Faculty of Humanities (ETDs)

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Challenging the Representation of Masculinity & Themes Pertaining to Rape Culture in Film & Televisual Media
(University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, 2022-06) Gondo, Jackson Onai; Heatlie, Damon; Dladla, Tiisetso
This dissertation raises questions around the representation of masculinity and in turn the notion of ‘toxic masculinity’ in film and televisual media, and will result in a project in the form of a screenplay and animated scene that subverts these representations and makes the audience, through viewing the film, question their relationship to toxic masculinity and ‘rape culture.’ The dissertation looks at the narrative and visual conventions pertaining to masculinity that have existed throughout the history of film and television and how they still manifest themselves today. It looks at attempts to subvert these conventions and where these attempts failed. It also looks at literary scholars who have theorized these notions of masculinity and how those ideas have indeed manifested throughout film and television.
Constructing identities through discourse: Examining the textual representation of prostituted women in post-apartheid South Africa
(University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, 2021) Landman, Tiaan A.
The current study explores the intersectional social identities of four ‘prostituted women’ in post-apartheid South Africa as they are represented through discourse. The socio-cognitive model of critical discourse studies is employed to explore the way in which their social identities are represented through texts. These texts were retrieved from the online blog of a non-profit organisation, Embrace Dignity (2019), which advocates for the rights of women and girls. The texts were written to represent the personal experiences of four black women who identify as ‘prostituted’. This study found, through the engagement with biopolitical and intersectional feminist theory, that conditions which are paramount to a ‘social death’ are often proliferated for the subjects at the intersection of their gender, sex, sexual, and racial identities. Furthermore, these conditions are often concealed through the guise of class. The subjects make meaning of their social identities through a range of experiences, which are facilitated by sociohistorical systems of oppression aimed to disenfranchise feminised and blackened bodies in South Africa. These systems of oppressions are communicated through discourses of Bantu education, unskilled labour, violence, sexual perversion, limited access to services, marginal citizenship, geography, movement, and displacement, as well as a discourse of care, to name a few. The study found that these discourses are fostered and realised through the political project of domination, enforced by white heteropatriarchy that was institutionalised by the apartheid government. The study further indicates how the women who are represented by the texts, have been positioned within contexts that suppress their lives. This study emphasises the importance of exploring the intersectional social identities of black prostituted women in order to appropriately support the women within this community and their voices.
Experiences of Gender Roles in Young Adults Living in Soweto
(University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, 2023-11) Mdunge, Fundiswa Rejoice Lucia; Patel, Ruby
The study explores the more contemporary meanings and experiences of gender roles which have been developed by young adults over the years in their small-lived, contemporary experiences within Soweto. The study draws on in-depth interviews conducted with six young adult men and women and is carried out using a qualitative design. In exploring the topic of gender roles, normative patterns of change were identified which can contribute to the future discourse of gender role development. These normative patterns of change were attributed to ecological influences from the individual, their family, and their local and international communities, as well as intersectional influences which were identified as also playing a role in the participants’ experiences of gender. The study reveals participants’ experiences which are related to themes of gendered social pressures and socialisation, generational experiences of traditional and non-traditional gender roles, gendered divides and harmful gender stereotypes, gender identity conflicts in the ecological system, social ostracisation, issues of adultification, and views on patriarchal gendered ideologies and the maternal gatekeepers of these ideologies. The participants’ stories reveal fractures in their contemporary gender role ideology and their gender role development during their upbringing. Despite these fractures, they express hopes to develop gender role experiences which incorporate both traditionally socialised gender roles and non-traditionally developed understandings of gender and gender roles in their future adult years, as a means to create their own personal gendered experiences based on their exposure to different ecological environments.
