Research Publications (Arts and Design)

Permanent URI for this collectionhttps://hdl.handle.net/10321/214

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Dancing with decolonial curriculum theorists : technology as a shapeshifter in art and design education
(UJ Press, 2024-9-15) Olalere, Folasayo Enoch; Makwela, Mashaole Jacob; Fomunyam, Kehdinga George
In the past two decades, the concept of decolonisation of higher education in South Africa gained momentum. Amidst this growing concern, the role players in the education sector have interrogated their role in this discourse and examined how curricula and pedagogical approaches can stand up to this call for decolonisation. Some decolonial theorists have associated the concept with changing the nature of knowledge, shifting our position in relation to knowledge, and economic transformation. Even though there are multiple views and schools of thought, the question that remains unanswered in curriculum development is what the concept of decolonisation will look like in technologically advanced university settings.
Curriculum potential for theory, theorising, and praxis
(University of Johannesburg Press, 2024-8-31) Fomunyam, Kehdinga George; Fomunyam, Kehdinga George
Balancing acts : navigating research challenges as a female academic in higher education
(IGI Global, 2025-5-16) Thamae, Mamothibe Amelia; Mdikana, Andile Alfred
The author generated no research outputs in the past two decades, resulting in limited career trajectories in academia that require research publications in accredited, reputable journals and books. To go up the ranks in Higher Education Institutions, the author is expected to actively contribute to knowledge production as evidenced by scholarly articles, graduate doctoral students in record time, secure research grants and visiting scholars. As a result of the lack of research outputs, the author appears stuck since the author cannot apply for any promotion that requires recent publications. This study contributes to current debates on research outputs, university rankings, sustainability of Higher Education Institutions, staff promotion policies, and neoliberal principles' impact on Higher Education. This conceptual study employs an interpretivist paradigm that uses data from the diaries and notes on the author's experiences across Institutions. In this light, this chapter explores the challenges that females encounter in HEIs and contribute to few or no research outputs.
Navigating the academic odyssey : exploring the role of supervisors in supporting postgraduate students
(OpenEd Network, 2024-2-23) Adedokun, Theophilus; Oyetunde-Joshua, Funsho
Postgraduate supervision entails an intensive, one-on-one academic relationship between the supervisor and student. Through this relationship, the supervisor facilitates the student's scholarly development. This study investigates supervisors' roles in supporting postgraduate students from the students’ perspective. This study through in-depth semi-structured interviews with 12 doctoral and masters students at two universities seeks to investigate how postgraduate students perceive and undergo guidance from their supervisors. The factors analyzed include the role of networking and motivational supports provided by supervisors during postgraduate students’ research journey. This study explores the ways supervisors provide career mentoring and networking to prepare students for postgraduate careers, and how they inspire and emotionally assist students through inherent research challenges. The findings identify strengths in supervisory support and areas needing enhancement. The findings indicate that many students desire more hands-on help with methodology and writing and career mentoring emerges as an area where postgraduate support falls short of expectations. The study recommends that supervisor trainings be provided for supervisors and intending ones, and such trainings should be focused on writing guidance, networking, advising and motivation. By implementing such programs, universities can empower supervisors to optimally assist students, thereby enhancing experiences and outcomes.
Students’ demographics in postgraduate engineering education : the case of international students
(UJ Press, 2024-9-15) Fomunyam, Kehdinga George; Moyo, Sibusiso
Engineering was informally viewed as skills that were passed down from engineers who were mostly European immigrants. As times changed and development occurred, these engineering skills were integrated into the curriculum to train engineers to meet the regional economic need in various countries of the world. As a result of various needs of people and of the international community, internationalization of higher education has gained interest recently. In an attempt to unravel this, there must be an understanding of their demographic characteristics, enrolment, and support. In this demographic study, postgraduate engineering international students were the study group and data from the National Science Foundation (2018) was used in this study. Data was collected from graduate students and post doctorates in science and engineering (GSS). This research is a demographic study of doctoral and postdoctoral non-tenure researchers in engineering education. Findings from the study revealed that there was more male enrolment than female in postgraduate programmes.
