Journal articles on the topic 'Academic libraries - South Africa, Western Cape'

A brain drain in the physiotherapy profession is a cause of major concern currently among physiotherapists in South Africa. The main aim of this study was to determine the future plans of 2nd to 4th year physiotherapy students registered at the three academic institutions in the Western Cape for the 1999 academic year. It also aimed at determining the reasons why graduates chose to stay or leave South Africa. The results of the study show that an overwhelming majority (86%) of the respondents considered leaving South Africa following graduation. The reasons listed for leaving included gaining experience, financial gain and job availability. It is hoped that the results of this study will stimulate relevant role players to investigate means of persuading our graduates to stay and work in the country.

Aim:The aim of this study was to determine the most common causes of hypophosphataemia (⩽0.5 mmol/l) in a hospital population in order to identify patient groups at risk of developing the condition.Methods:The study was conducted at Tygerberg Hospital, a tertiary care centre in the Western Cape, South Africa. All patients identified with a phosphate level ⩽0.5 mmol/l during an 18-month period were included in the study. Medical records of these patients were reviewed.Results:Of all the requests received for serum phosphate determination by the laboratory, 2% (861 out of 45 394 requests) were ⩽0.5 mmol/l. Thirty per cent (30%; n = 189) of the patients in the study population died during their hospital stay. Most (45%; n = 278) of the patients with low phosphate levels occurred in an intensive care setting, whereas 10% (n = 63) were most likely due to refeeding, and 6% (n = 35) had neoplastic disease. Sepsis was implicated as a contributing factor in 26% (n = 162).Conclusion:Severe hypophosphataemia is associated with a very high mortality (30%, n = 189). Patients with a high risk of developing hypophosphataemia include those in an intensive care unit (ICU), patients suffering from neoplastic diseases, possible refeeding syndrome and septic patients. Regular phosphate determination is recommended in these patients to facilitate early diagnosis of hypophosphataemia.

The aim was to establish the prevalence of large pericardial effusions in the Western Cape Province of South Africa, and to determine the incidence of various types of effusions. A total of 233 patients presented with large pericardial effusions. Each patient underwent tests for HIV, sputum smear and culture, blood culture, blood biochemistry and serological testing. Tuberculous pericardial effusions were diagnosed according to pre-determined criteria. Eighty-four patients (36·1%) were found to be HIV positive; 81 of these (96·4%) had tuberculous pericarditis. More than 65% of the study population was aged between 15 and 39 years. The prevalence of HIV amongst unemployed individuals was 49·0% compared to 30·0% amongst employed individuals. Tuberculous pericarditis was the most common cause of pericardial effusions (69·5%, n=162). It was concluded that tuberculosis (TB) is a leading cause of pericarditis in this province of South Africa. The prevalence of TB confounded by HIV co-infection is steadily increasing, burdening the health-care facilities.

The relationship between crime and tourism has not received much attention in the academic fraternity. Instead, extensive attention has been placed on the impact of tourism on economic growth, inequality, poverty and employment. To contribute to the scarce literature on crime-tourism, the researcher examined the impact of crime on tourists arrival in the Western Cape Province, South Africa. An Autoregressive Distributive Lag model was employed to examine whether crime reduces or increases the arrival of tourists in the Western Cape Province. The results show that robberies, car hijacking and unemployment minimizes the number of tourists in the province, while economic growth and prosecution per population increases the number of tourists in the province. The results further highlight that robberies, car hijacking and unemployment disequilibrium can be solved after 1 year 6 months, holding all other things constant. Based on these findings, the study recommends that the government provide more employment opportunities to prevent crime in the province.

The eradication of poverty is an important priority for the South African government. The Constitution makes provision for vulnerable households and, therefore, local government has to develop policies to address the needs of the poor. Municipalities developed and adopted Indigent Policies to ensure that the poor households have access to essential basic services. This led the researcher to investigate what challenges are related to the financial sustainability of the Indigent Policy in its implementation process at the City of Cape Town for the period from 2003 to 2016. This study followed a qualitative research approach. Data were collected by conducting in-depth interviews. The participants were selected, because they had access to the most recent information that relates to the Indigent Policy. The researcher respected the rights of participants by allowing them the freedom to withdraw at any stage of the research study, ensuring confidentiality, ensuring anonymity, ensuring fair treatment and protecting the participants from any harm and discomfort throughout the research study. The researcher is of the opinion that all of the respondents are confident that the Indigent Policy is sustainable. However, should it become too expensive for the City of Cape Town to maintain the Indigent Policy, it could result in the budget of some other services being reprioritized. It is recommended that the City of Cape Town develops a beneficiary system for qualified indigents to allow them to receive additional benefits from other City of Cape Town facilities such as libraries, swimming pools and the MyCiTi bus services.

Background. Skin cancer is a growing health concern worldwide. It is the most common malignancy in South Africa and places a large burden on the public healthcare sector. There is a paucity of published scientific data on skin cancer in South Africa. Objectives. To report the findings of biopsies performed in patients with suspected skin cancer attending the Tygerberg Academic Hospital (TAH) Dermatology outpatient department (OPD) in the Western Cape Province of South Africa. Methodology: A retrospective chart review identified all patients who underwent a biopsy for a suspected skin cancer diagnosis between September 2015 and August 2016 at the TAH dermatology OPD. Results. A total number of 696 biopsies from 390 participants were identified, of which 460 were histologically confirmed as malignant lesions. The proportion of clinically suspected skin cancers that were histologically confirmed as cancer was 68%. The most commonly occurring malignancies were basal cell carcinoma (BCC) (54.8%), squamous cell carcinoma (SCC) (18.9%), squamous cell carcinoma in-situ (SCCI) (8.0%), Kaposi’s sarcoma (KS) (6.7%), malignant melanoma (MM) (6.1%), and keratoacanthoma (KA) (4.6%). The number needed to treat (NTT) for all cancers diagnosed and for MM was 1.5 and 4 respectively. BCC (89.3%) and KS (67.7%) was the most common skin cancer in the white and black population respectively. The ratio of BCC to SCC was 2.03. Conclusion. This study provides valuable scientific data on the accuracy of skin cancer diagnosis, distribution and patient demographics in the Western Cape Province of South Africa, on which further research can be based. The study highlights the burden of skin cancer on this specific population group and calls for standardised reporting methods and increased surveillance of skin cancers.

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to explore how an innovation in the University Management Information System was leveraged to incorporate library data by an initially sceptical strategic management team. The rationale was to extract evidence of correlations between library use and student achievement. This kind of information is of particular interest to the institution, which is at present dealing with crises popularly summarised in the slogan “#FeesMustFall” among students who suffer from the effects of poverty and exclusion in higher education. Comment is offered on some of the relationships between student library behaviour before, during and after the nationwide disruptions that destabilised universities and threatened their survival at the end of 2016, just before the final examination period. Design/methodology/approach Data were extracted from the data warehouse from the comparative demographic perspectives of students’ degrees of disadvantage in an effort to uncover any hitherto hidden patterns of library use. Findings The use of the library as expressed by footfall and loans was mapped against students’ pass rates and their collective GPA, indicating that increased library use correlates positively with better academic performance. Some of the initial correlations between student library behaviour before, during and after the nationwide disruptions that destabilised universities and threatened their survival at the end of 2016 just before the final examination period are explored. The effects that library closures (under threat of damage) at a critical time in the academic year might have had on library use and on student performance are interrogated. Practical implications Students on financial aid, which was used as an indicator of disadvantage, come from schools and environments where access to information technology and libraries is very limited, so that library habits are either poorly established or not at all. At the University of Cape Town (UCT), considerable support is in place for students to encourage the development of library habits. An analysis of available data indicates that students who have acquired library habits regardless of unfavourable financial circumstances do not exhibit behaviour and academic outcomes markedly different from that of their more privileged peers. Originality/value Combining library data with data from the university data warehouse is a new approach in South Africa. It is an approach that is of value both to the library and the institution at large and has brought meaningful insights into the role the academic library might be seen to play in promoting student academic achievement.

This special issue of Multilingual Margins on the theme of “Space/place matters” has its origin in a doctoral summer school organised in December 2016 by the Department of Linguistics and the Centre for Multilingualism and Diversities Research at the University of the Western Cape as part of a collaboration with the University of Oslo and three other South African universities – Stellenbosch University, University of Cape Town and University of the Witwatersrand – and financed by Research Council of Norway’s programme International Partnerships for Excellent Education, Research and Innovation (INTPART). Doctoral students based in Norway and South Africa attended the summer school, presented their research projects, and were encouraged to submit an article to Multilingual Margins. This was with a view to training budding scholars to deal with the peer-review process of academic publishing. This special issue is the material outcome of this process and includes three articles that have a common interest in unpicking the complex relationship between language and space/place.

Mentoring programs contribute to the development and retention of academics in dental education. To describe the perceptions of academic staff of the Faculty of Dentistry, University of the Western Cape, South Africa, about a funded pilot mentoring process. Cross-sectional, purposive sampling qualitative design. Twenty mentees who had engaged in the funded mentoring process were targeted for semi-structured interviews, to describe their perceptions about the ongoing mentorship process, experiences in other mentoring processes, and expectations about future formal mentoring in the faculty. Quantitative data was analysed descriptively, while content analysis of the qualitative data was performed to identify themes. Perceptions of eight mentees, aged 37 to 59 years and spent between 3 and over 20 years in the faculty, were categorized into two themes - ‘A welcome initiative’ and ‘Mentorship seen as a holistic experience’. The program provided the much-needed space where mentees felt they could seek guidance for their development. Expectations from a future formal program included assistance in meeting institutional and personal demands. Participants’ expectations were broader than what the pilot program offered, though

In October 2002 I was lucky enough to spend three stimulating days at the New York University Law School Library participating in the annual Legal Information Transfer Network workshop. The Legal Information Transfer Network (ITN) is funded by a generous grant from The Starr Foundation (established in 1955 by insurance entrepreneur Cornelius Van der Starr) and is headed by the dynamic Director of the NYU Law School Library, Professor Kathie Price. ITN aims to establish a global network of prestigious law libraries which ultimately can offer a 24/7 virtual reference service, both to its own partner libraries in the developed world and to academic legal communities in less developed countries. Previous annual workshops in such cities as Lausanne in Switzerland have given senior librarians from ITN partner libraries the opportunity to meet and make progress on issues such as providing a global virtual reference desk, sharing database access across the libraries, developing interactive legal research guides, and creating imaginative training programmes for local law librarians in China and Southern Africa (http://www.law.nyu.edu/library/itn). Between workshops the exchange of ideas is continued by email discussion. Currently the list of law library partners includes New York University, Washington University in Seattle, Toronto University in Canada, IALS Library in the UK, the Catholic University of Leuven in Belgium, Tilburg University in the Netherlands, Konstanz University in Germany, Cape Town University in South Africa, Melbourne University in Australia, Yerevan State University in Armenia, and Tsinghua University in China.

Abstract Through the Free Basic Sanitation (FBSan) service policy, many informal settlements in South Africa have been provided with basic sanitation facilities. However, access to these facilities remains challenging for many residents. These challenges have compelled residents to adopt a range of alternative sanitation practices. Through interviews, observation and focus group discussions in five informal settlements in the Western Cape, South Africa, 383 randomly selected respondents identified factors that shape their sanitation practices and how these practices impact on access to, and sustainability of sanitation services in the policy context of the FBSan. Residents' sanitation practices include the use of buckets, porta-potties, plastic bags, and existing facilities within and outside their settlements for either defecating or discharging the bucket contents and open defecation. These sanitation practices are informed by factors including safety concerns, poor conditions of the facilities, lack of privacy and choice. These findings suggest that the provision of facilities through the FBSan policy should consider the multiple and varied needs of residents, practices and conditions of their settlements prior to the selection and deployment of facilities to informal settlements in South Africa. This article has been made Open Access thanks to the generous support of a global network of libraries as part of the Knowledge Unlatched Select initiative.

Background. Drug abuse is as relevant today as ever. Management of such cases on a primary health care level may be challenging, particularly when laboratory facilities are unavailable. Furthermore, substance abuse and its sequelae place a significant burden on the already overstretched primary health care resources in the country, as well as on other ser- vices and society in general.Objectives. The current study surveyed the trends in demand for laboratory determination of amphetamines, opiates, methaqualone, cannabis, cocaine and ethanol for the period 1991 - 2002, in the Western Cape. The survey was conducted by extracting the relevant data from the records of the Pharmacology/Toxicology Laboratory of the University of Stellenbosch and Tygerberg Academic Hospital. This facility processes the largest number of specimens by a single laboratory in the Western Cape.Results. From the data obtained a seasonal pattern emerged for all substances except ethanol, with a trough appearing in early winter. Demand for ethanol analysis was fairly constant throughout the year, with a peak in the last quarter. Ethanol level was the most frequently requested analysis between 1991 and 1997. This concurs with its status as the main substance of abuse in South Africa and the rest of the world. There was an increased demand for analysis of ampheta- mines, opiates, methaqualone, cannabis and cocaine between 1991 and 2002. Generally dominating, next to ethanol, were requests for cannabis and methaqualone analysis. Interesting to note was the increase in demand for opiate analysis, following the trend observed in certain other regions of the world.Conclusion. The analysis trends observed in this study demon- strate global patterns of drug abuse emerging in the Western Cape. The medical and social effects of drug abuse impose a grave responsibility on policymakers to ensure that adequate funding is available for analytical laboratories. Only in such a way can these patients be correctly diagnosed and treated.