Exploring the perceptions of Adolescent’s Black Female Learners in Public School of STEM Careers in terms of its significance towards individual Economic Empowerment: A case study of Bona Comprehensive High School in Soweto, South Africa
(University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, 2023-06) Sikhosana, Hope Nosipho; Nkomo, Thobeka
Low enrolment of females in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) careers is a persistent problem in South Africa and Globally. The issue was greatly exacerbated by the history of gender-based discrimination and oppression, particularly in the workplace and in education. This unequal way of life between men and women of different races was established and maintained in large part by power structures like apartheid and patriarchy. Women have been underrepresented in STEM disciplines as a result of discrimination and sexism. But as the balance of power shifted over the years, many women—and particularly those from historically marginalized groups—were given encouragement to enter STEM areas. However, despite the efforts, women number in STEM remains low. The study investigated how Black adolescent female students in public schools perceived STEM occupations to better understand the low representation of women in STEM fields. The researcher conducted a qualitative case study at Bona Comprehensive School in Soweto to fulfil this goal. A purposive sampling strategy was utilized to choose 1 Life Orientation teacher, while an intentional snowball sampling technique was used to sample 10 Black Adolescent Female students. In-depth one-on-one telephone interviews were performed to collect data, with a semi-structured interview schedule serving as the research tool. Thematic content analysis was used to examine the data that had been gathered. Results show that female students view occupations in medical favourably because they see them as safe and feminine, whereas they view careers in electrical engineering and construction as dangerous and masculine. Also, the results demonstrate that participants' positive perceptions were influenced by the good pay associated with STEM fields because they felt that economic empowerment was crucial to changing their lives and the lives of their families. The lack of resources from the school for hands-on learning, however, was a challenge for the female students as they pursued STEM degrees. In order to keep and attract female students in STEM fields, there is a need to better support them throughout their academic careers. In the research report's latter sections, recommendations are given.
Femicide in South Africa: Ideal Victims, Visible Bodies, and Invisible Perpetrators
(University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, 2023-05) Nyathi, Tebogo; Falkof, Nicky
South Africa’s femicide rate is five times the global average (Statistics South Africa 2018). In recent years, we have seen increased scholarly attention examining media reporting of femicide. These studies have been critical the way South African media have and continue to cover femicide. This study seeks to add to this existing knowledge by exploring the media coverage of three sexual violence murders. This study explores the online news media coverage of three case studies. These case studies are the rape and murder of University of Cape Town student Uyinene Mrwetyana, the rape and murder of Lynette Volschenk, and the rape and murder of grade 7 pupil Janika Mallo. All these murders happened in Cape Town in August 2019 and received prominent media coverage. This study utilizes thematic analytic tools to explore dominant patterns in the data through the framework of representation and intersectionality. The study aims to do a close reading and identify discourses embedded in news media texts to highlight their functions, effects, and social and ideological implications for society. The findings reveal an increased focus on the visible bodily injuries of victims and media used spectacular language to present this. The focus on the bodily injuries resulted in making perpetrators invisible. The analysis confirmed that certain victims matter to media more than others. Furthermore, media represented femicide as a current crisis and ignored the historical structures that enable the prevalence of sexual violence. Although, this study is not comparative media analysis and does not provide media to show that some murders are under reported, because it is only looking at three cases the analysis does demonstrate that other murders matter more than others. The study concludes that the way media cover femicide does not present the ‘true reality’ of sexual violence in South Africa and we are still far from finding long lasting solutions to the rampant violence.
From Fatherlessness to fatherhood: Experiences of adult Black South African men in the Gauteng Province.
(University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, 2022) Senwamadi, Jacob Ramasoane Makgoane John; Matee, Hopolang
This study aimed to explore the experiences of Black South African first-time fathers who grew up without their biological fathers, as well as how these men perceive their fathers’ absence to have influenced their experiences of fatherhood. Individual semi-structured interviews were conducted with five Black first-time fathers between the ages of 25-30. The study followed a qualitative explorative design where the participants were recruited using purposive sampling. The findings of the study revealed that some of the first-time fathers had known their biological fathers’ identities during childhood even though they were not physically or financially present in their lives. Furthermore, they did not form any close relationship with them. The participants reported to have experienced rejection from their fathers while growing up. There was a common thread amongst the participants with regards to the need to feel accepted by their biological fathers. This appeared to be a powerful motivational basis for the men’s’ interpersonal experiences. The experience of rejection in childhood has been found to have many negative effects on an individual’s development later in life. This includes increased aggression, increased internalising of difficulties in adolescence, and psychopathological symptoms in adulthood. It has also been found that individuals with this experience are more likely to hold distorted mental representations that could lead to perceiving rejection and hostility in interpersonal relationships, and to further interpret relationships as being untrustworthy and unpredictable. What the participants experienced in this study is consistent with what has been reported in psychoanalytic literature; fatherhood is defined in connection to the father's function in the Oedipus complex where his function as an intrapsychic construct, also known as the "internal father," and their involvement in child development. It was concluded that in post-apartheid South Africa, numerous factors such as high levels of unemployment, poverty, and inequality are amongst the major determinants of family disruptions particularly among the Black people. The situation is exacerbated by the burden of HIV/AIDS and violence-related mortality. The family and parental practices have been significantly affected leaving so many children growing up without biological fathers, either through rejection or premature death.