Pre-service science teachers’ perceptions towards developing Isizulu vocabulary for teaching and learning
(UJ Press, 2024-9-20) Thamae, Mamothibe Amelia; Fomunyam, Kehdinga
This study investigates pre-service teachers’ perceptions towards developing an isiZulu vocabulary for teaching and learning chemistry in three rural FET schools in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. It contributes to the ongoing debates around curriculum decolonisation and code-switching in teaching and learning. The study adopts a qualitative interpretivist paradigm, utilizing individual interviews with six (6) isiZulu pre-service chemistry teachers who were purposively selected. The study found that pre-service teachers generally had a positive attitude towards curriculum decolonisation and code-switching for teaching and learning chemistry. This study also found that some pre-service teachers were not keen to develop isiZulu vocabulary, given the challenges and complexities of code-switching in real-life chemistry teaching and learning contexts.Further, the findings indicate developing isiZulu vocabulary can enhance curriculum decolonisation and code-switching for effective teaching and learning of chemistry in this context. The study recommends the need for pre-service teachers to be conscientised about the value of developing isiZulu vocabulary for effective teaching and learning of chemistry lessons. Future must explore how to effectively empower pre-service teachers to manage code-switching in teaching chemistry in rural contexts.
Saving journalism 2 : Global strategies and a look at investigative journalism
(Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung USA., 2022) Schiffrin, Anya; Clifford, Hannah; Adjin-Tettey, Theodora Dame
A year after publishing Saving journalism in 2021, we’ve gone back to see what happened to some of the promising measures we documented in our last report. The appetite for sweeping change and broad support for quality information we described then has grown. Many of the organizations we spoke to last year are close to making major announcements and all feel they made headway in 2020. In the absence of research and hard evidence as to what works best (not unique to journalism—some things are essentially unknowable) we’re seeing pragmatism, with different groups backing policies that seem politically feasible. There is continuing tension between the larger, established outlets that benefit from many of the government programs to support journalism and the niche players/digital startups, which have less to gain. This is getting in the way of agreements as to which, if any, government policies to support. However, given the political and economic contexts in many countries, it’s not clear what the counterfactual would be: If there were agreement and a concerted push, would it make a difference given the political constraints that exist around the world? There is lots of useful new research on media viability and how to help save journalism. One outstanding example was the 2021 report from Reporters without Borders calling for a New Deal for journalism.
Academics well-being as a pillar of institutional autonomy : a study on work-life balance in higher education amidst and post Covid-19
(SUNJournals, 2025-8-23) Shange, Mzwakhe Ellen; Nyide, Celani John
In higher education, intricate relationships among academic freedom, academic welfare, institutional autonomy, and public accountability have become increasingly evident. This research investigates the critical issue of balancing work and home lives for academics and its significant ramifications. This research aimed to evaluate the influence of work life balance on academics productivity at a specific university in South Africa. Three sophisticated quantitative approaches, the JD-R Model, structural equation modelling (SEM), and Analysis of Moment Structures (AMOS) 27 statistical software, were applied in the study of 175 full-time academics. The results of this research indicated a substantial negative connection among academics performance and work life imbalance (β = -0.232†, p < 0.100). This is an example of how difficult it is to be an academic and have a life. It is evident that productivity and meaningful contributions to an institution will increase when academics are able to successfully manage their personal and professional lives. However, institutional autonomy has an impact on administrative decisions and measures, which in turn affect the work environment, resources at disposal, job security, and overall welfare of academics.