Lifelong learning among healthcare practitioners is crucial to keep abreast of advances in therapeutic and service delivery approaches. In South Africa, continuous professional development (CPD) was mandated (2019) for re-registration of pharmacists to illustrate their learning according to the South African Pharmacy Council’s (SAPC) competency standards. This paper uses a preceptor programme linked to the University of the Western Cape School of Pharmacy’s service learning programme to map the competencies employed by pharmacist preceptors in primary care public healthcare facilities in Cape Town in an attempt to encourage completion of their annual CPDs and strengthening the academic-service partnership. Competencies identified were divided into input competencies related to the preceptor’s role in designing and implementing the educational programme in their facilities and assisting students to complete their prescribed learning activities, and output/outcome competencies that emerged from preceptors identifying the facility needs and employing their input competencies. Input competencies pertained to education, leadership, patient counselling, collaborative practice and human resources management. Output competencies related to pharmaceutical infrastructure, quality assurance, professional and health advocacy, primary healthcare, self-management and patient-centred care. The preceptor programme enabled pharmacist preceptors to employ several competencies that are aligned with the SAPC’s competency framework.

The article attempts to identify whether the level of education and gender has an impact on the business growth of SMMEs in a developing economy. The study furthermore looks at the contribution made by the SMME sector from a spatial perspective. The Western Cape is seen as a more affluent province and a bigger contributor to the countrys GDP as opposed to KwaZulu-Natal, which comprises of the former province of Natal and the Zululand homelands. Entrepreneurship can be considered as one of the means of creating an enabling environment conducive to reducing poverty, stimulating economic growth, and creating employment opportunities, particularly in a South African context. Hence, activities in the SMME sector are often considered to be the bedrock of an economy and a key driver of growth and development. This holds most true for women assuming the role of entrepreneur, especially in developing countries. This study aims to explore and test this delicate relationship between women entrepreneurs and SMME sustainability, and to conduct empirical investigations into high-density SMME operations in two South African provinces. Survey data were collected from SMME owners/managers in the Western Cape and KwaZulu-Natal provinces of South Africa. In building on previous academic literature on SMME sustainability and women in business, various measures are developed and tested for reliability and validity. The study is cross-sectional in design, making use of trained fieldworkers to administer face-to-face surveys to a diverse set of SMMEs. A structured questionnaire was used to collect data from 465 owners/managers in the two provinces. The findings show (i) a positive relationship between a business owners/managers level of education and business growth, (ii) no correlation between a business owners/managers education and employment, and (iii) no relationship between gender and business growth. The findings of the study can benefit the South African Government in directing policy, SMME owners, educators and women in business by increasing awareness of the nature of sustainable SMMEs, and the effect of operational skills, gender and education on the development thereof. This study focuses on the growing sector of women in business and the impact of education in SMMEs linked toward business sustainability. A contribution is made toward theory development through empirical research.

Children and youth at risk, particularly those placed in child and youth care centres (CYCC) in South Africa, have suffered from school disengagement due to multiple barriers to learning such as the exposure to crime and violence at a young age. As children and youth at risk at these centres find it difficult to engage in learning, new approaches need to be found to re-engage their interest to learn. This article discusses how the ‘Curriculum of Care’, an adaptation of the Curriculum and Assessment Policy Statement (CAPS), responds to the educational needs of children and youth at risk at a CYCC in the Western Cape. It draws primarily from interviews and a focus group discussion with the centre manager and teachers at the institution. The findings reveal that positive learning outcomes, and the effective integration of children and youth at risk, are shaped by positive teacher–learner relationships; however, the findings raise questions about the extent to which such a curriculum prepares children and youth at risk for life after they leave the institution. The article suggests that the institutions providing education and care for children and youth at risk need to provide a curriculum balancing academic rigour with care to promote a holistic, inclusive education programme that enables youth and children at risk to effectively navigate their entry into society.

This article contributes graduate destination survey (GDS) evidence to the debate about graduate unemployment in South Africa. There has been lively contestation on the topic for several years, including several contributions from the commercial press arguing that graduate unemployment is very high. In contrast, academic evidence (based on national labour force data for the period 1995–2011) has been presented suggesting that the unemployment of graduates in South Africa is minimal, on average only 4.9% in 2011. New evidence has emerged from two recent GDSs – one comprehensive survey of all 2010 graduates across all qualification levels at all four universities in the Western Cape, and a second focusing only on the 2012 Bachelor of Technology (BTech) graduates at the Vaal University of Technology (VUT) in Vanderbijlpark, Gauteng. These two studies, using the same methodology and online questionnaire, provide a more accurate picture of the graduate unemployment problem in two important economic regions of the country. The results show that although rates of unemployment are low at the elite University of Cape Town (UCT) and Stellenbosch University (SU) (graduate unemployment is between 3 and 6%), rates are much higher at the Cape Peninsula University of Technology (CPUT) – a former historically disadvantaged technikon – with 15.8% unemployment among CPUT students. African unemployment at CPUT reached 20.2% among all first-time entrants (as compared with 4% for whites), suggesting the continuation of a racially stratified labour market for highly skilled labour long after apartheid’s demise. Similarly, unemployment rates among the BTech VUT graduates of 2012 reached 18%. This is an extremely high rate for fourth-year graduates of a polytechnic-type institution whose primary mandate is to place qualified graduates in jobs in the mainstream economy.

A steadily increasing number of wealthy foreigners, mainly from other African countries, opt to send their teenage children to independent secondary schools in South Africa to give their children what they perceive to be the “best education possible” (Spaull, 2015: 14). As is the case globally, international students entering the South African independent school system at secondary level may face major difficulties in acquiring academic English.International students with language barriers tend to gravitate towards schools without rigorous entrance examinations in place. This article focusses on three high-fee independent secondary schools in the Western Cape, two boarding schools and one day school, whose websites in 2017 did not indicate that they had formal, exclusionary entrance examinations in place. Data subsequently provided by these schools showed that their student bodies did, in fact, include a substantialnumber of international students. For this study, the principal and two other senior members of staff at each of the three schools were interviewed to ascertain how they provided language support for international students with language barriers. After reporting backon these interviews, the discussion section of the article critically analyses current practices, with the conclusion of the article acting as a preamble for a follow-up article, in which aspects of the CLIL (content and language integrated literacy) model will be identified whichcould prove useful to these schools to further support students and staff.
 Keywords: international students, language support, independent schooling, challenges, secondary schools

Sweet basil (Ocimum basilicum) is an herbaceous aromatic annual plant of the family Lamiaceae grown for its flavoring and fragrances that can be used fresh or dried. In South Africa, sweet basil is grown on a commercial scale. Downy mildew has recently been reported as one of the most destructive diseases of sweet basil in Switzerland, France, and Italy (1–3). The identity of the downy mildew species infecting sweet basil has been controversial and has been indicated as Peronospora lamii, a presumably undescribed (unnamed) Peronospora species, as well as a few species of which the status as distinct species is mostly unclear or doubtful (1). The distinction between P. lamii and the unnamed Peronospora species has been based on their sporangial dimensions, with P. lamii having sporangial dimensions with a length and width range of 16 to 26 × 15 to 23 μm (average 21 × 18 μm) and the unnamed Peronospora species having sporangial dimensions of 20 to 35 × 15 to 25 μm (average 28 × 22 μm) (1) or 23 to 36 × 18 to 29 μm (average 29 × 23 μm) (2). Additionally, internal transcribed spacer (ITS) sequence data has also been used to show that P. lamii and the unnamed Peronospora species on basil are not similar (1). In the Western Cape Province of South Africa, a sweet basil sample was received at the Stellenbosch University Plant Disease Clinic in 2005 from a grower in the region who experienced almost 50% crop failure under greenhouse-grown conditions. Initial symptoms were chlorotic leaves that subsequently developed a brown sporulation on the abaxial side. Microscopic observations of the brown sporulation were consistent with a Peronospora species. The sporangiophores branched two to five times with lengths ranging from 130 to 290 μm (average 194 μm). Sporangiophores terminated with dichotomously branched denticels bearing single detachable sporangia. Sporangia measured 26 to 34 × 20 to 28 μm (average 30 × 24 μm) and were elliptical and brown. The sporangia were similar in shape, color, and size range as that previously reported for a unnamed Peronospora species on sweet basil (1,2). Sequence analyses were also conducted on two isolates by first extracting DNA from spores that were washed from leaves using the Wizard SV genomic DNA purification system (Promega, Madison, WI), followed by polymerase chain reaction (PCR) amplification and sequencing of the ITS1, 5.8S, and ITS2 regions using primers ITS6 and ITS4 (4). The sequences of the two isolates were identical (GenBank Accession No. DQ479408). BLAST analyses of the sequences revealed a 99% similarity to the unnamed Peronospora species that was isolated from sweet basil in Switzerland and Italy (1). The sequences of the South African isolates only had low homology to P. lamii. To our knowledge, this is the first report of a Peronospora species on sweet basil in South Africa that on the basis of morphology and ITS sequence data is similar to the unnamed Peronospora species recently described in Switzerland and Italy on sweet basil (1). References: (1) L. Belbahri et al. Mycol. Res. 109:1276, 2005. (2) A. Garibaldi et al. Plant Dis. 88:312, 2004. (3) A. Garibaldi et al. Plant Dis. 89:683, 2005. (4) T. J. White et al. PCR Protocols: A Guide to Methods and Applications. M. A. Innis et al., eds., Academic Press, San Diego, 1990.

Rhizoctonia solani consists of 13 anastomosis groups (AGs) designated AG1 to 13. AG3-PT is considered the predominant AG in potatoes (4) and is associated with quantitative and qualitative yield losses. Qualitative losses are typically associated with the tuber blemish disease, black scurf. However, atypical tuber blemishes such as elephant hide consisting of corky lesions on the tuber surface (2) have also been attributed to Rhizoctonia. Such atypical blemishes are not considered specific to Rhizoctonia, making direct-cause effect estimates difficult (1). Koch's postulates for the elephant hide symptom and R. solani AG3-PT have not been completed. Recently, growth cracking and scab lesions were observed on potato tubers in South Africa and attributed to a new Streptomyces species (3). These lesions and cracks were similar to elephant hide symptoms attributed to R. solani AG3-PT. Therefore, the cause of the elephant hide symptom in South Africa was investigated further. Symptoms of elephant hide and cracking have been observed on tubers from the Eastern Free State, KwaZulu-Natal, Limpopo, Mpumalanga, North-Eastern Cape, Northern Cape, North West, Sandveld, and Western Free State growing regions. In 2012, three samples of potato tubers (cv. BP1) with elephant hide and cracking were selected for analysis. These samples were collected from Clanwilliam in the Sandveld potato growing region. Tubers were surface sterilized with 1% NaOCl; sections of affected tissue were excised and plated onto potato dextrose agar (PDA). Rhizoctonia-like colonies were identified and after further sub-culturing on PDA, three representative isolates (Rh3, Rh4, and Rh6) of R. solani from each sample were obtained. For each isolate, genomic DNA was extracted and the rDNA ITS region sequenced using ITS1-F and ITS4 (2). The resulting sequences (KF234142, KF234143, and KF234144) were at least 98% identical to other AG3-PT sequences on GenBank (JX27814 and KC157664). To confirm Koch's postulates, pathogenicity tests were conducted with the three isolates. PDA plugs of each isolate were added to 10 g of barley grains which were incubated for 14 days until fully colonized. The barley grains were then used to inoculate disease-free mini-tubers (cv. BP1) in 5l pots containing a sand-clay-pine bark mixture (1:1:1 ratio). Potato plants inoculated with sterile barley grains served as controls. Plants were held for 120 days in a greenhouse at 22°C with light for 12 h a day. Incidence of the elephant hide symptom for isolates Rh3, Rh4, and Rh6 was 58%, 33%, and 37.5%, respectively. Growth cracking and black scurf were also observed with each isolate. R. solani AG3-PT was successfully re-isolated from symptomatic tubers, confirming Koch's postulates. This is the first report of R. solani AG3-PT causing elephant hide in potato tubers in South Africa. Elephant hide caused by R. solani AG3-PT has been reported in tubers from France (2) and the United Kingdom (3), but Koch's postulates were not proven. In this study, Koch's postulates were proven for R. solani AG3-PT causing scab or elephant hide symptom and cracking in potato tubers. R. solani AG3-PT should thus be considered in addition to Streptomyces as a cause of this symptom and control strategies should also consider R. solani AG3-PT. References: (1) G. J. Banville et al. Pages 321-330 in: Rhizoctonia Species: Taxonomy, Molecular Biology, Ecology, Pathology and Disease Control, B. Sneh et al., eds. Kluwer Academic Publishers, Dordrecht, The Netherlands, 1996. (2) M. Fiers et al. Eur. J. Plant. Pathol. 128:353, 2010. (3) R. Gouws and A. McLeod. Plant Dis. 96:1223, 2012. (4) J. W. Woodhall et al. Eur. J. Plant. Pathol. 136:273, 2013.

Introduction Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) is a highly clonal pathogen causing infections in various settings. The aim of this study was to determine if healthcare-associated (HA) MRSA isolates with the same spa-type originating from two geographically distinct hospitals in South Africa were genetically related based on PFGE. Furthermore, a small subset of MRSA isolates were characterised with WGS and then compared to PFGE to determine if PFGE is still a reliable method to define outbreaks and/or transmission chains. Methods Staphylococcus aureus isolated from blood cultures (BC) were submitted to the Centre for Healthcare-Associated Infections, Antimicrobial Resistance and Mycoses (CHARM) as part of a laboratory-based surveillance programme (GERMS-SA). The identified HA-MRSA isolates underwent molecular characterisation [Staphylococcal Chromosome Cassette (SCC) mec and spa-typing]. Pulsed-field gel electrophoresis (PFGE) was performed on selected isolates with the same spa-type. Twenty-one MRSA isolates were selected for whole-genome sequencing (WGS) based on spa-type, PFGE clustering, time and place of isolation. Results Eighteen percent (n = 95/529) and 33% (n = 234/710) of isolates collected, from two public tertiary academic hospitals in the Gauteng (GAU) and the Western Cape (WC) provinces, were identified as MRSA, respectively. The most dominant clone in the GAU hospital was t037-III-MRSA (43.2%; n = 41/95). The most dominant clones in the WC hospital was t037-III-MRSA (23.9%, n = 56/234) and t045-I-MRSA (23.5%, n = 55/234). The GAU-t037-III-MRSA cases and WC-t045-I-MRSA cases occurred in the paediatric patient population, whereas the WC-t037-III-MRSA cases occurred in the adult patient population. A novel spa-type (t19935) was detected in the GAU hospital. PFGE showed that the GAU- and WC-t037-III-MRSA isolates were genetically indistinguishable, as well as most of the WC-t045-I-MRSA isolates. The Vienna/Hungarian/Brazilian clone and British EMRSA-3 clone were in circulation and a low frequency of single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNP) (≤20) differences was observed among isolates with the same spa-type. Conclusion The low number of SNP differences is suggestive of uninterrupted strain transmission and the persistence of t037-III-MRSA and t045-I-MRSA from 2013 to 2017 in the two studied hospitals. Alternative infection prevention and control strategies should be considered to supplement control efforts.

