ETD Collection

Permanent URI for this collectionhttps://wiredspace.wits.ac.za/handle/10539/104


Please note: Digitised content is made available at the best possible quality range, taking into consideration file size and the condition of the original item. These restrictions may sometimes affect the quality of the final published item. For queries regarding content of ETD collection please contact IR specialists by email : IR specialists or Tel : 011 717 4652 / 1954

Follow the link below for important information about Electronic Theses and Dissertations (ETD)

Library Guide about ETD

Browse

Subject: search.filters.subject.Families--South Africa.

Search Results

Now showing 1 - 2 of 2
  • No Thumbnail Available
    Item
    Saying goodbye: carers’ experience of separation and loss in carer-child relationships in South Africa
    (2017) Matthews, Daniella Ashleign
    The purpose of this research study was to explore the reported experiences and subjective meaningmaking of South African carers’ attachment to and separation from the children they helped to raise during their employment. This research was primarily conducted due to the absence of any known research exploring separation and loss in carer-child relationships in South Africa. Therefore, this study was carried out in order to contribute to the small body of literature in this area and to create awareness in the public regarding domestic carers’ unique and ever-changing needs in order to support their emotional wellbeing. In doing so, it is believed that this will impact positively on the emotional wellbeing of the children under their care as well as their own biological children. Based on an exploratory design, with a foundation in attachment theory, nine domestic carers employed in Johannesburg, South Africa, were asked to report on how they made sense of their relationship with the children they were paid to care for during a semi-structured interview. Additionally, carers were asked to reflect on their unique experiences of separation and loss following termination of employment (for various reasons). The interviews were audiorecorded, transcribed and analysed within an interpretivist framework, using thematic content analysis. Three broad areas of interest emerged based on previous literature and inductively from the carers’ interviews. These were namely, attachment, identity and separation and loss. The carers were found to form deep, emotional attachments to the children and family as a whole. A number of sub-themes emerged delineating the facilitators of the development of such an attachment between the carer and child. Themes regarding carers’ identity construction and the intricate and unique position they undertake within their employing family, emerged. The existence of an attachment relationship and the formation of an identity around this relationship inherently gave way to themes regarding carers’ profound sense of loss and grief following separation. This was accompanied by themes providing insight into some of the after effects and mediating factors of separation for the carers in this study. These findings were used to suggest recommendations for support initiatives and future research endeavours. Keywords: Domestic worker, carer, emotional labour, motherhood, attachment, separation, loss, mourning, support, South Africa
  • No Thumbnail Available
    Item
    Domestic bliss : how a group of white South Africans understand their relationships with the domestic workers who helped to raise them.
    (2013-04-08) Swisa, Sarit
    In the dearth of literature regarding domestic workers in general, there is a notable absence of the relationships formed between domestic workers and their employers’ children. Nine young white adults who self-identified themselves as having a close relationship with their families’ domestic workers for a minimum of ten years, were interviewed on the nature of this closeness and what it means in the context of the family and in South Africa. These participants shared the significance of their domestic workers in their lives, highlighting their integration into the family structure. These women often filled in for absent parents or mediated conflicted parent-child interactions, serving as a unique support system for the participants. However, contradictory evidence was also apparent as the boundaries between domestic workers and the participants’ families were described. Issues of race and social difference were cloaked in a silence perceived to be an aspect of concealing the uncomfortable elements of whiteness and the implicit understandings of the institution of domestic work. When these matters were addressed, the interviewees were often ambivalent about their own role in maintaining this norm. Exploring the less than perfect parts of the relationship with these caregivers seemed to threaten the very foundations of the relationship. The findings in this report support the argument that having multiple caregivers is optimal for children’s development but when the third caregiver is a black domestic worker the benefits of this arrangement are complicated by racial, social and class constructions. Moreover, constructions of the ideal Western family create friction in allowing a non-relative to be fully integrated into the family.