Gender-based violence in Sri Lanka: Has Sustainable Development Goal 5 been an effective policy tool?
(University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, 2023-03) Jurgensen, Kim; Zähringer, Natalie
This research paper is an investigation of gender-based violence and gender inequality in Sri Lanka. Sri Lanka was chosen as a case study because it ended the 26-year civil war in 2009, and has had over a decade since this reset moment to rebuild the country. The paper builds on feminist research which says that high levels of gender inequality give rise to high levels of violence against women. The research is based on a gender structural inequality theoretical framework, and uses the Sustainable Development Goals (specifically SDG 5 which talks to gender equality) as the measurements of these structures. While there has been work done on various aspects of development in Sri Lanka, the purpose of this research project was to pull together the targets under SDG 5 and, using a process tracing methodology, demonstrate their effect on levels of violence against women. The research stated upfront that data for the dependent variable (violence against women) was already known, and that data would be sought for the independent variables (i.e. the remaining targets under SDG 5) to show correlation between the DV and IVs. The research showed that there has been poor implementation for most of the targets under SDG 5, and as such the outcomes were mostly negative. These findings were in line with the theoretical framework of gender structural inequality, and the feminist writings of the link between gender inequality and violence against women. It was interesting to see that on two main areas i.e. sexual health and education (which does not fall under SDG 5), Sri Lanka has almost complete gender parity. This demonstrated that women’s economic power and participatory parity (i.e. participating at senior level in the labour market and in government) were decisive factors in entrenching conservative societal views that undermine women’s agency and entrenches unequal power dynamics in the home, where most of the violence occurs.
Gender-Based Violence: Lived experiences of female students at the University of the Witwatersrand
(University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, 2023-08) Kgolane, Serole Joy; Langa, Malose
This research aimed to explore experiences of Gender based violence (GBV) among female students at the University of the Witwatersrand. It sought to ascertain how these experiences unfolded as well as the impact they have had on the students. Intersectionality theory was applied as the theoretical framework to observe the impact of overlapping identities on the students’ experiences of GBV. The study consisted of seven female participants who were selected using a volunteer sampling method. Interpretive phenomenological analysis (IPA) was used to analyse the transcribed interviews and derive themes from the collected data. Four themes in total were identified: power relations, internal experience, normalization of GBV, and help-seeking. The objectives of the study were used to guide the analysis of the themes. The findings showed that students face stalking, verbal abuse, emotional abuse, physical abuse, and sexual abuse perpetrated mostly by fellow male students. Moreover, influences of hegemonic masculinity and gendered power imbalances played a role in the perpetration of violence against the female students. Furthermore, the findings indicate that these experiences had adverse effects on the mental well-being of the students and led the students to adopt various coping strategies while often failing to engage in help-seeking behaviour.
Gendered Affective Economies of Male Sexual Violence Against Men in South Africa
(University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, 2023-08) Chitiki, Elizabeth; Nkomo, Nkululeko; Kiguwa, Peace
Within the South African context, sexual violence against men is an under-researched phenomenon, and abuse against men is largely characterized by silence. This study focused attention on discursive and affective dimensions of societal responses to sexual violence against men (heterosexual, gay, bisexual, and transgender men). At the pinna core of this research was the interrogation of how male victim-survivors of sexual violence are constructed within contexts that are embedded with gender, sexuality, and masculinity governing ideologies. Concerning sexual violence against men, dominant sexual constructions of men perceive men as sexually promiscuous and always ready for sex. Then, one ought to pose a question about how men's sexual agency and subjectivity are constructed when one or more of these social constructs are violated in the case of sexual violence. Using data from online radio talk podcasts and virtual ethnographies, I analyse societal responses to male sexual violence. Data were analysed using Foucauldian Discourse Analysis in tandem with Affect theory. The results of this research are presented in three chapters. The first chapter of the analysis discusses victim worthiness and empathy in social constructions of male sexual violence. The second chapter of the analysis shows the humanization of a (de)humanized subject in understanding prison rape via affective tropes. The third chapter of the analysis discusses the unmasking of institutional culpability through affective economies of shared pain and rage. Thus, the findings of the study highlighted that particular discursive constructions and affective tropes are useful in the negotiation, and surfacing of particular subjectivities in connection to male sexual violence.