<p>Research has revealed that the academic performances of learners in South Africa are below the required level. The Western Cape Education Department (WCED) launched the literacy and numeracy strategy 2006–2016 in response to the low literacy and numeracy levels. In addition, the WCED introduced the Grade 1 baseline assessment in 2006, as part of the literacy and numeracy strategy. The purpose of this study was to observe the implementation of the Grade 1 literacy baseline assessment programme of the WCED. This study aimed to determine what literacy barriers, if any, the learners were experiencing and to recommend literacy support strategies, in order to inform teaching practices. Purposive sampling was used for the selection of a Grade 1 class, with English as the language of learning and teaching Thirty-seven Grade 1 learners participated in the study. A mixed-methods research design was used to collect both quantitative and qualitative data. The data collection strategies employed<br />included documentary analysis, by examining participants’ school admission forms to provide biographical information as well as their written baseline assessment scripts. The baseline assessment process was also observed as it was being conducted. The findings suggest that some of the learners experienced literacy barriers in terms of receptive and expressive language, perceptual skills and fine motor development. The data were summarised, and the information was used to describe the literacy barriers in terms of the biographical variables and to recommend learning support strategies for literacy development.</p>

<p><strong>List of abstracts and authors:</strong></p><p><strong>1. Antipsychotics in anxiety disorders</strong></p><p>Christer Allgulander</p><p><strong>2. Anxiety in somatic disorders</strong></p><p>Christer Allgulander</p><p><strong>3. Community rehabilitation of the schizophrenic patient</strong></p><p>Orlando Alonso Betancourt, Maricela Morales Herrera</p><p><strong>4. Dual diagnosis: A theory-driven multidisciplinary approach for integrative care</strong></p><p>David Blackbeard</p><p><strong>5. The emotional language of the gut - when 'psyche' meets 'soma'</strong></p><p>Helen Clark</p><p><strong>6. The Psychotherapy of bipolar disorder</strong></p><p>Franco Colin</p><p><strong>7. The Psychotherapy of bipolar disorder</strong></p><p>Franco Colin</p><p><strong>8. Developing and adopting mental health policies and plans in Africa: Lessons from South Africa, Uganda and Zambia</strong></p><p>Sara Cooper, Sharon Kleintjes, Cynthia Isaacs, Fred Kigozi, Sheila Ndyanabangi, Augustus Kapungwe, John Mayeya, Michelle Funk, Natalie Drew, Crick Lund</p><p><strong>9. The importance of relapse prevention in schizophrenia</strong></p><p>Robin Emsley</p><p><strong>10. Mental Health care act: Fact or fiction?</strong></p><p>Helmut Erlacher, M Nagdee</p><p><strong>11. Does a dedicated 72-hour observation facility in a district hospital reduce the need for involuntary admissions to a psychiatric hospital?</strong></p><p>Lennart Eriksson</p><p><strong>12. The incidence and risk factors for dementia in the Ibadan study of ageing</strong></p><p>Oye Gureje, Lola Kola, Adesola Ogunniyi, Taiwo Abiona</p><p><strong>13. Is depression a disease of inflammation?</strong></p><p><strong></strong>Angelos Halaris</p><p><strong>14. Paediatric bipolar disorder: More heat than light?</strong></p><p>Sue Hawkridge</p><p><strong>15. EBM: Anova Conundrum</strong></p><p>Elizabeth L (Hoepie) Howell</p><p><strong>16. Tracking the legal status of a cohort of inpatients on discharge from a 72-hour assessment unit</strong></p><p>Bernard Janse van Rensburg</p><p><strong>17. Dual diagnosis units in psychiatric facilities: Opportunities and challenges</strong></p><p>Yasmien Jeenah</p><p><strong>18. Alcohol-induced psychotic disorder: A comparative study on the clinical characteristics of patients with alcohol dependence and schizophrenia</strong></p><p>Gerhard Jordaan, D G Nel, R Hewlett, R Emsley</p><p><strong>19. Anxiety disorders: the first evidence for a role in preventive psychiatry</strong></p><p>Andre F Joubert</p><p><strong>20. The end of risk assessment and the beginning of start</strong></p><p>Sean Kaliski</p><p><strong>21. Psychiatric disorders abd psychosocial correlates of high HIV risk sexual behaviour in war-effected Eatern Uganda</strong></p><p>E Kinyada, H A Weiss, M Mungherera, P Onyango Mangen, E Ngabirano, R Kajungu, J Kagugube, W Muhwezi, J Muron, V Patel</p><p><strong>22. One year of Forensic Psychiatric assessment in the Northern Cape: A comparison with an established assessment service in the Eastern Cape</strong></p><p>N K Kirimi, C Visser</p><p><strong>23. Mental Health service user priorities for service delivery in South Africa</strong></p><p>Sharon Kleintjes, Crick Lund, Leslie Swartz, Alan Flisher and MHaPP Research Programme Consortium</p><p><strong>24. The nature and extent of over-the-counter and prescription drug abuse in cape town</strong></p><p>Liezl Kramer</p><p><strong>25. Physical health issues in long-term psychiatric inpatients: An audit of nursing statistics and clinical files at Weskoppies Hospital</strong></p><p>Christa Kruger</p><p><strong>26. Suicide risk in Schizophrenia - 20 Years later, a cohort study</strong></p><p>Gian Lippi, Ean Smit, Joyce Jordaan, Louw Roos</p><p><strong>27.Developing mental health information systems in South Africa: Lessons from pilot projects in Northern Cape and KwaZulu-Natal</strong></p><p>Crick Lund, S Skeen, N Mapena, C Isaacs, T Mirozev and the Mental Health and Poverty Research Programme Consortium Institution</p><p><strong>28. Mental health aspects of South African emigration</strong></p><p>Maria Marchetti-Mercer</p><p><strong>29. What services SADAG can offer your patients</strong></p><p>Elizabeth Matare</p><p><strong>30. Culture and language in psychiatry</strong></p><p>Dan Mkize</p><p><strong>31. Latest psychotic episode</strong></p><p>Povl Munk-Jorgensen</p><p><strong>32. The Forensic profile of female offenders</strong></p><p>Mo Nagdee, Helmut Fletcher</p><p><strong>33. The intra-personal emotional impact of practising psychiatry</strong></p><p>Margaret Nair</p><p><strong>34. Highly sensitive persons (HSPs) and implications for treatment</strong></p><p>Margaret Nair</p><p><strong>35. Task shifting in mental health - The Kenyan experience</strong></p><p>David M Ndetei</p><p><strong>36. Bridging the gap between traditional healers and mental health in todya's modern psychiatry</strong></p><p>David M Ndetei</p><p><strong>37. Integrating to achieve modern psychiatry</strong></p><p>David M Ndetei</p><p><strong>38. Non-medical prescribing: Outcomes from a pharmacist-led post-traumatic stress disorder clinic</strong></p><p>A Parkinson</p><p><strong>39. Is there a causal relationship between alcohol and HIV? Implications for policy, practice and future research</strong></p><p>Charles Parry</p><p><strong>40. Global mental health - A new global health discipline comes of age</strong></p><p>Vikram Patel</p><p><strong>41. Integrating mental health into primary health care: Lessons from pilot District demonstration sites in Uganda and South Africa</strong></p><p>Inge Petersen, Arvin Bhana, K Baillie and MhaPP Research Programme Consortium</p><p><strong>42. Personality disorders -The orphan child in axis I - Axis II Dichotomy</strong></p><p><strong></strong>Willie Pienaar</p><p><strong>43. Case Studies in Psychiatric Ethics</strong></p><p>Willie Pienaar</p><p><strong>44. Coronary artery disease and depression: Insights into pathogenesis and clinical implications</strong></p><p>Janus Pretorius</p><p><strong>45. Impact of the Mental Health Care Act No. 17 of 2002 on designated hospitals in KwaZulu-Natal: Triumphs and trials</strong></p><p>Suvira Ramlall, Jennifer Chipps</p><p><strong>46. Biological basis of addication</strong></p><p>Solomon Rataemane</p><p><strong>47. Genetics of Schizophrenia</strong></p><p>Louw Roos</p><p><strong>48. Management of delirium - Recent advances</strong></p><p>Shaquir Salduker</p><p><strong>49. Social neuroscience: Brain research on social issues</strong></p><p>Manfred Spitzer</p><p><strong>50. Experiments on the unconscious</strong></p><p>Manfred Spitzer</p><p><strong>51. The Psychology and neuroscience of music</strong></p><p>Manfred Spitzer</p><p><strong>52. Mental disorders in DSM-V</strong></p><p>Dan Stein</p><p><strong>53. Personality, trauma exposure, PTSD and depression in a cohort of SA Metro policemen: A longitudinal study</strong></p><p>Ugashvaree Subramaney</p><p><strong>54. Eating disorders: An African perspective</strong></p><p>Christopher Szabo</p><p><strong>55. An evaluation of the WHO African Regional strategy for mental health 2001-2010</strong></p><p>Thandi van Heyningen, M Majavu, C Lund</p><p><strong>56. A unitary model for the motor origin of bipolar mood disorders and schizophrenia</strong></p><p>Jacques J M van Hoof</p><p><strong>57. The origin of mentalisation and the treatment of personality disorders</strong></p><p>Jacques J M Hoof</p><p><strong>58. How to account practically for 'The Cause' in psychiatric diagnostic classification</strong></p><p>C W (Werdie) van Staden</p><p><strong>POSTER PRESENTATIONS</strong></p><p><strong>59. Problem drinking and physical and sexual abuse at WSU Faculty of Health Sciences, Mthatha, 2009</strong></p><p>Orlando Alonso Betancourt, Maricela Morales Herrera, E, N Kwizera, J L Bernal Munoz</p><p><strong>60. Prevalence of alcohol drinking problems and other substances at WSU Faculty of Health Sciences, Mthatha, 2009</strong></p><p>Orlando Alonso Betancourt, Maricela Morales Herrera, E, N Kwizera, J L Bernal Munoz</p><p><strong>61. Lessons learnt from a modified assertive community-based treatment programme in a developing country</strong></p><p>Ulla Botha, Liezl Koen, John Joska, Linda Hering, Piet Ooosthuizen</p><p><strong>62. Perceptions of psychologists regarding the use of religion and spirituality in therapy</strong></p><p>Ottilia Brown, Diane Elkonin</p><p><strong>63. Resilience in families where a member is living with schizophreni</strong></p><p>Ottilia Brown, Jason Haddad, Greg Howcroft</p><p><strong>64. Fusion and grandiosity - The mastersonian approach to the narcissistic disorder of the self</strong></p><p>William Griffiths, D Macklin, Loray Daws</p><p><strong>65. Not being allowed to exist - The mastersonian approach to the Schizoid disorder of the self</strong></p><p>William Griffiths, D Macklin, Loray Daws</p><p><strong>66. Risky drug-injecting behaviours in Cape Town and the need for a needle exchange programme</strong></p><p>Volker Hitzeroth</p><p><strong>67. Neuroleptic malignant syndrome in adolescents in the Western Cape: A case series</strong></p><p>Terri Henderson</p><p><strong>68. Experience and view of local academic psychiatrists on the role of spirituality in South African specialist psychiatry, compared with a qualitative analysis of the medical literature</strong></p><p>Bernard Janse van Rensburg</p><p><strong>69. The role of defined spirituality in local specialist psychiatric practice and training: A model and operational guidelines for South African clinical care scenarios</strong></p><p>Bernard Janse van Rensburg</p><p><strong>70. Handedness in schizophrenia and schizoaffective disorder in an Afrikaner founder population</strong></p><p>Marinda Joubert, J L Roos, J Jordaan</p><p><strong>71. A role for structural equation modelling in subtyping schizophrenia in an African population</strong></p><p>Liezl Koen, Dana Niehaus, Esme Jordaan, Robin Emsley</p><p><strong>72. Caregivers of disabled elderly persons in Nigeria</strong></p><p>Lola Kola, Oye Gureje, Adesola Ogunniyi, Dapo Olley</p><p><strong>73. HIV Seropositivity in recently admitted and long-term psychiatric inpatients: Prevalence and diagnostic profile</strong></p><p>Christina Kruger, M P Henning, L Fletcher</p><p><strong>74. Syphilis seropisitivity in recently admitted longterm psychiatry inpatients: Prevalence and diagnostic profile</strong></p><p>Christina Kruger, M P Henning, L Fletcher</p><p><strong>75. 'The Great Suppression'</strong></p><p>Sarah Lamont, Joel Shapiro, Thandi Groves, Lindsey Bowes</p><p><strong>76. Not being allowed to grow up - The Mastersonian approach to the borderline personality</strong></p><p>Daleen Macklin, W Griffiths</p><p><strong>77. Exploring the internal confirguration of the cycloid personality: A Rorschach comprehensive system study</strong></p><p>Daleen Macklin, Loray Daws, M Aronstam</p><p><strong>78. A survey to determine the level of HIV related knowledge among adult psychiatric patients admitted to Weskoppies Hospital</strong></p><p><strong></strong> T G Magagula, M M Mamabolo, C Kruger, L Fletcher</p><p><strong>79. A survey of risk behaviour for contracting HIV among adult psychiatric patients admitted to Weskoppies Hospital</strong></p><p>M M Mamabolo, T G Magagula, C Kruger, L Fletcher</p><p><strong>80. A retrospective review of state sector outpatients (Tara Hospital) prescribed Olanzapine: Adherence to metabolic and cardiovascular screening and monitoring guidelines</strong></p><p>Carina Marsay, C P Szabo</p><p><strong>81. Reported rapes at a hospital rape centre: Demographic and clinical profiles</strong></p><p>Lindi Martin, Kees Lammers, Donavan Andrews, Soraya Seedat</p><p><strong>82. Exit examination in Final-Year medical students: Measurement validity of oral examinations in psychiatry</strong></p><p>Mpogisheng Mashile, D J H Niehaus, L Koen, E Jordaan</p><p><strong>83. Trends of suicide in the Transkei region of South Africa</strong></p><p>Banwari Meel</p><p><strong>84. Functional neuro-imaging in survivors of torture</strong></p><p>Thriya Ramasar, U Subramaney, M D T H W Vangu, N S Perumal</p><p><strong>85. Newly diagnosed HIV+ in South Africa: Do men and women enroll in care?</strong></p><p>Dinesh Singh, S Hoffman, E A Kelvin, K Blanchard, N Lince, J E Mantell, G Ramjee, T M Exner</p><p><strong>86. Diagnostic utitlity of the International HIC Dementia scale for Asymptomatic HIV-Associated neurocognitive impairment and HIV-Associated neurocognitive disorder in South Africa</strong></p><p>Dinesh Singh, K Goodkin, D J Hardy, E Lopez, G Morales</p><p><strong>87. The Psychological sequelae of first trimester termination of pregnancy (TOP): The impact of resilience</strong></p><p>Ugashvaree Subramaney</p><p><strong>88. Drugs and other therapies under investigation for PTSD: An international database</strong></p><p>Sharain Suliman, Soraya Seedat</p><p><strong>89. Frequency and correlates of HIV Testing in patients with severe mental illness</strong></p><p>Hendrik Temmingh, Leanne Parasram, John Joska, Tania Timmermans, Pete Milligan, Helen van der Plas, Henk Temmingh</p><p><strong>90. A proposed mental health service and personnel organogram for the Elizabeth Donkin psychiatric Hospital</strong></p><p>Stephan van Wyk, Zukiswa Zingela</p><p><strong>91. A brief report on the current state of mental health care services in the Eastern Cape</strong></p><p>Stephan van Wyk, Zukiswa Zingela, Kiran Sukeri, Heloise Uys, Mo Nagdee, Maricela Morales, Helmut Erlacher, Orlando Alonso</p><p><strong>92. An integrated mental health care service model for the Nelson Mandela Bay Metro</strong></p><p>Stephan van Wyk, Zukiswa Zingela, Kiran Sukeri</p><p><strong>93. Traditional and alternative healers: Prevalence of use in psychiatric patients</strong></p><p>Zukiswa Zingela, S van Wyk, W Esterhuysen, E Carr, L Gaauche</p>