Textual elements of The Great Gatsby
(AOSIS Books, 2023) Vooght, Ursula
Introduction : African higher education and the praxis of research, innovation, and internationalisation
(University of Johannesburg Press, 2024-8-31) Kehdinga, George Fomunyam; Kehdinga, George Fomunyam
Introduction : digitalisation and organisational communication
(Palgrave Macmillan, 2024-11-10) Usadolo, Sam Erevbenagie; Makwambeni, Blessing; Usadolo, Queen; Usadolo, Sam Erevbenagie; Makwambeni, Blessing; Usadolo, Queen
Organisational Communication in Africa: Navigating a Digitalised World is a book that brings together empirical work that examines how digitalisa tion is impacting on and re-configuring organisational communication in different countries across the African continent. The book provides new insights, theories, and practical strategies for engaging with organisational communication from a Global South perspective. The rapid acceleration of technological changes presents both opportunities and challenges for organisations operating on the African continent where the adoption of digital technologies has significant variations across countries (Li, 2024). The fourth industrial revolution has been transforming organisations and their environment as well as society as a whole for more than a decade now. However, developments surrounding the onset of COVID-19 in 2020 have staggeringly increased the pace at which transformation is tak ing place in organisations regardless of their prior state of readiness. This book notes that although the digitalisation of organisational communica tion per se is not a new phenomenon, the seismic changes brought by the fourth industrial revolution have been transformative of organisations themselves, their environment, and the practice of organisational communication.
Re-engineering sociological constellations for higher education in South Africa
(University of Johannesburg Press, 2024-8-31) Kehdinga, George Fomunyam; Ezeonwuachusi, Nnenna Fidelia
Higher education in South Africa has experienced a number of challenges for the past three decades: from the days of apartheid to post-apartheid South Africa, to the challenges of transforming the higher education landscape. The merger of several South African higher education institutions in 2004 created a plethora of challenges to add to the already existing ones. These challenges were political, sociological, structural and fiscal in nature. The desire to address these challenges has in a way created an epistemological backlog where access to higher education has increased drastically but epistemological access remains a challenge. These amongst other things fuelled the decolonisation movement which demanded for the decolonisation of knowledge. However, the decolonisation of knowledge amongst other things cannot be effective or complete without a re-engineering of the sociology of education. this chapter articulates a pathway for the re engineering of the sociology of education by articulating four sociological constellations.
Perceptions of Grade 10 to 12 adolescents on contextual situations that contribute to their psychosocial development challenges
(Education Association of South Africa, 2025-2-28) Khumalo, Gift; Pretorius, Edmarie
Adolescence is a complex developmental stage with challenges that affect transitioning to adulthood. The success in managing the transition depends on personal capabilities, circumstances, and support systems. Contextual situations in adolescent development are understudied in developing countries. In this qualitative study, we explored what South African Grade 10 to 12 adolescents perceived to be the factors influencing their experience of psychosocial challenges at home and at school. Participants (22 Grade 10–12 learners) completed an open-ended survey structured as a written interview. Thematic analysis of the data revealed 2 main themes: home life situations (household financial difficulties, unfavourable living conditions, time-inflexible house chores, poor parent-child relationships, lack of support from families), and school life situations (peers’ inappropriate behaviour, perceptions of ineffective school leadership, teachers’ low work enthusiasm and commitment, insufficient school resources, unsafe and unfavourable geographical conditions). The findings suggest a need for psychosocial intervention by school social workers at family and school levels to support adolescents in negotiating their psychosocial developmental transition to young adulthood. The departments of education, social development and health, the police services, and non-governmental organisations (NGOs) should collaborate to establish school programmes addressing learners’ disruptive behaviour and school safety concerns.