In Search of Blackwomen’s Voices – Engendering South African Liberation Movement
(University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, 2023) Rodwell, Karabo-Maya; Shange, Kholeka
The Black Consciousness Movement played a vital role in South Africa’s fight for liberation against the apartheid government. A significant part of this movement were the Black women that risked their lives for the country. Despite the work that they have all done and continue to do, Black women in this movement have faced multiple challenges related to their gender. I am interested in sharing the experiences of these women to add to the growing literature on the role and impact of Black women in South Africa’s history. To do this, I conducted interviews with six Black women over six months, between July 2022 and January 2023, all of whom have been involved in the Black Consciousness Movement. The participants in this research represent a small glimpse into the experiences of Black women in South African liberation movements. This research report follows the lived experiences of Black women in South Africa’s liberation movement, looking specifically at the Black Consciousness Movement. My research found that while each of these women were involved in the movement at different time periods, and in different areas of South Africa, many of their experiences overlap. I have broken these findings into three major themes. The first ethnographic chapter follows their early consciousness building and when they believe they came into consciousness. This chapter explores the formative years of Black women in the Black Consciousness Movement, namely who and or what influenced their political consciousness. The second ethnographic chapter examines Black women’s subjective interpretations of Black Consciousness and the impact this has on the self. While they were all part of the same movement they all seemed to have experienced the ideology differently. The third and final ethnographic chapter interrogates the marginalisation of Black women in the BCM. Here I discuss how women joined this structure for the emancipation of Black people at large, as well as connections to the ideology, and yet many felt that as women they were not always allowed the space to fully participate.
In Search of Utopia: Sylvia Pankhurst, Ethel Mannin, Nancy Cunard, and International Socialist Woman Authors in Interwar Britain
(University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, 2024) Timlin, Carrie; Kostelac, Sofia; Gordon, Colette
A revival of anti-communist discourse in scholarship and politics has reignited decades-long debates between those who associate communism with the atrocities of totalitarian systems, and those who seek to emphasise the work of Socialists who genuinely sought to create a world free from gender, class and racial discrimination. In literary studies this has manifested as renewed interested in the lives and work of utopian Socialist authors like Nancy Cunard, Ethel Mannin and Sylvia Pankhurst, which suggests a shift in scholarship towards those outside the literary canon. Pankhurst and Mannin drew on literary forms that spoke to the culture, history, and experiences of their readers: women and the working classes. An exploration of the complexity of Cunard’s journey from attempts to infiltrate elitist literary circles, to a poet whose work captured the hardships of racial inequality and war, challenges ideas about the politics of modernist experimentation, and the value placed on high art. Taken together, their fiction and non-fiction unsettles the boundaries between art and activism, high, middle and lowbrow art, and preconceived ideas about the canon in the study of literature. Bringing their fiction and non-fiction into conversation with their socio-political contexts, readerships, and the philosophies and utopian socialist doctrine that shaped them as author-activists opens new avenues of exploration into the interplay of politics and aesthetics. Blurring the line between public politics, fiction and non-fiction, Pankhurst, Mannin, and Cunard’s work was a crucial and effective part of their internationalism, socialist activism, and resistance to totalitarianism. In the tradition of the utopianism of the late 19th Century they adapted literary forms as vehicles for socialist philosophy and doctrine. In addition to their creative work, they used literary techniques to shape non-fiction like newspaper articles, pamphlets and other political texts. The diversity of experience that Pankhurst, Mannin and Cunard recorded in their fiction and non-fiction amounts to an archive of work that complicates reductionist post-Cold War debates about the theory and practice of communism.
