rhythm. Chapter 6 focusses attention on the reproduction and representation of the music of the three subjects on records, radio, live performance and the print media. / Thesis (M.Mus.)-University of Natal, 1998.

No abstract available. / Thesis (B.Mus.)-University of Natal, Durban,1992.

This dissertation studies South African popular 'Gospel' music in the context of the new order of the post-apartheid era. The four main focal points of the study are genre, production, mediation and consumption. The end of apartheid was a historic and significant socio-political phenomenon in South Africa. Its implications were not only socio-political; they also affected many other aspects of the country, including arts and culture. Music was not exempt. The genre of local 'Gospel' is premised on the Christian faith, so that by producing and mediating 'Gospel' music, the music industry is at the same time producing and mediating the 'Gospel', or Christian culture. Consequently, by consuming 'Gospel' music the audience also consumes this 'Gospel' culture. Local 'Gospel' first emerged with foreign influences brought into South Africa by the missionaries, but gradually developed into the broad and complex genre that we know today. This is, in part, a result of 'other' influences, styles and elements having been incorporated into it. Many production companies are responsible for the production of local 'Gospel' music. These can be broadly categorized into two: major companies, and indies (which are small, private production companies). These two production routes have different implications for the artists and their music. Similarly, there are many different ways in which this music is mediated, or 'channelled', to its audience. These include television, radio, print media (newspapers, magazines, posters, fliers, etc.), internet, and live performances, all of which have their own specificities that determine their effectiveness in mediating local 'Gospel'. As is the case with any music, the audience for local 'Gospel' consumes its music in different ways and for different purposes. Though the artists/musicians assign certain meanings to their musical works, the audience does not always identify precisely with those musical meanings. Different people at different places and times, with different experiences and social conditions, encounter and interpret the music in different ways. South African popular 'Gospel' music is a broad and complex genre that has developed and grown over the years. The birth of democracy has had an indelible impact on it, and on its processes of production, mediation and consumption. / Thesis (M.Mus.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, 2005.

This thesis is a detailed biographical review of Brother Clement Sithole's life (1). This thesis traces Brother Clement's musical development, his acquisition of indigenous musical knowledge, and his application of this knowledge to his present experience. The purpose behind my enquiry is to further understand the relationship between historical musical practices and the present world experienced by the individual. What is the impact of past indigenous musical performance on the performer? Is indigenous musical performance an effective way for displaced people to alleviate alienation and disjuncture? What problems, complications, and contradictions are encountered by an individual when they attempt to use past musical practices to express their contemporary experience? The thesis is divided into six chapters. Chapter One is a general introduction to the Master's project. Chapter Two highlights Brother Clement's early years, and presents discussions related to the musical practices and cultural ideas acquired during this period. Certain childhood events are analyzed for the impact of these events on Brother Clement's later development. Chapter Three concerns Brother Clement's religious vocation and his liturgical compositions. Brother Clement has composed a number of religious songs for the umakhweyana bow and choral songs for Catholic Mass. In his compositions, he combines the text of the Catholic liturgy with indigenous Zulu musical styles. I discuss how indigenous Zulu music has assisted Brother Clement to create a sense of individuality, place, and belonging within the context of the Catholic community. In addition, I analyze how these compositions have brought a sense of continuity to his life through easing the tension between his commitments to the Catholic Church on the one hand, and to Zulu culture on the other. I also discuss some of the problems, and complications, which Brother Clement encountered when he attempted to introduce these indigenous musical styles to the context of the Catholic Church. In Chapter Four Brother Clement's work as a caregiver within his community is introduced. In the late 1980's, he opened a children's home to cater for needy children from the Vryheid area. Brother Clement is fully responsible for these children. In the home, the children practice and perform indigenous music on a regular basis. Brother Clement has named all of his musical work, including the children's home "Inyoni Kayiphumuli" which translates from isiZulu as "the bird that does not rest." The name is descriptive of his work within the abbey as a monk, and his continuous effort to transmit indigenous Zulu music and heritage to the youth. I focus on the impact of Brother Clement's work, and of the indigenous musical practice on the children from the Inyoni Kayiphumuli Children's Home. I analyze the relationship between the performance of past indigenous Zulu music and the introduction of certain moral values to the youth, and examine the relevance of these values in the context of contemporary South African society, in particular the national HIV/AIDS epidemic. Chapter Five provides a self-reflexive account of the creation of the accompanying video anthology. I discuss the relevance of video documentation in ethnomusicological study and analyze the relationship between the video and the written text presented in the thesis. Chapter Six serves as a conclusion to the thesis and presents an analytical summary of the project outcomes. I highlight the significance of this project and make some suggestions for future scholars undertaking similar research. (1) In this thesis, I use the name Mpimbili when referring to Brother Clement Sithole's formative years, since this is the name given to him at birth. In 1956, Mpimbili was baptized and his name changed to Albert, therefore when referring to these years I use the name Albert. In 1965, Albert takes his first vows as Benedictine brother, and his name changes to Brother Clement. Following this final name change I use his current name, which is Brother Clement. / Thesis (M.A.-Music)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, 2005.