In today’s knowledge-based economy, the role of universities in preparing students to be information literate and independent thinkers and researchers is crucial. Information literacy (IL) skills enable students to become research-oriented, hold critical approaches to knowledge, be critical thinkers, consider things from different perspectives, develop their own ideas and defend and share these in an ethical manner. University students are often expected to access, process, evaluate and synthesise information from a number of sources in order to complete their assessment tasks. To do this efficiently, they need to possess good IL skills. This article postulates that students’ IL skills can be successfully fostered and enhanced if academics and academic librarians enter into a partnership to collaboratively develop students’ IL skills. The article discusses an intervention at the University of the Western Cape, South Africa that entailed embedding IL skills in an academic literacies (AL) course offered to first-year students in the Faculty of Community and Health Sciences. This intervention involved a partnership between academic librarians and an AL lecturer in adopting a team-teaching approach to collaboratively develop students’ IL skills. Overall, students showed great enthusiasm for the IL sessions, and their responses to the different tasks given to them were positive. The partnership between the team members was found to be successful. Although the researchers concluded that a collaborative partnership between academics and academic librarians was feasible and sustainable, they acknowledged that the available resources within an institution, for example, library computer laboratories, might well impact on the decision to pursue such an initiative.

This article reports on three participant observation studies conducted in schools and libraries in South Africa, between 1999 and 2015. The study findings have been reported on elsewhere, thus the focus is on the methodologies used, with the common thread being the author’s preoccupation with the information literacy education of South African pupils. The author’s purpose was to provide evidence of the impact of the dire lack of resources and libraries at South African schools. The first study in 1999 explored how teachers at an underresourced primary school in Cape Town, Western Cape, were coping with the demands of the new curriculum. The second study in 2006 examined two public libraries in a rural town in Mpumalanga, with seven local schools, but no school libraries. The third study in 2015 involved the library at a high school in Kayelitsha township outside Cape Town, which is part of a non-governmental organisation (NGO) project to employ school leavers to manage school libraries. Participant observation is rare in the Library and Information Science (LIS) research literature and the author’s aim is to demonstrate its power to dig beneath the surface. The article uncovers the complex relations and tacit beliefs that existed at the three research sites, which are probably at play in other contexts and which have to be taken into account in planning effective programmes in South African schools and libraries. The article also acknowledges the ethical challenges, arguably inherent in participant observation, which relate to the often sensitive relations among participants, and to the researcher’s positioning.

The inadequate nature of the education infrastructure in South Africa has led to poor academic performance at public schools. Problems within schools such as under-qualified teachers and poor teacher performance arise due to the poorly constructed education system in our country. The implementation in 2012 of the Curriculum and Assessment Policy Statement (CAPS) at public schools in South Africa saw the further crippling of some teachers, as they were unfamiliar with parts of the CAPS subject content. The Statistics and Population Studies department at the University of the Western Cape was asked to join the Maths4Stats project in 2012. This project was launched by Statistics South Africa in an effort to assist in training the teachers in statistical content within the CAPS Mathematics curricula. The University of the Western Cape’s team would like to share their experience of being part of the Maths4Stats training in the Western Cape. This article focuses on how the training sessions were planned and what the outcomes were. With the knowledge gained from our first Maths4Stats experience, it is recommended that future interventions are still needed to ensure that mathematics teachers become well-informed and confident to teach topics such as data handling, probability and regression analysis.

Honesty is regarded as a basic ethical value in all educational programmes, and academic integrity is of undisputed importance in educational environments. The literature reviewed revealed that academic dishonesty is wide-ranging and also encountered in the nursing education environment. This phenomenon is of concern to the nursing fraternity because of the proven positive correlation between unethical academic practices and future unethical professional behaviour. Limited research data regarding academic dishonesty at nursing education institutions in South Africa and this correlation motivated the present study. The purpose was to examine the status of academic integrity amongst nursing students at a nursing education institution in the Western Cape. Formulated objectives guided investigation of several variables which impact upon academic integrity, for example the incidence of and student perceptions around academic dishonesty.A quantitative, descriptive survey design was used, with a self-reported questionnaire (based on literature review and study objectives) designed to obtain information about academic dishonesty. Provision was also made for qualitative input from the respondents by including three open-ended questions.It was found that academic dishonesty was a reality at the nursing education institution where this study was done. Cheating associated with plagiarism and assignments was identified as the main problem area. An unacceptably high level of dishonesty in completion of practical records was also an area of concern. The main recommendations are development and implementation of a code of honour and implementation of comprehensive academic integrity policies at the nursing education institution, with practical measures aimed at combating cheating in tests and examinations.