“It’s not you that needs to change, it’s the system that needs to change” – The narratives of South African women professionals working with Gender-Based Violence
(University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, 2023-08) Ramlucken, Roxanne; Kiguwa, Peace
Professional South African women who encounter gender-based violence in their field have important and potentially transformational experiences to share on addressing this issue. These professionals have experience and in-depth knowledge of the realities of working with gender-based violence. They can use their expertise to conceptualise and explain this phenomenon. They understand how gender-based violence is presented in society and their recommendations are informed by pragmatic reasoning. This study utilised a qualitative research method to obtain the narratives of these women that work in psychology, community health work, social work, legal work and journalism. This paper used a combination of three theoretical frameworks: narrative theory, post-structural feminist theory and African feminist theory. The synergies between these three theories prioritised the voice of the participants and allowed for a critical engagement with the narratives. The use of multiple professions accounts for the complex and multidimensional elements that contribute to the levels of gender-based violence in South Africa. The findings suggest the cultural acceptance of violence and patriarchal values are ingrained into the fabric of society. Gender-based violence is a systemic issue that prevails through insufficient implementation of legislation and the lack of accountability by official personnel.
Lil_ith- A love story for South Africa’s queer, misfit youth
(University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, 2023-03) de Jager, Robin Claude; Wessels, Christopher
This project takes the form of an explorative filmic investigation into and reflection on the archetype of the queer misfit in South African cinema. The film and research take the standpoint of the South African misfit archetype being a post-queer-theory subject in relation to the country’s historical, socio-economic, sexual, traditional and technological landscape. I will compare the appearance of the queer misfit through the arrival of the neon and caustic characters of the New Queer Cinema movement of the 1990s to South Africa’s contemporary emergence of this archetype, positioning Queer Theory and the New Queer Cinema movement of the early as the primary emergence of a ‘true’ queer voice. I will engage with the influence of socio-economic, political and technological stimuli as well as the emergence of post-Queer Theory in the West and South Africa and its contribution to the evolution of the queer and misfit in post-colonial South African cinema. Through a practice-led, autoethnographic approach I combined these findings with core theoretical frameworks on post-modern sexuality by Queen and Schimel to inform and fuel the development of the film Lil_ith. The film stands as a creative execution expanding on the South African Misfit archetype in relation to the global history of Queer Misfit representation as well as its relationship with South Africa as a nation in the process of de-lonialisation within a digitised and globalised world.
Men’s responses to the #menaretrash movement on Reddit: a social constructionist and psychoanalytic analysis
(University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, 2022) Stroucken, Paige Alexandra
Gender-based violence (GBV) has been declared a global pandemic by the United Nations and has been linked to traditional gender roles and societal pressure to achieve certain masculinities. The necessity of including men in conversations around gender and GBV interventions has been highlighted, however, there is limited research on men’s responses to GBV or to protests against GBV. This study aimed to contribute to the inclusion of men in GBV conversations by focusing on men’s responses to a particular online protest movement, #MenAreTrash (#MAT). This movement began in South Africa in 2016/17 in response to violence against women and was adopted by women across the world as a means to express anger toward broader gender discrimination, violence and gender power imbalances. This study examined men’s responses to the #MAT movement on Reddit (a free online social media platform). In particular, these men’s constructions of masculinity, women, and the #MAT movement were examined. Subreddits threads and posts (including comments) using the hashtag from January 2019 to January 2021 were analysed. An interpretive thematic analysis that utilized psychodynamic and social constructionist frameworks was conducted, which allowed for both intrapsychic and social aspects of responses to be explored. This study found that the predominant emotion displayed by men in the threads was anger, in response to feeling threatened. However, underlying this anger was anxiety. Anxiety was understood as an underlying response to feeling the need to defend their masculinity. Masculinity was constructed in two ways: as either unfairly under attack or needing to change. Some men felt that the good parts of masculinity were being ignored. Other men viewed masculinity as capable of being more responsive and adaptive to female causes. However, within these two constructions the complex nature of masculinity emerged, within which there were shifting positions of agency and victimhood. Men in the study constructed all women who support the #MAT movement as feminists, however, splits in this construction were also evident: women were either ‘reasonable feminists’ who demonstrate less combative support of the movement, or ‘radical feminists’, who aim to annihilate and alienate men. Overall, #MAT was constructed as damaging and stereotyping. However, a small number of men viewed the movement as helpful and necessary in generating awareness of GBV.
Rethinking the Logics of the Sex/Gender Anatomical Schema
(University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, 2023-03) Nqambaza, Palesa Rose; Dube, Siphiwe
This dissertation is an appraisal of the dominant gender discourse(s) in selected South African anthropological, gender and feminist texts. It challenges the uncritical adoption of colonial sex/gender frameworks when making sense of indigenous ways and modes of being and proposes an Afrocentric alternative that goes beyond bio-logical frameworks. This study is two pronged. Firstly, it problematises the uncritical application of Western feminist theories that have tended to impose European realities on the African context. Secondly, it mines the indigenous archive for Afrocentric ideas that contribute to creating a uniquely African theory of subject formation that considers aspects important to the African world-sense such as seniority, kinship status and ancestral links. I make use of critical discourse analysis to analyse the dominant discourse(s) and knowledge on sex and gender within the context of what is today known as South Africa. I do this employing the Azanian philosophical tradition as the theoretical framework that informs the perspective from which I read and make sense of these discourses, using a mixture of textual analysis, linguistics, archival work, and historical method. Based on my reading of dominant gender discourses against textual, linguistic and historical evidence, I make the following arguments. Firstly, I problematise the blanket usage of the conceptual category of ‘woman’ to refer to colonised subjectivities. I demonstrate that Black womxn have been discursively constructed as existing outside the bounds of the conceptual category ‘woman’ who is the key subject of feminist theorising. Secondly, I demonstrate that the logics of the sex/gender anatomical schema, that organises men and women in a hierarchy, cannot account for indigenous modes of social organising. I maintain that African subjectivities are fluid, complex and contingent, depending on aspects such as one’s seniority, kinship status and ancestral links. Likewise, I invoke the institution of ubungoma as an additional site to demonstrate the inadequacy of the sex/gender anatomical framework in making sense of sangoma subjectivities. I also problematise the tendency to use LGBTQ languaging as an alternative in making sense of the institution of ubungoma. I maintain that while noble, this alternative framing is also implicated in underscoring the existence of a coherent sex/gender regime within which the institution of ubungoma is then assumed to be ‘queer’. I maintain that there is a pressing need to mine indigenous linguistic archives for alternative ways of wording indigenous subjectivities in ways that are not distortive, nor mimic Eurocentric versions.
She’s Not a Bad Girl, Brenda Fassie: Past, Present and Future, A Canon for the Construction of Post Colonial Feminist Consciousness
(University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, 2023-07) Qwesha, Qhama; Mupotsa, Danai S.
In this research report, I examine the ways that icon Brenda Fassie operates as an important archive for the articulation of quotidian feminist consciousness. In paying close attention to the present re-emergence of Fassie in South African intimate publics that include idioms, modes, praxes, aesthetics, and consumptive forms that she currently figuratively circulates. I approach the question of an archive from two central sensibilities: first, with regards to authoritative narrative accounts related to her memorialization; and second, in the ways that her figure (re)appears in these intimate publics to reconfigure the meanings we attach to African femme/womanhood and sexualities. Looking to multiple archives is a methodological gesture at assembling a range of cultural objects that include her body of work, including the aural, visual, and aesthetic performance of her work; along with the archive of work produced with or about her that often situates itself around accounts of her biography. With this understanding of her archive, the approach is to see how Fassie figuratively operates, presenting contesting identities through which she can move in and out of multiple temporalities that are often contradictory. Fassie’s ability to transgress while equally forming a part of national historic discourse allows us to inquire into the ways that she complicates notions of gender and sexuality – and how these continue to shape current articulations of feminism in post-apartheid South Africa.
Short Cut: A Feminist Reflection on the Postcolonial Uncanny
(University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, 2023) MILLS, ANGELITA VIOLA; Sakota, Tanja
This research-led praxis Masters interrogates and explores Sigmund Freud’s psychoanalytic theory on the uncanny to realise a short film text, entitled Short Cut. Specific attributes of the uncanny are applied in the film’s attempt to produce a sensibility of the uncanny, in order to convey the anxiety and fear of femicide experienced by women in South Africa on a daily basis. The film is effectively created through the theoretical considerations of the research. Drawing on primary texts from Sigmund Freud, Homi Bhabha and Teresa De Lauretis, the research deliberates on how the uncanny is a critical register through which to articulate conditions of dread and horror shaping the lives of women navigating the spectre of femicide in South Africa. The uncanny is marshalled as an aesthetic-conceptual tool consciously and intentionally used by filmmakers and as an aesthetic and conceptual tool for filmmakers interested in exploring the experiences and traumas of postcolonial women. In so doing, it seeks to provide new possibilities, insights and expressions of representation on film, through the intersectional conceptual lenses of gender, postcolonial theory and psychoanalysis.