IntroductionThere are two types of Africa. The first is a place where people and cultures live. The second is the image of Africa that has been invented through colonial knowledge and power. The colonial image of Africa, as the Other of Europe, a land “enveloped in the dark mantle of night” was supported by western states as it justified their colonial practices (Hegel 91). Any evidence that challenged the myth of the Dark Continent was destroyed, removed or ignored. While the looting of African natural resources has been studied, the looting of African knowledges hasn’t received as much attention, partly based on the assumption that Africans did not produce knowledge that could be stolen. This article invalidates this myth by examining the legacy of Ethiopia’s indigenous Ge’ez literature, and its looting and abduction by powerful western agents. The article argues that this has resulted in epistemic violence, where students of the Ethiopian indigenous education system do not have access to their books, while European orientalists use them to interpret Ethiopian history and philosophy using a foreign lens. The analysis is based on interviews with teachers and students of ten Ge’ez schools in Ethiopia, and trips to the Ethiopian manuscript collections in The British Library, The Princeton Library, the Institute of Ethiopian Studies and The National Archives in Addis Ababa.The Context of Ethiopian Indigenous KnowledgesGe’ez is one of the ancient languages of Africa. According to Professor Ephraim Isaac, “about 10,000 years ago, one single nation or community of a single linguistic group existed in Ethiopia, Eritrea, and the Horn of Africa” (The Habesha). The language of this group is known as Proto-Afroasiatic or Afrasian languages. It is the ancestor of the Semitic, Cushitic, Nilotic, Omotic and other languages that are currently spoken in Ethiopia by its 80 ethnic groups, and the neighbouring countries (Diakonoff). Ethiopians developed the Ge’ez language as their lingua franca with its own writing system some 2000 years ago. Currently, Ge’ez is the language of academic scholarship, studied through the traditional education system (Isaac, The Ethiopian). Since the fourth century, an estimated 1 million Ge’ez manuscripts have been written, covering religious, historical, mathematical, medicinal, and philosophical texts.One of the most famous Ge’ez manuscripts is the Kebra Nagast, a foundational text that embodied the indigenous conception of nationhood in Ethiopia. The philosophical, political and religious themes in this book, which craft Ethiopia as God’s country and the home of the Ark of the Covenant, contributed to the country’s success in defending itself from European colonialism. The production of books like the Kebra Nagast went hand in hand with a robust indigenous education system that trained poets, scribes, judges, artists, administrators and priests. Achieving the highest stages of learning requires about 30 years after which the scholar would be given the rare title Arat-Ayina, which means “four eyed”, a person with the ability to see the past as well as the future. Today, there are around 50,000 Ge’ez schools across the country, most of which are in rural villages and churches.Ge’ez manuscripts are important textbooks and reference materials for students. They are carefully prepared from vellum “to make them last forever” (interview, 3 Oct. 2019). Some of the religious books are regarded as “holy persons who breathe wisdom that gives light and food to the human soul”. Other manuscripts, often prepared as scrolls are used for medicinal purposes. Each manuscript is uniquely prepared reflecting inherited wisdom on contemporary lives using the method called Tirguamme, the act of giving meaning to sacred texts. Preparation of books is costly. Smaller manuscript require the skins of 50-70 goats/sheep and large manuscript needed 100-120 goats/sheep (Tefera).The Loss of Ethiopian ManuscriptsSince the 18th century, a large quantity of these manuscripts have been stolen, looted, or smuggled out of the country by travellers who came to the country as explorers, diplomats and scientists. The total number of Ethiopian manuscripts taken is still unknown. Amsalu Tefera counted 6928 Ethiopian manuscripts currently held in foreign libraries and museums. This figure does not include privately held or unofficial collections (41).Looting and smuggling were sponsored by western governments, institutions, and notable individuals. For example, in 1868, The British Museum Acting Director Richard Holms joined the British army which was sent to ‘rescue’ British hostages at Maqdala, the capital of Emperor Tewodros. Holms’ mission was to bring treasures for the Museum. Before the battle, Tewodros had established the Medhanialem library with more than 1000 manuscripts as part of Ethiopia’s “industrial revolution”. When Tewodros lost the war and committed suicide, British soldiers looted the capital, including the treasury and the library. They needed 200 mules and 15 elephants to transport the loot and “set fire to all buildings so that no trace was left of the edifices which once housed the manuscripts” (Rita Pankhurst 224). Richard Holmes collected 356 manuscripts for the Museum. A wealthy British woman called Lady Meux acquired some of the most illuminated manuscripts. In her will, she bequeathed them to be returned to Ethiopia. However, her will was reversed by court due to a campaign from the British press (Richard Pankhurst). In 2018, the V&A Museum in London displayed some of the treasures by incorporating Maqdala into the imperial narrative of Britain (Woldeyes, Reflections).Britain is by no means the only country to seek Ethiopian manuscripts for their collections. Smuggling occurred in the name of science, an act of collecting manuscripts for study. Looting involved local collaborators and powerful foreign sponsors from places like France, Germany and the Vatican. Like Maqdala, this was often sponsored by governments or powerful financers. For example, the French government sponsored the Dakar-Djibouti Mission led by Marcel Griaule, which “brought back about 350 manuscripts and scrolls from Gondar” (Wion 2). It was often claimed that these manuscripts were purchased, rather than looted. Johannes Flemming of Germany was said to have purchased 70 manuscripts and ten scrolls for the Royal Library of Berlin in 1905. However, there was no local market for buying manuscripts. Ge’ez manuscripts were, and still are, written to serve spiritual and secular life in Ethiopia, not for buying and selling. There are countless other examples, but space limits how many can be provided in this article. What is important to note is that museums and libraries have accrued impressive collections without emphasising how those collections were first obtained. The loss of the intellectual heritage of Ethiopians to western collectors has had an enormous impact on the country.Knowledge Grabbing: The Denial of Access to KnowledgeWith so many manuscripts lost, European collectors became the narrators of Ethiopian knowledge and history. Edward Ullendorff, a known orientalist in Ethiopian studies, refers to James Bruce as “the explorer of Abyssinia” (114). Ullendorff commented on the significance of Bruce’s travel to Ethiopia asperhaps the most important aspect of Bruce’s travels was the collection of Ethiopic manuscripts… . They opened up entirely new vistas for the study of Ethiopian languages and placed this branch of Oriental scholarship on a much more secure basis. It is not known how many MSS. reached Europe through his endeavours, but the present writer is aware of at least twenty-seven, all of which are exquisite examples of Ethiopian manuscript art. (133)This quote encompasses three major ways in which epistemic violence occurs: denial of access to knowledge, Eurocentric interpretation of Ethiopian manuscripts, and the handling of Ge’ez manuscripts as artefacts from the past. These will be discussed below.Western ‘travellers’, such as Bruce, did not fully disclose how many manuscripts they took or how they acquired them. The abundance of Ethiopian manuscripts in western institutions can be compared to the scarcity of such materials among traditional schools in Ethiopia. In this research, I have visited ten indigenous schools in Wollo (Lalibela, Neakutoleab, Asheten, Wadla), in Gondar (Bahita, Kuskwam, Menbere Mengist), and Gojam (Bahirdar, Selam Argiew Maryam, Giorgis). In all of the schools, there is lack of Ge’ez manuscripts. Students often come from rural villages and do not receive any government support. The scarcity of Ge’ez manuscripts, and the lack of funding which might allow for the purchasing of books, means the students depend mainly on memorising Ge’ez texts told to them from the mouth of their teacher. Although this method of learning is not new, it currently is the only way for passing indigenous knowledges across generations.The absence of manuscripts is most strongly felt in the advanced schools. For instance, in the school of Qene, poetic literature is created through an in-depth study of the vocabulary and grammar of Ge’ez. A Qene student is required to develop a deep knowledge of Ge’ez in order to understand ancient and medieval Ge’ez texts which are used to produce poetry with multiple meanings. Without Ge’ez manuscripts, students cannot draw their creative works from the broad intellectual tradition of their ancestors. When asked how students gain access to textbooks, one student commented:we don’t have access to Birana books (Ge’ez manuscripts written on vellum). We cannot learn the ancient wisdom of painting, writing, and computing developed by our ancestors. We simply buy paper books such as Dawit (Psalms), Sewasew (grammar) or Degwa (book of songs with notations) and depend on our teachers to teach us the rest. We also lend these books to each other as many students cannot afford to buy them. Without textbooks, we expect to spend double the amount of time it would take if we had textbooks. (Interview, 3 Sep. 2019)Many students interrupt their studies and work as labourers to save up and buy paper textbooks, but they still don’t have access to the finest works taken to Europe. Most Ge’ez manuscripts remaining in Ethiopia are locked away in monasteries, church stores or other places to prevent further looting. The manuscripts in Addis Ababa University and the National Archives are available for researchers but not to the students of the indigenous system, creating a condition of internal knowledge grabbing.While the absence of Ge’ez manuscripts denied, and continues to deny, Ethiopians the chance to enrich their indigenous education, it benefited western orientalists to garner intellectual authority on the field of Ethiopian studies. In 1981, British Museum Director John Wilson said, “our Abyssinian holdings are more important than our Indian collection” (Bell 231). In reaction, Richard Pankhurst, the Director of Ethiopian Studies in Addis Ababa, responded that the collection was acquired through plunder. Defending the retaining of Maqdala manuscripts in Europe, Ullendorff wrote:neither Dr. Pankhurst nor the Ethiopian and western scholars who have worked on this collection (and indeed on others in Europe) could have contributed so significantly to the elucidation of Ethiopian history without the rich resources available in this country. Had they remained insitu, none of this would have been possible. (Qtd. in Bell 234)The manuscripts are therefore valued based on their contribution to western scholarship only. This is a continuation of epistemic violence whereby local knowledges are used as raw materials to produce Eurocentric knowledge, which in turn is used to teach Africans as though they had no prior knowledge. Scholars are defined as those western educated persons who can speak European languages and can travel to modern institutions to access the manuscripts. Knowledge grabbing regards previous owners as inexistent or irrelevant for the use of the grabbed knowledges.Knowledge grabbing also means indigenous scholars are deprived of critical resources to produce new knowledge based on their intellectual heritage. A Qene teacher commented: our students could not devote their time and energy to produce new knowledges in the same way our ancestors did. We have the tradition of Madeladel, Kimera, Kuteta, Mielad, Qene and tirguamme where students develop their own system of remembering, reinterpreting, practicing, and rewriting previous manuscripts and current ones. Without access to older manuscripts, we increasingly depend on preserving what is being taught orally by elders. (Interview, 4 Sep. 2019)This point is important as it relates to the common myth that indigenous knowledges are artefacts belonging to the past, not the present. There are millions of people who still use these knowledges, but the conditions necessary for their reproduction and improvement is denied through knowledge grabbing. The view of Ge’ez manuscripts as artefacts dismisses the Ethiopian view that Birana manuscripts are living persons. As a scholar told me in Gondar, “they are creations of Egziabher (God), like all of us. Keeping them in institutions is like keeping living bodies in graveyards” (interview, 5 Oct. 2019).Recently, the collection of Ethiopian manuscripts by western institutions has also been conducted digitally. Thousands of manuscripts have been microfilmed or digitised. For example, the EU funded Ethio-SPaRe project resulted in the digital collection of 2000 Ethiopian manuscripts (Nosnitsin). While digitisation promises better access for people who may not be able to visit institutions to see physical copies, online manuscripts are not accessible to indigenous school students in Ethiopia. They simply do not have computer or internet access and the manuscripts are catalogued in European languages. Both physical and digital knowledge grabbing results in the robbing of Ethiopian intellectual heritage, and denies the possibility of such manuscripts being used to inform local scholarship. Epistemic Violence: The European as ExpertWhen considered in relation to stolen or appropriated manuscripts, epistemic violence is the way in which local knowledge is interpreted using a foreign epistemology and gained dominance over indigenous worldviews. European scholars have monopolised the field of Ethiopian Studies by producing books, encyclopaedias and digital archives based on Ethiopian manuscripts, almost exclusively in European languages. The contributions of their work for western scholarship is undeniable. However, Kebede argues that one of the detrimental effects of this orientalist literature is the thesis of Semiticisation, the designation of the origin of Ethiopian civilisation to the arrival of Middle Eastern colonisers rather than indigenous sources.The thesis is invented to make the history of Ethiopia consistent with the Hegelian western view that Africa is a Dark Continent devoid of a civilisation of its own. “In light of the dominant belief that black peoples are incapable of great achievements, the existence of an early and highly advanced civilization constitutes a serious anomaly in the Eurocentric construction of the world” (Kebede 4). To address this anomaly, orientalists like Ludolph attributed the origin of Ethiopia’s writing system, agriculture, literature, and civilisation to the arrival of South Arabian settlers. For example, in his translation of the Kebra Nagast, Budge wrote: “the SEMITES found them [indigenous Ethiopians] negro savages, and taught them civilization and culture and the whole scriptures on which their whole literature is based” (x).In line with the above thesis, Dillman wrote that “the Abyssinians borrowed their Numerical Signs from the Greeks” (33). The views of these orientalist scholars have been challenged. For instance, leading scholar of Semitic languages Professor Ephraim Isaac considers the thesis of the Arabian origin of Ethiopian civilization “a Hegelian Eurocentric philosophical perspective of history” (2). Isaac shows that there is historical, archaeological, and linguistic evidence that suggest Ethiopia to be more advanced than South Arabia from pre-historic times. Various Ethiopian sources including the Kebra Nagast, the works of historian Asres Yenesew, and Ethiopian linguist Girma Demeke provide evidence for the indigenous origin of Ethiopian civilisation and languages.The epistemic violence of the Semeticisation thesis lies in how this Eurocentric ideological construction is the dominant narrative in the field of Ethiopian history and the education system. Unlike the indigenous view, the orientalist view is backed by strong institutional power both in Ethiopia and abroad. The orientalists control the field of Ethiopian studies and have access to Ge’ez manuscripts. Their publications are the only references for Ethiopian students. Due to Native Colonialism, a system of power run by native elites through the use of colonial ideas and practices (Woldeyes), the education system is the imitation of western curricula, including English as a medium of instruction from high school onwards. Students study the west more than Ethiopia. Indigenous sources are generally excluded as unscientific. Only the Eurocentric interpretation of Ethiopian manuscripts is regarded as scientific and objective.ConclusionEthiopia is the only African country never to be colonised. In its history it produced a large quantity of manuscripts in the Ge’ez language through an indigenous education system that involves the study of these manuscripts. Since the 19th century, there has been an ongoing loss of these manuscripts. European travellers who came to Ethiopia as discoverers, missionaries and scholars took a large number of manuscripts. The Battle of Maqdala involved the looting of the intellectual products of Ethiopia that were collected at the capital. With the introduction of western education and use of English as a medium of instruction, the state disregarded indigenous schools whose students have little access to the manuscripts. This article brings the issue of knowledge grapping, a situation whereby European institutions and scholars accumulate Ethiopia manuscripts without providing the students in Ethiopia to have access to those collections.Items such as manuscripts that are held in western institutions are not dead artefacts of the past to be preserved for prosperity. They are living sources of knowledge that should be put to use in their intended contexts. Local Ethiopian scholars cannot study ancient and medieval Ethiopia without travelling and gaining access to western institutions. This lack of access and resources has made European Ethiopianists almost the sole producers of knowledge about Ethiopian history and culture. For example, indigenous sources and critical research that challenge the Semeticisation thesis are rarely available to Ethiopian students. Here we see epistemic violence in action. Western control over knowledge production has the detrimental effect of inventing new identities, subjectivities and histories that translate into material effects in the lives of African people. In this way, Ethiopians and people all over Africa internalise western understandings of themselves and their history as primitive and in need of development or outside intervention. African’s intellectual and cultural heritage, these living bodies locked away in graveyards, must be put back into the hands of Africans.AcknowledgementThe author acknowledges the support of the Australian Academy of the Humanities' 2019 Humanities Travelling Fellowship Award in conducting this research.ReferencesBell, Stephen. “Cultural Treasures Looted from Maqdala: A Summary of Correspondence in British National Newspapers since 1981.” Kasa and Kasa. Eds. Tadesse Beyene, Richard Pankhurst, and Shifereraw Bekele. Addis Ababa: Ababa University Book Centre, 1990. 231-246.Budge, Wallis. A History of Ethiopia, Nubia and Abyssinia. London: Methuen and Co, 1982.Demeke, Girma Awgichew. The Origin of Amharic. Trenton: Red Sea Press, 2013.Diakonoff, Igor M. Afrasian Languages. Moscow: Nauka, 1988.Dillmann, August. Ethiopic Grammar. Eugene: Wipf & Stock, 2005.Hegel, Georg W.F. The Philosophy of History. New York: Dover, 1956.Isaac, Ephraim. The Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahido Church. New Jersey: Red Sea Press, 2013.———. “An Open Letter to an Inquisitive Ethiopian Sister.” The Habesha, 2013. 1 Feb. 2020 <http://www.zehabesha.com/an-open-letter-to-an-inquisitive-young-ethiopian-sister-ethiopian-history-is-not-three-thousand-years/>.Kebra Nagast. "The Queen of Sheba and Her Only Son Menyelik I." Trans. Wallis Budge. London: Oxford UP, 1932.Pankhurst, Richard. "The Napier Expedition and the Loot Form Maqdala." Presence Africaine 133-4 (1985): 233-40.Pankhurst, Rita. "The Maqdala Library of Tewodros." Kasa and Kasa. Eds. Tadesse Beyene, Richard Pankhurst, and Shifereraw Bekele. Addis Ababa: Ababa University Book Centre, 1990. 223-230.Tefera, Amsalu. ነቅዐ መጻህፍት ከ መቶ በላይ በግዕዝ የተጻፉ የእኢትዮጵያ መጻህፍት ዝርዝር ከማብራሪያ ጋር።. Addis Ababa: Jajaw, 2019.Nosnitsin, Denis. "Ethio-Spare Cultural Heritage of Christian Ethiopia: Salvation, Preservation and Research." 2010. 5 Jan. 2019 <https://www.aai.uni-hamburg.de/en/ethiostudies/research/ethiospare/missions/pdf/report2010-1.pdf>. Ullendorff, Edward. "James Bruce of Kinnaird." The Scottish Historical Review 32.114, part 2 (1953): 128-43.Wion, Anaïs. "Collecting Manuscripts and Scrolls in Ethiopia: The Missions of Johannes Flemming (1905) and Enno Littmann (1906)." 2012. 5 Jan. 2019 <https://halshs.archives-ouvertes.fr/halshs-00524382/document>. Woldeyes, Yirga Gelaw. Native Colonialism: Education and the Economy of Violence against Traditions in Ethiopia. Trenton: Red Sea Press, 2017.———. “Reflections on Ethiopia’s Stolen Treasures on Display in a London Museum.” The Conversation. 2018. 5 June 2018 <https://theconversation.com/reflections-on-ethiopias-stolen-treasures-on-display-in-a-london-museum-97346>.Yenesew, Asres. ትቤ፡አክሱም፡መኑ፡ አንተ? Addis Ababa: Nigid Printing House, 1959 [1951 EC].

This article focuses on social work research with displaced families in the Western Cape, South Africa, who have experienced both the historical trauma of their slave past and the trauma of displacement during apartheid. In a similar context, aboriginal academic writers have found that initial studies of intergenerational trauma did not take into account the historical ordeal of colonialism which they believe has left its mark on aboriginal communities today. Intergenerational trauma has also been based on research with holocaust survivors. For this research paper, a postcolonial indigenous research paradigm was implemented owing to the colonial history of Cape Town. Collective narrative practice and participatory learning action techniques were used to decolonise the theoretical and methodological approach. Foucault’s counter-memories and counter-histories were applied to critically engage with the research findings to include the “unofficial” stories of slave descendants in social work discourse where these stories have largely been ignored.

AbstractThis qualitative study reports on teachers in the Western Cape as they attempt to embed information literacy in their classrooms. It explores how teachers come to understand information literacy and the extent to which they change their beliefs about guiding research projects in a more concerted way. The research questions were: (1) how do teachers understand information literacy education? (2) how do teachers make their information literacy explicit in the classroom? and (3) at what level are teachers’ web knowledge and skills? The teachers, who were part of an information literacy education course, formed a purposive sample. The data for this study emanated from solicited, reflective journals which participants kept over a period of eight to 10 weeks. Information seeking and use theory and an inquiry-based approach to learning frame this research. Motivation for the study is rooted in a curriculum which embodies information literacy characteristics. Traditionally, information literacy has been the domain of the school librarian. Only 16.82 % of South African schools have a stocked library. With so few school libraries and no official position in schools for a qualified school librarian, the onus for teaching information literacy thus rests on the teacher. This article provides the context for South African education and a review of the information literacy literature with an emphasis on South Africa and teachers’ information literacy. The results show that, despite many obstacles in these teachers’ paths, they express a fairly sound understanding of information literacy education by the end of the journaling exercise. However, fewer teachers can competently mediate information literacy in the classroom. One of the major barriers to information literacy is the teachers’ slow adoption of the World Wide Web. Recommendations for further study include examining teacher education programmes for their inclusion of information literacy education; for awareness of plagiarism and the ethics of information use in the school environment; and the effect of information and communication technology on learners’ information literacy.

Background: The field of Health Policy and Systems Research (HPSR) views researchers as active participants in processes of knowledge mobilization, learning and action. Yet few studies examine how such processes are institutionalized or consider their health system or wider impacts. This paper aims to contribute insights by presenting a South African experience: the Western Cape (WC) HPSR Journal Club (JC). Methods: The paper draws on collective reflection by its authorial team, who are managerial and academic JC participants; reflective discussions with a wider range of people; and external evaluation reports. The analysis has been validated through rounds of collective engagement among authors, and through comparison with the wider sets of data, documentation and international literature. It considers impacts using a framework drawn from the co-production literature. Results: Since 2012, the JC has brought together provincial and local government health system managers and academics to discuss complex systems’ and social science perspectives on health system development. The JC impacts encompass the trusting relationships (group micro-level) that have not only strengthened personal confidence and leadership skills (individual micro level), but also led to organizational impacts (meso level), such as practice and policy changes (practitioner organizations) and strengthened research and post-graduate teaching programs (academic organizations). Macro-societal impacts are, finally, judged likely to have resulted from new health system practices and policies and from academic post-graduate training activities. This set of impacts has been enabled by: the context of the JC; aspects of the JC design that underpin trusting relationships and mutual learning; the sustained participation of senior health system managers and academic managers who are able to translate new ideas into practice in their own organizational environments; and our individual and collective motivations – including the shared goal of health system development for social justice. Our challenges include risks and costs to ourselves, and the potential exclusion of challenging voices. Conclusion: The principles and practice of the JC approach, rather than the JC as a model, offer ideas for others wishing to mobilize knowledge for health system development through embedded and co-production processes. It demonstrates the potential for productive human interactions to seed long-lasting systemic change.

Background: The demand for highly qualified and skilled nurses is increasing in South Africa as well as around the world. Having a background in science can create a significant advantage for students wishing to enrol for an undergraduate nursing qualification because nursing as profession is grounded in scientific evidence.Aim: The aim of this study was to investigate the predictive validity of grade 12 mathematics and science on the academic performance of first year student nurses in science modules.Method: A quantitative research method using a cross-sectional predictive design was employed in this study. The participants included first year Bachelor of Nursing students enrolled at a university in the Western Cape, South Africa. Descriptive and inferential statistics were performed to analyse the data by using the IBM Statistical Package for Social Sciences versions 24. Descriptive analysis of all variables was performed as well as the Spearman’s rank correlation test to describe the relationship among the study variables. Standard multiple linear regressions analysis was performed to determine the predictive validity of grade 12 mathematics and science on the academic performance of first year student nurses in science modules.Results: The results of this study showed that grade 12 physical science is not a significant predictor (p > 0.062) of performance in first year science modules. The multiple linear regression revealed that grade 12 mathematics and life science grades explained 37.1% to 38.1% (R2 = 0.381 and adj R2 = 0.371) of the variation in the first year science grade distributions.Conclusion: Based on the results of the study it is evident that performance in grade 12 mathematics (β = 2.997) and life science (β = 3.175) subjects is a significant predictor (p < 0.001) of the performance in first year science modules for student nurses at the university identified for this study.

Background: Educational environments have been found to bear a substantial relationship with the academic performance and success, as well as the retention, of students.Objectives: The study objectives were to (1) evaluate the educational environment as perceived by undergraduate nursing students at a school of nursing (SON) in Western Cape province and (2) investigate whether the educational environment, or components thereof, is perceived negatively or positively among undergraduate nursing students of different year level, gender, home language and ethnicity.Method: A quantitative research method with a cross-sectional design was implemented. Data were collected from 232 undergraduate nursing students from a SON at a university in Western Cape province, South Africa. The subscales and the items of the educational environment questionnaire were compared among undergraduate nursing students. Data were analysed by means of the IBM Statistical Package for Social Sciences (IBM SPSS-24) using analysis of variances (ANOVAs), independent-sample t-tests, mean scores, standard deviations and percentages.Results: The mean score attained for the entire participant group was 195 (standard deviation [SD] = 24.2) out of 268 (equivalent to 72.8% of maximum score), which indicated that the educational environment was perceived substantially more positively than negatively. The overall mean score was significantly higher (p < 0.05) for male students (M = 202; SD = 21) and for black students (M = 202; SD = 21). The digital resources (DR) subscale was the only subscale with a statement or item that was rated as absolute negative (M = 1.9; SD = 0.9).Conclusion: The educational environment at the institution concerned was perceived as predominantly positive by its undergraduate nursing students. Although the educational environment was predominantly perceived as positive, the results of this study also indicated that enhancements are required to improve the physical classroom conditions, skills laboratories, DR and the implemented teaching and learning strategies. It is vital for university management to prioritise the creation of an educational environment which would ensure that quality learning takes place.

Purpose The current scourge of COVID-19 in educational enterprise requires that libraries tame the wave of the pandemic through effective leadership. This paper aims to investigate library leadership in Nigeria and COVID-19 pandemic. Design/methodology/approach Descriptive research design was used for the study. A structured questionnaire designed with Google Form and administered online was used to elicit data from 137 heads of academic and public libraries and their deputies in South West, Nigeria. Findings It was found that transformational and transactional leadership styles were more effective than laissez-faire style in managing libraries during crisis. Library operations were reduced during the COVID-19 era, and communication and meetings were conducted via social media. The spread of the pandemic was curtailed through enforcement of the use of face mask and nose covers and awareness campaign through posters and handbills. Practical implications It is the library heads with effective leadership styles that will be productive in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic. Originality/value This study is novel, as it approaches the handling of COVID-19 in libraries from the perspective of the leadership styles of the library leaders. No studies have emanated from Africa in this area. The few available narratives are centred around the Western countries. Meanwhile, managers of libraries in Nigeria are not immune to leadership crisis in the handling of the COVID-19 in their respective libraries.

Student dropout, also called ‘early departure’, is a significant problem in South Africa’s post-school education and training (PSET) landscape, specifically in the technical and vocational education and training (TVET) sector. The challenge of student retention and programme completion (the antithesis of dropping out) is equally significant and important to TVET institutions, the state department responsible (Department of Higher Education and Training) and the South African economy. Early departure negatively influences the success rates of educational institutions. It also influences the chances of personal employment and financial well-being of individual students, causing financial ripple effects on society and government. Students’ decisions to remain or leave college or a programme are influenced by a variety of individual and social factors, both internal and external, including people close to the students and the policies, systems and structures within which students interact. These factors also encompass the quality and friendliness of teachers, social interaction with teachers and peers, and the role played by friends in academic achievement. This article reports on a study of student perspectives on the internal and external factors that influence their retention in, and completion of, a TVET college Business Studies National Certificate (Vocational) (NC(V)) programme in the Western Cape, South Africa. An improved understanding of student experiences, intentions, and decision-making processes leading to persistence provides a foundation for improving student retention and programme completion in a TVET environment.

A growing shift towards research and evidence based practice in academia is associated with requirements to disseminate research results in the form of publication in peer reviewed journals. Mentoring has been identified as an important component of developing young authors, as it increases confidence and competence, and facilitates professional development. This led to the formation of a support group to stimulate peer-review publication in the physiotherapy department at the University of the Western Cape. The Kirkpatrick Framework of Evaluation was used to evaluate the success of the mentoring process which made use of a participatory action research methodology. The writing group consisted of nine academic members of staff and took place over ten weeks. The programme included writing, giving feedback, discussion and peer review on a weekly basis. Focus group discussions were taped and transcribed in order to evaluate the mentoring process by identifying relationships within the data and categorising key concepts, which were shaped into a thematic framework. The findings indicated that participants experienced a variety of emotions throughout the programme, with an overall feeling of personal growth by the end. In addition, participants also reported improved writing, reviewing and communication skills. Six months following the programme, six participants had submitted at least one article to a peer reviewed journal. It is clear from this study that some academics still find the task of writing and reviewing articles daunting, and that guidance and support in the form of a writing programme can be useful.

Watch the VIDEO here. Presenter - Frédéric Brodkom.The ARES-CCD (formerly CUD) is the French-speaking universities and high-school of Belgium Commission for the Cooperation to Development. With an annual budget of 31 M€ fully dedicated to the academic development of actually 19 universities of North and Central Africa, South-East Asia, Western South America and Greater Antilles, this commission brings together volunteers of the academic, scientific and administrative staffs of our universities. Since 2000, librarians are strongly involved in this project with the aim to develop the partner’s libraries, to improve their infrastructures and operations, to facilitate their access to documentary resources and to strengthen their librarians' skills.Given the important documentary needs of students and researchers in the South and the lack of financial resources, the promotion of Open Science is more than an obvious. We will show that, in addition to our activities of purchasing books or materials, basic training or library renovation, we develop, in close partnership with our colleagues, the Open Science culture in six fields:(1) The installation and support of open-source ILS (mainly KOHA and PMB), including the learning of IT teams(2) The harvesting and promotion of OA resources via our Web Portal, including subscription to official resources of international organization(3) The development of policies to develop local institutional repositories for new and archived (printed) publications and thesis (DSpace support, purchase of scanner, etc)(4) The support to the development of university presses to reduce/abolish the excessive cost of printed course materials for students(5) Training and awareness-raising of library trainers for academic social networks, data exchange platforms, community-based researchers' sites, OA use, etc.(6) Promote the obligation to deposit in our university repositories the scientific papers financed by the ARES-CCD cooperation and co-signed by Belgian researchers and partners of developing countries (academic and doctorate students).Concrete case studies of our 17 years of experience in the South from Haiti to Vietnam will illustrate these actions. Perspectives on future projects will also be discussed, such as a week, jointly with all our partners, of exchange and work in Belgium in 2018 (as already done in 2016) on the topic of the practical implementation of Open Access in their universities.

Background: Optimal infant- and young child–feeding practices are crucial for nutritional status, growth, development, health and, ultimately, survival. Human breast milk is optimal nutrition for all infants. Complementary food introduced at the correct age is part of optimal feeding practices. In South Africa, widespread access to antiretrovirals and a programme to prevent mother-to-child transmission of HIV have reduced HIV infection in infants and increased the number of HIV-exposed uninfected (HEU) infants. However, little is known about the feeding practices and nutritional status of HEU and HIV-unexposed (HU) infants.Objective: To assess the feeding practices and nutritional status of HIV-exposed and HIV-unexposed (HU) infants in the Western Cape.Design: Prospective substudy on feeding practices nested in a pilot study investigating the innate immune abnormalities in HEU infants compared to HU infants. The main study commenced at week 2 of life with the nutrition component added from 6 months. Information on children’s dietary intake was obtained at each visit from the caregiver, mainly the mother. Head circumference, weight and length were recorded at each visit. Data were obtained from 6-, 12- and 18-month visits. World Health Organization feeding practice indicators and nutrition indicators were utilised.Setting: Tygerberg Academic Hospital, Western Cape. Mothers were recruited from the postnatal wards.Subjects: Forty-seven mother–infant pairs, 25 HEU and 22 HU infants, participated in this nutritional substudy. Eight (17%) infants, one HU and seven HEU, were lost to follow-up over the next 12 months. The HEU children were mainly Xhosa (76%) and HU were mainly mixed race (77%).Results: The participants were from poor socio-economic backgrounds. In both groups, adherence to breastfeeding recommendations was low with suboptimal dietary diversity. We noted a high rate of sugar- and salt-containing snacks given from a young age. The HU group had poorer anthropometric and nutritional indicators not explained by nutritional factors alone. However, alcohol and tobacco use was much higher amongst the HU mothers.Conclusion: Adherence to breastfeeding recommendations was low. Ethnicity and cultural milieu may have influenced feeding choices and growth. Further research is needed to understand possible reasons for the poorer nutritional and anthropometric indicators in the HU group.Keywords: Feeding practices; Nutritional status; HIV-exposed