The Black Homoerotic Oedipus: An Exploratory Multiple-Case Study on the Possible Cross-Cultural Applicability of a Depathologized Psychoanalytic Theory of Male Homosexuality
(University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, 2023-02) Bloomberg, Jonti Joey; Bain, Katherine
Classical psychoanalytic theory famously hypothesises a process in the aetiology of male homosexuality whereby a boy identifies with his mother and takes himself as a love-object. In addition to acknowledging that there may be various mechanisms in the development of a homosexual disposition, contemporary psychodynamic theoreticians have attempted to distance themselves from this view by emphasizing the primacy of the negative Oedipus complex and the ‘heretical’ possibility of one being able to identify with and lust the same object in the development of a homosexual object choice in adulthood. The present study sought to determine the potential cross-cultural applicability of this aforementioned depathologized psychoanalytic theory of male homosexuality by way of three openly homosexual Black South African men. The study found that aspects of both the classical and depathologized psychoanalytic theories might have cross-cultural applicability. It also brought to the fore the many difficulties and forms of discrimination that Black South African homosexual men face within their communities.
The role of Mzansi Magic’s ‘Makoti, Are You the One’ in facilitating gender discourses
(University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, 2023) Vabaza, Ncumisa; Muparamoto, Nelson; Vanyoro, Kudzaiishe
The South African Bill of rights prohibits all forms of discrimination based on gender and sex. The government through the National Development Plan encourages stakeholder involvement in the promotion of gender equality. Yet, the experiences of women in various spheres reveal that normative patriarchal socialization persists. This research evaluates the role of local media in facilitating gender discourses that permeate modern-day South African society. This research employs critical discourse analysis (CDA) and critical diversity literacy (CDL) to interpret the dominant gender discourses on the locally produced reality television show Makoti Are You the One? CDA and CDL are used to interpret the representation techniques used to empower and disempower men and women respectively. The research adopts a qualitative research approach, specifically non-participatory observation to comprehend the dynamics in the relationships between the show’s male-female participants as well as the inter-group relationships between female participants on the show. Using discourse, framing and gender theories the study provides an understanding of the techniques used by the media in representing gender, and how these contribute to the co-construction of social meanings assigned to gender. The findings show a persistent imbalance in the representation of gender through local programming, by hegemonically positioning men in superior standing to women who are represented as subjects in their homes and the broader society. These imbalances are contrary to the ideals of gender equality.
The ‘Gay Plague’: Community responses to AIDS in South Africa 1982-1987
(University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, 2023-08) Chernis, Linda; Glaser, Clive
South Africa became the epicentre of the HIV/AIDS pandemic in the 1990s, and still has the highest HIV rate in the world. Consequently, much has been written about HIV/AIDS in South Africa across a variety of academic disciplines, though with very little emphasis on the first five years (1982-1987) in which the epidemic first manifested in South Africa. This thesis explores these early years from the perspective of the “gay community” in which the virus was first identified, while also unpacking what is meant by community in this context. How did gay organisations, activists and individuals respond, rally and organised in a time of fear, oppression, ignorance and upheaval? Initial responses to AIDS fell on fledgling, mostly white, gay community organisations, and a few healthcare workers. By analysing the services and programmes initiated from this (admittedly disparate and problematic) group, and by placing these responses within the broader context of AIDS internationally, and apartheid locally, we can see a very specific and complex local response develop. This laid the groundwork for what was to become the much larger-scale gay and HIV/AIDS organising of the 1990s, which is generally where most researchers pick up the thread. Certainly, no previous research has sought to include all aspects of this organising, including fundraising, counselling, the gay press, public education initiatives, and caregiving. An intensive audit of the relevant material in the collections of the GALA Queer Archive in Johannesburg, including new additions, has contributed to a more in-depth understanding of this time period.

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