Moore, Christopher. The Big Book of Canada: Exploring the Provinces and Territories. Illustrated by Bill Slavin. Tundra Books-Random House Canada, 2017.This publication retains the contents and organizational structure of Moore’s 2002 edition of the same title. (It also revisits, reorganizes, and condenses material that he presented in The Story of Canada, Scholastic of Canada, 2016.) The Big Book of Canada is organized by province and territory, east to west, beginning with Newfoundland and Labrador. Each chapter opens with an illustrated map of the province or territory under discussion; however, nowhere is there an overall map that shows the geographic relationships of the provinces with each other, or with the country as a whole. This could be disorienting for the youngster who does not have immediate access to an atlas or a globe. A further problem exists. Each map occupies one-and-one-half pages at the start of each chapter; for example, the map for Nunavut occupies exactly the same page space as the map for Prince Edward Island. The young reader who has yet to develop an accurate spatial concept of Canada might easily come away with the false impression that all of the provinces and territories are equal in size. A map, even a pictorial one occupying the end papers, would have greatly improved the educational value of this publication.Because of The Big Book of Canada’s organization, I read the introduction, then turned to the chapter on Alberta—the province of my birth and my home for seven decades and counting. There, I found strengths and weaknesses that seemed to be mirrored in the other chapters.The “Landscapes” section in the Alberta chapter raised some concerns. Under “Parklands” the text reads as follows, ”…much of this is rich farming country with thick black soils …interspersed with aspen forests on the rolling hills” (157). The wording obscures an important reality: much grey-wooded soil prevails in the rolling hills. Also, because of their elevation, the hills experience a shortened growing season; spring comes late and frost comes early. Rich farms are not omnipresent. (Full disclosure here: my father had a quarter section in those “aspen forests on rolling hills.” We could grow hay crops successfully. We could pasture sheep. Beaver enjoyed the aspen and built a delightful series of dams on the creek that crossed our land diagonally. Sadly, none of these blessings led to our prosperity. We moved to Edmonton.) Further along, under the heading “Forests,” this statement appears: “In northern Alberta, the Athabaska River and the Peace River drain away to the Arctic Ocean” (157). A map would have clarified other vital components of the waterway’s approach to the Arctic: Lake Athabasca’s delta region, the Slave River, Great Slave Lake, Great Bear Lake, and, of course, the Mackenzie River.I found great satisfaction in the historical “Moments” section. Events significant in my own lifetime were listed. I noted the signal event in Alberta’s economic history that took place in my early childhood: the striking of oil in Leduc. Toward the end of Ernest Manning’s premiership I became a voter. I watched the changing orientation of my province under the leadership of such premiers as Peter Lougheed, Ralph Klein, and Rachel Notley. Even though Moore did not discuss every premiership throughout these years, I felt that his choice of major events in Alberta’s history was well done. Their significance rang true.The next section, however, the “Peoples” section, was an enigma. Perhaps because of its title, I expected it to be inclusive. Instead, it comprised a very limited, very arbitrary selection. To mention only the “Blackfoot Confederacy,” “Plains Cree,” and “Nakota (Stoney),” is to acknowledge a mere fraction of the First Nations people who occupy Treaty 6, 7, and 8 lands in Alberta. Acknowledging the “Hutterites” who, for religious reasons, live communally and separately from mainstream society, and noting the “Mormons” who settled at Cardston identifies two interesting aspects of religious practice in Alberta. But why is the larger picture ignored? In Alberta there are many faith communities, some large, some small, some who were persecuted in their countries of origin, some who were not. Each is a part of the fabric of our society. Finally, with regard to the commentary on the “South Asians,” had a broader concept—perhaps “Asian-Pacific Peoples”—been used, then all who have come here from that vast region might have been included; taken together, they currently make up about one eighth of Alberta’s population.If the purpose of the “Peoples” section were to highlight large minorities, why the utter silence about the Francophone populations of Alberta? If it were to note small but significant minorities, why not mention the Afro-Americans who fled here from the United States? And if it were intended to give a realistic sense of the diversity of the province, why completely exclude the huge proportions of people whose ancestors came from the British Isles, and Eastern or Western Europe? Finally, even as I write, people are migrating to this province and country from the Middle East, from Africa, Central and South America, and the Caribbean. Is this not worthy of mention?This book is intended for the school-aged reader who might well ask of its pages, “Where are my people?” Every child in Canada who reads this book has a right to feel included. The territories of our Indigenous people, and the countries from which immigrants came, could be effectively and economically communicated with visuals: maps, graphs, charts, and illustrations. The problem of limited inclusion appears to prevail in the “Peoples” sections of all the provinces and territories. I leave further commentary to other long-time residents of those parts of Canada. On a positive note, the sections on “The Famous and The Infamous” were hugely interesting. For all that the athletes, musicians, artists, authors, heroes, and villains were subjectively chosen, they were unarguably worthy of inclusion. It was also delightful to come upon entertaining trivia in the midst of all the serious geography and history, biography and sociology. I have not yet tried the “Blueberry Grunt” recipe of the Nova Scotians, but I have already begun to think of a bumblebee in the Newfoundland way as a “dumbledore.” In sum, though it is perfectly readable, The Big Book of Canada does not present a perfect picture of Canada.Recommended: 3 out of 4 starsReviewers: Leslie Aitken in consultation with Larry LaLibertéLeslie Aitken’s long career in librarianship involved selection of children’s literature for school, public, special and academic libraries. She is a former Curriculum Librarian for the University of Alberta.Larry LaLiberté is the current Geographic Information Systems Librarian of the University of Alberta.

ABSTRACT BACKGROUND: To analyse the impact that the adoption of our institutional standard operating procedure (SOP) for cervical spine dislocations had on the timing of closed reduction at our hospital METHODS: The study was a retrospective review of patients who presented to our institution with cervical dislocation injuries and who were managed with closed reduction. The patient records of acute cervical spine dislocations from 2015 to 2018, data from the Acute Spinal Cord Injury database along with patient's demographic information were gathered and compared. Participants within the study time frame were diagnosed with a cervical facet dislocation based on clinical examination findings and radiological confirmation. Patients who had reduction performed at other referring hospitals were excluded from the study. RESULTS: The practice within all tertiary hospitals in the Western Cape is to perform closed reduction of cervical fracture dislocations as soon as possible after injury. In this study the time between injury and closed reduction before introducing the SOP was 13 h 13 min and after introducing the SOP, the time increased to an average of 14 h 28 min. The main cause of delay was the transfer time from the site of injury to the emergency ward. Other reasons for the delay include missed diagnosis, orthopaedic registrar unavailability and incomplete reduction bed CONCLUSION: This study found that the time taken for orthopaedic management of cervical dislocations increased by an hour after introduction of the SOP. Additionally, the overall time to reduction also increased. This was due to delays in transfer to the emergency ward and referral to Orthopaedics. We recommend that, in our setting, reduction could be initiated within an hour of patient arrival, if emergency ward doctors rapidly identified the problem and commenced cervical traction when the orthopaedic team was not immediately available. Our impression was that there was poor adherence to the new SOP guidelines on time management by the trauma team, and possibly transport delays prior to hospital admission. A further study to investigate the bottlenecks of the referral system is advisable Level of evidence: Level 4 Keywords: acute outcomes, cervical spine, dislocation injuries

The failure to achieve academic outcomes in linguistically diverse classrooms in poor areas of the Western Cape, South Africa, is well documented. A major contributing factor is the written language communication difficulties experienced in these classrooms. This paper describes the views of intermediate-phase teachers on why written language difficulties are experienced by learners and ways in which these difficulties might be overcome. A series of interviews were conducted with two class teachers in one urban school from which there had been a high number of referrals for speech-language therapy. The teachers were individually interviewed using an in-depth, semi-structured format. Teachers reported that 50 - 70% of learners in their classes were not meeting grade level academic outcomes. They were asked to explain the difficulties experienced with regard to written language, and the challenges and solutions linked to these. The findings suggest that there are barriers and opportunities at the school system, individual learner and home/social community levels. Major challenges identified at the school system level included limited training and lack of support for teachers, poor foundation skills in learners and difficulties with language. The current opportunities for the development of written language were insufficient and teachers identified further opportunities to promote the learners’ written language development. These included training and support for teachers, clear and consistent assessment guidelines, remedial assistance for learners and safe, nurturing home environments. There is a need to look beyond the learner as the site of the problem; a systemic approach is essential. In the light of these findings, suggestions are made for the role of the speech-language therapist.

Orientation: The exhibition of organisation citizenship behaviour (OCB) by teachers is of great benefit for human capital development. Teachers’ perceptions of school principals as servant leaders play a critical role in their psychological empowerment and exhibition of OCBs.Research purpose: The goal of the study was to analyse the relationship between servant leadership, psychological empowerment and OCB of teachers in the South African school system.Motivation for the study: Teachers are usually under pressure to attend to the academic needs of the learners, which may be required either during normal working hours or after hours. This has necessitated the need to investigate the role played by a school principal’s servant leadership style in influencing the exhibition of OCBs.Research approach/design and method: A non-probability sample of 203 teachers drawn from selected schools in the Western Cape Province of South Africa was utilised. Item and dimensional analysis as well as structural equation modelling were performed on the data.Main findings: The constructs of servant leadership, psychological empowerment and OCB displayed high levels of internal consistency. Generally, a reasonable model fit was found for the structural and measurement models of the latent variables through confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation modelling. Positive relationships were found between servant leadership, psychological empowerment and OCB.Practical/managerial implications: A principal’s servant leadership approach is likely to promote teacher empowerment and development as it enables the principal to develop teachers to their fullest potential through mentoring and coaching. The teachers are likely to respond with OCB, which benefits the learners and society at large.Contribution/value-add: Schools face the challenge of motivating teachers. One of the ways of achieving this objective is by encouraging servant leadership amongst principals. Servant leadership promotes positive outcomes and extra-role behaviours.

Background: Diabetic patients are at increased risk of developing cardiac events and stroke, and prevention of diabetes mellitus is therefore desirable. Marked geographical and ethnic variation in the prevalence of diabetes caused by urbanisation, demographic and epidemiological transitions has rendered this one of the major non-communicable diseases in South Africa. Duplex ultrasound (DUS) plays an important role in primary health care in early detection of carotid atherosclerotic disease and the degree of carotid stenosis present. It is a reliable, cost-effective and non-invasive diagnostic tool. The purpose of this study was to determine the role of ultrasound in carotid stenosis management in type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM).Objectives: To determine the prevalence of carotid stenosis in a selected T2DM population using DUS and to correlate these findings with other predisposing atherosclerotic risk factors.Methods: The study setting was at an academic hospital in the Western Cape using carotid DUS reports of 103 diabetic subjects ≥ 35 years old. Predisposing risk factors were correlated with degree of carotid stenosis present. Data were analysed using the Fischer exact test, Chisquare and Student t-test.Results: Carotid DUS reports of 63 out of 103 T2DM patients revealed no evidence of a carotid stenosis, thereby lowering the risk profile. Forty patients were identified as having carotidstenosis; 22 symptomatic patients had a > 70% carotid stenosis which warranted surgicalintervention. A greater prevalence of stenosis in the Caucasian group, in both the male (p =0.0411) and female (p = 0.0458) cohorts, was noted. The overall trend suggested a relationship between T2DM and lifestyle, and a statistically significant relationship (p = 0.0063) between smoking and carotid stenosis was observed.Conclusion: T2DM and predisposing atherosclerotic risk factors significantly increased thepossibility of carotid stenosis development.

The practice of community health nursing (CHN) may enhance the life experiences of families and communities, particularly amongst the poor and socially marginalised. CHN provides for a deeper understanding of the health status of families living within communities, for example, where and how they live, their cultural context and their ability to identify resources available to assist with their health care (Allender, Rector & Warner 2010:17).This qualitative phenomenological study reflects on the self-reported lived experiences of undergraduate CHN students at the University of the Western Cape in the City of Cape Town, South Africa. These students conducted a family health assessment (FHA) learning task at the homes of families within communities.Purposive and convenience sampling was used by students who had conducted an FHA. Fourteen students agreed to participate in the study, of whom nine were interviewed, two withdrew and the remaining three were not interviewed since no new data were emerging during interviews, indicating that saturation had been reached.During in-depth interviews with seven female and two male students, data for the exploration of the lived experiences was gathered through the following question: ‘How did you experience the FHA?’ Field notes were taken and used to capture non-verbal communication of participants. The focus of the study was to explore the lived experiences of students and not those of the family on whom the FHA was completed.Data collected were categorised into themes, guided by the systematic data analysis process of Tesch (1990) cited in Cresswell (2003:192). Four themes emerged: challenges of family selection, challenges of safety, socio-cultural challenges and academic challenges experienced by the participants. This study will inform future research and curriculum planning for CHN education in a multifaceted context.OpsommingDie praktyk van gemeenskapsgesondheidverpleging (GGV) het die potentiaal om die lewenservaringe van families en gemeenskappe te verryk, veral in arm en voorheen benadeelde gemeenskappe. GGV verskaf ‘n dieper begrip met betrekking tot die welstand van families in hulle gemeenskappe, byvoorbeeld, waar en hoe hulle leef, hul kultuur en hulle vermoë om beskikbare hulpbronne te identifiseer om sodoende hulle gesondheid te bevorder (Allender, Rector & Warner 2010:17).Hierdie kwalitatiewe fenomonologiese studie is ʼn refleksie op die self-gerapporteerde persoonlike ervaringe van voorgraadse gemeenskapsgesondheidverpleging studente (VGVS) verbonde aan die Universiteit van Wes Kaapland, in Kaapstad, Suid-Afrika. Hierdie studente het as ʼn werksopdrag ʼn familie gesondheidsberaming (FGB) by wonings van gesinne in die gemeenskap voltooi.ʼn Gerieflikheids- en doelgerigte steekproefneming is gedoen met studente wat die FGB voltooi het. Veertien studente het ingestem om aan die studie deel te neem, waarvan daar onderhoude met nege gevoer is. Twee studente het onttrek en die oorblywende drie is nie genader nie weens die feit dat daar geen nuwe data na vore gekom het nie, wat daarop dui dat saturasie bereik was.Data vir die verkenning van persoonlike ervaringe is deur in-diepte onderhoude met sewe vroulike en twee manlike studente ingesamel deur die volgende vraag te vra: ‘Wat was jou ervaring met die voltooing van die FGB?’ Veldnotas was geneem om nie-verbale kommunikasie van die studente aan te teken. Die fokus van die studie was gerig om die persoonlike ervarings van die VGVS te verken met verwysing na die FGB wat hulle voltooi het. Die fokus was nie gerig op die ondervindinge van die familie op wie die FGB gedoen is nie.Die ingesamelde data is in temas gekategoriseer volgens die sistematiese data analitiese proses van Tesch (1990), soos omskryf in Cresswell (2003:192). Vier temas is geïdentifiseer naamlik: uitdagings ten opsigte van die keuring van ‘n geskikte familie: uitdagings ten opsigte van veiligheid, sosiokulturele uitdagings en akademiese uitdagings soos ervaar is deur die deelnemende studente. Die belangrikheid van die studie is om toekomstige navorsing en kurrikulumbeplanning in gemeenskapsgesondheidverpleging binne ‘n diverse konteks te bevorder.

Scores of farm workers on hunger strike in the US. A campaigner for affordable housing abducted in Cape Town. Tens of thousands of anti-war demonstrators marching in Istanbul. None of those stories made my daily paper — instead, I read them all this morning on the global Indymedia network. Developments in communication technologies have often enabled new approaches to the production, distribution and reception of news. In this article, using Carey’s analysis of the impacts of the telegraph (1989) and Burnett and Marshall’s discussion of “informational news” (2003) as starting points, I want to offer some examples from the brief history of the Indymedia movement to show how the Net is making possible a significant shift in who gets to make the news. The telegraph offers a number of useful perspectives from which to consider the impacts of the Net, and there are some striking parallels between the dot.com boom of the 1990s and the dot.dash boom of the 19th century. Telegraphy, writes James Carey, “permitted for the first time the effective separation of communication from transportation” (203). The telegraph was not only an instrument of business, but “a thing to think with, an agency for the alteration of ideas” (204). And a consideration of the telegraph offers a number of examples of the relationships between technological form and the nature of news. One such example, in Carey’s analysis, was the impact of the telegraph on the language and nature of journalism. “If the same story were to be understood in the same way from Maine to California,” he writes, “language had to be flattened out and standardised” (210). Local colour was bleached out of news reports to make them saleable in a market unconstrained by geography. “The origins of objectivity,” Carey argues, “may be sought, therefore, in the necessity of stretching language in space over the long lines of Western Union” (210). The telegraph didn’t just affect the quality of news — it greatly increased the quantity of it as well, forcing greater attention to be paid to the management of newsrooms. News became a commodity; not only that, just like cattle or wheat, news was now subject to all the vagaries of any other commodity business, from contracts and price gouging to outright theft (211). And in Western Union, the telegraph made possible the prototype of today’s transnational media firms (201). As the telegraph solved problems of communicating across space, it opened up time as a new arena for expansion. In this sense, the gradual emergence of 24-hour broadcasting schedules is traceable to the impact of the telegraph (Carey 228). A key legacy of this impact is the rise to primacy of CNN and its imitators, offering round-the-clock news coverage made possible by satellite transmission. This too changed the nature of news. As McKenzie Wark has pointed out, a 24-hour continuous news service is not ideally compatible with the established narrative strategies of news. Rather than cutting and shaping events to fit familiar narrative forms, CNN instead introduced an emphasis on what Wark calls “the queer concept of ‘live’ news coverage — an instant audiovisual presence on the site of an event” (38). This focus on speed and immediacy, on being the first on the scene, leads to news that is all event and no process. More than this, it leads at times to revealing moments when CNN-style coverage becomes obvious as a component part of the event it purports to cover. In his analysis of the Tiananmen Square crisis of 1989 Wark argues that the media event appeared as “a positive feedback loop” (22). The Beijing students’ perceptions of Western accounts of their demands and motives became caught up in the students’ own accounts of their own motives, their own demands: Western interpretations of what was happening in Beijing, Wark writes, “fed back into the event itself via a global loop encompassing radio, telephone, and fax vectors. They impacted back on the further unfolding of the event itself” (22). Both the telegraph and the satellite contributed to major shifts in the production, distribution and reception of news. And both made possible new types of media institution, from Western Union and Reuters to CNN. This is not to argue that technologies determine the nature of news or of news organisations, but rather that certain developments are made possible by both the adoption and the adaptation of new technologies. Institutional and cultural factors, of course, affect the nature of news, but technology also both enables and constrains. The medium might not be the message — but it does matter. So with such precedents as those above in mind, what might be the key impacts of the Net on the nature of news? In an important analysis of the online news environment, Robert Burnett and P. David Marshall introduce the concept of “informational news,” defined as “the transformation of journalism and news in Web culture where there is a greater involvement of the user and news hierarchies are in flux” (206). News, they argue, has become “a subset of a wider search for information by Web users” (206) and this “has led to a shift in how we recontextualise news around a much larger search for information” (152). In this analysis, audience members are transformed into researchers. These researchers become comfortable with getting their news from a broader range of sources, while at the same time searching for new ways to hierarchise those sources, to establish some as more legitimate than others. Adding to the complexity are Burnett and Marshall’s observations that new media forms offer enhanced flexibility (with, for example, archival access to news databases, including audio and video, available 24 hours a day), and that online news fosters and caters for new global communities of interest 161-7). When these phenomena are taken together, the result for Burnett and Marshall is “a shifted boundary of what constitutes news” (167). But this concept of informational news is largely cast in terms of reception and consumption: the practices of the new informational news researchers are discussed in terms of information retrieval, not production — even newsgroups and Weblogs are considered as additional sources for information retrieval, rather than as new avenues for new kinds of journalists to develop and publish new kinds of news. Burnett and Marshall are, I believe, right in their identification of changes to the nature of news, and their analysis is an important contribution. But what I want to emphasise in this article is that there is also a corresponding ongoing shift in the boundary of what constitutes newsmakers. The Indymedia movement offers clear examples of this, in its spectacular growth and in its promotion of open publishing models. As a forum for non-professional journalists of all stripes, Indymedia’s development is a vivid example of the shifting boundary around who gets to make the news. By now, many readers of M/C will perhaps be familiar with Indymedia to some degree. But it’s worth briefly reviewing both the scope of the movement and the speed with which it’s developed. The first Indymedia Website was established for the Seattle demonstrations against the World Trade Organisation meeting in November 1999. Its key feature was offering news coverage supplied by anyone who wanted to contribute, using free software and ideas from the Australian activists who had created the Active network. As events in Seattle gathered pace, the nascent Indymedia drew a claimed 1.5 million hits; this success led to the site being refocussed around several subsequent protests, before local collectives began to appear and form their own Indymedia centres. Within a year, this original Indymedia site was just one of a new network of more than 30. At the time of writing, a little over three years on from the movement’s inception, there are more than 100 Indymedia centres around the world — there are both Israeli and Palestinian Indymedia; Indymedia is established in Mumbai, Jakarta and Buenos Aires; there are centres in Poland, Colombia and South Africa. By any measure, this is a remarkable achievement for a decentralised project run entirely by volunteers and donations. Like any other complex phenomenon, the story of this development can be told in many different ways, each adding a different dimension. Three are especially relevant here. The first version would centre around the Active software developed by Sydney’s Catalyst tech collective. This was devised to create the Active Sydney site, an online hub for Sydney activists to promote events from direct actions to screenings and seminars. Launched in January 1999, Active Sydney was to become a prototype for Indymedia — part events calendar, part meeting place, part street paper. For June of that year, the Active team revised the system for the J18 global day of action. Using this system, anyone could now upload a report, a video clip, a photo or an audio file, and see it instantly added to the emerging narrative of events. It was as easy as sending email. And it ran on open source code. With Catalyst members collaborating online with organisers in Seattle to establish the first site, this system became the basis for Indymedia. While the Active software is no longer the only platform used for Indymedia sites, it made a huge contribution to the movement’s explosive growth (see Arnison, 2001; Meikle, 2002). Another version of the story would place Indymedia within the long traditions of alternative media. John Downing’s work is important here, and his definition of “politically dissident media that offer radical alternatives to mainstream debate” is useful (240). To tell the Indymedia story from this perspective would be to highlight its independence and self-management, and the autonomy of each local editorial collective in running each Indymedia centre. It would be to emphasise Indymedia as a forum for viewpoints which are not usually expressed within the established media’s consensus about what is and isn’t news. And, perhaps most importantly, to tell the Indymedia story as one in the alternative media tradition would be to focus on the extent to which this movement fosters horizontal connections and open participation, in contrast to the vertical flows of the established broadcast and print media (Downing, 1995). A third version would approach Indymedia as part of what cultural studies academic George McKay terms “DiY Culture.” McKay defines this as “a youth-centred and -directed cluster of interests and practices around green radicalism, direct action politics, new musical sounds and experiences”(2). For this version of the story, a useful analogy would be with punk — not with the music so much as with its DIY access principle (“here’s three chords, now form a band”). DIY was the key to Richard Hell’s much-misunderstood lyric “I belong to the blank generation” — the idea of the blank was that you were supposed to fill it in for yourself, rather than sign up to someone else’s agenda. To consider Indymedia as part of this DIY spirit would be to see it as the expression of a blank generation in this fine original sense — not a vacant generation, but one prepared to offer their own self-definitions and to create their own media networks to do it. More than this, it would also be to place Indymedia within the frameworks of independent production and distribution which were the real impact of punk — independent record labels changed music more than any of their records, while photocopied zines opened up new possibilities for self-expression. Just as the real importance of punk wasn't in the individual songs, the importance of Indymedia isn't in this or that news story posted to this or that site. Instead, it's in its DIY ethos and its commitment to establishing new networks. What these three versions of the Indymedia story share is that each highlights an emphasis on access and participation; each stresses new avenues and methods for new people to create news; each shifts the boundary of who gets to speak. And where these different stories intersect is in the concept of open publishing. This is the Net making possible a shift in the production of news, as well as in its reception. Matthew Arnison of Catalyst, who played a key role in developing the Active software, offers a working definition of open publishing which is worth quoting in full: “Open publishing means that the process of creating news is transparent to the readers. They can contribute a story and see it instantly appear in the pool of stories publicly available. Those stories are filtered as little as possible to help the readers find the stories they want. Readers can see editorial decisions being made by others. They can see how to get involved and help make editorial decisions. If they can think of a better way for the software to help shape editorial decisions, they can copy the software because it is free and change it and start their own site. If they want to redistribute the news, they can, preferably on an open publishing site.” (Arnison, 2001) Open publishing has undoubtedly been a big part of the appeal of Indymedia for its many contributors. In fact, one of Indymedia’s slogans is “everyone is a journalist.” If this is a provocation, who and what is it meant to provoke? Obviously, “everyone” is not a journalist — at least not if journalists are seen as employees of news institutions and news businesses, employees with some kind of training in research methods and narrative construction. But to say that “everyone is a journalist” is not to claim that everyone has such institutional affiliation, or that everyone has such training or expertise. Instead, the tactic here seems to be to inflate something out of all proportion in order to draw attention to the core smaller truth that may otherwise go unnoticed. Specifically in this case, what authorises some to be story-tellers and not others? From this perspective, the slogan reads like a claim for difference, a claim that other kinds of expertise and other kinds of know-how also have valid claims on our attention, and that these too can make valid contributions to the more plural media environment made possible — but not guaranteed — by the Net. It’s a claim that the licence to tell stories should be shared around. But developments to this core element — open publishing — point both to an ongoing challenge for the Indymedia movement, and to a possible future which might enable a further significant shift in the nature of Net news. In March 2002, a proposal was circulated to remove the open publishing newswire from the front page of the main site at http://www.indymedia.org/, replacing this with features sourced from local sites around the world. While this was said to have the objective of promoting those local sites to a broader audience, it should also be seen as acknowledgement that Indymedia was struggling against limits to growth. One issue was the large number of items being posted to sites, which meant that even especially well-researched or significant stories would be replaced quickly on the front page; another issue was the persistent trolls and spam which plagued some Indymedia sites. In April 2002, after a voting process in which 15 Indymedia collectives from Brazil to Barcelona voted unanimously in favour of the reform, the open publishing newswire was taken off the front page. Many local Indymedia sites followed suit. Even the Sydney site, which, perhaps because of the history and involvement of the Catalyst group, promotes open publishing rather more than some other Indymedia sites, adopted a features-based front page in August 2002, stating that “promoting certain issues above others” would make the site “more effective.” These developments might signal the eventual demise of the open publishing component. Indymedia might instead become ‘professionalised,’ with greater reliance on de facto staff reporters and more stringent editing, moving closer to existing alternative media outlets. But the new centrality of its news features might also open Indymedia up to a new level of involvement, because those features are given prominence in the site’s central column and can remain on the front page for some weeks. This offers the potential for what Arnison terms “automated open-editing”. This would involve creating the facility for audience members to contribute to sub-editing stories on an Indymedia site: they might, for instance, check facts or add sources; edit spelling, grammar or formatting; nominate a topic area within which a given story could be archived; or translate the story from one language or style to another (Arnison, 2001). Open publishing is one phenomenon in which we can see the Net enabling changes to the nature of news and newsmakers. If open editing were also to work, then it would need to be as simple to operate as the original open publishing newswire. But if this were possible, then open editing might involve not only more new people in the development of informational news, but involve them in new ways, catering for a broader range of abilities and aptitudes than open publishing alone. Like earlier communication technologies, the Net could facilitate new types of media institution — ones built on an open model, which enable a new, more plural, news environment. Works Cited Arnison, Matthew. “Open Publishing Is the Same as Free Software.” 2001. 21 Feb. 2003 <http://www.cat.org.au/maffew/cat/openpub.php>. Arnison, Matthew. “Open Editing: A Crucial Part of Open Publishing.” 2002. 21 Feb. 2003 <http://www.cat.org.au/maffew/cat/openedit.php>. Burnett, Robert, and P. David Marshall. Web Theory: An Introduction. London & New York: Routledge, 2003. Carey, James. Communication as Culture. New York & London: Routledge, 1989. Downing, John. “Alternative Media and the Boston Tea Party.” Questioning The Media. Eds. John Downing, Ali Mohammadi and Annabelle Sreberny-Mohammadi. Thousand Oaks: Sage, 1995. 238-52. McKay, George. “DiY Culture: Notes towards an Intro.” DiY Culture: Party & Protest in Nineties Britain. Ed. George McKay. London: Verso, 1998. 1-53. Meikle, Graham. Future Active: Media Activism and the Internet. New York & London: Routledge, and Annandale: Pluto Press, 2002. Wark, McKenzie. Virtual Geography: Living with Global Media Events. Bloomington: Indiana UP, 1994. Links http://www.cat.org.au/maffew/cat/openedit.html http://www.cat.org.au/maffew/cat/openpub.html http://www.indymedia.org/ http://www.sydney.active.org.au/ Citation reference for this article Substitute your date of access for Dn Month Year etc... MLA Style Meikle, Graham. "Indymedia and The New Net News" M/C: A Journal of Media and Culture< http://www.media-culture.org.au/0304/02-feature.php>. APA Style Meikle, G. (2003, Apr 23). Indymedia and The New Net News. M/C: A Journal of Media and Culture, 6,< http://www.media-culture.org.au/0304/02-feature.php>