Improving pre-service teachers’ conceptualisation of isometric drawing through AutoCAD-based simulation
(Society for Research and Knowledge Management, 2025-9-30) Mlambo, Philani Brian; Singh-Pillay, Asheena
This qualitative study aimed to address the ongoing issue of poor performance in isometric drawing, which has been a persistent problem. Each year, Grade 12 moderators' reports consistently highlight learners' difficulties with this section. This ongoing challenge suggests that teachers also face difficulties when teaching this concept. Consequently, this study focused on pre-service teachers to address this educational gap. The choice to concentrate on pre-service teachers from a university of technology training as Engineering Graphics and Design (EGD) teachers was strategic. As future educators, these individuals have significant potential to act as agents of change in the teaching and learning of isometric drawing. This potential for educational transformation compelled the need to explore the effect of technology-enhanced learning in improving the conceptualisation of isometric drawing. To address the research objectives, forty first-year pre-service teachers enrolled in EGD were purposively selected to participate in this study. The theoretical foundation combined the Zone of Proximal Development and technology framework with Self-Directed Learning theory to underpin this qualitative enquiry. Data was gathered through photovoice and reflective diaries to evaluate the impact of AutoCAD in enhancing the conceptualisation of isometric drawing. The collected data was examined through narrative analysis to document and interpret the effects of the AutoCAD intervention. Findings from this analysis suggest that technology-enhanced learning, specifically AutoCAD-based pedagogy, significantly enhances the conceptualisation of isometric drawing and improves fundamental spatial visualisation skills. The implications of these findings indicate that EGD teachers should adopt technology-based learning approaches in their classrooms. Therefore, this study recommends that all EGD teachers become proficient in operating AutoCAD to integrate this sophisticated drawing software into their teaching methodologies effectively.
A scoping review of contextual factors contributing to school violence in the Southern African Development Community (SADC) region
(MDPI AG, 2025-03) Khumalo, Gift; Makhakhe, Nosipho Faith; Lipholo, Bokang Nephtali
School violence is a prevalent phenomenon across Southern African Development Community (SADC), affecting children’s psychosocial and mental well-being. As part of SADC’s educational goals, access to quality education is a priority and is beneficial for the region’s economic growth and development. This goal cannot be achieved without addressing school violence at its roots. Using Arksey and O’Malley’s five-step framework, this scoping review explored evidence of contextual factors that contribute to school violence in the region. Twenty-four articles were included, and six themes were identified: home contextual factors, parental factors, community risk factors, school contextual factors, sociability factors, and demographic and individual characteristics. The findings suggest that factors contributing to school violence were from the learners’ immediate environments, including exposure to violence at home and poor parental methods, interactions with teachers and lack of appropriate disciplinary methods and processes, disruptive ideas related to masculinity, lack of understanding and intolerance to demographic and individual differences, and exposure to violence, drugs, and alcohol at the community level. To address this phenomenon, a comprehensive approach is needed, which includes developing clear school policies, teacher training on managing disruptive behaviours and professionalism, mapping incidents of school violence, and interventions involving collaboration between schools, parents, and school social workers to curb school violence.
Navigating trauma : analysing the lived experiences of journalists who suffered violence in the line of duty
(Sage Publications, 2025) Adjin-Tettey, Theodora Dame; Asuman, Manfred A.K; Ayim-Segbefia, Mary Selikem
Through the lens of the Coping Circumplex Model (CCM) and the phenomenological research approach, this study explores how Ghanaian journalists deal with trauma experienced in the line of duty. Participants reported experiencing a variety of traumas, including psychological, emotional, and physical. The data also revealed that the coping techniques adopted by participants fell within both the problem-coping and the emotion-coping dimensions. Some employed avoidance as an emotion-coping strategy and got triggered when they saw culprits, pointing to emotion-coping’s ineffectiveness in healing trauma. The trauma journalists experience also sometimes extends to the victims’ relations, calling for an exploration of coping strategies for victims of the cascading effects of trauma experienced by others in future studies.
Assessing the responsiveness of journalism curricula to the labor market needs in South Africa : a systematic review
(2025-7-23) Muringa, Tigere; Adjin-Tettey, Theodora Dame
Through the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) guidelines, this study evaluates the responsiveness of journalism curricula in South Africa to the evolving needs of the industry. Forty-six reviewed studies literature were retrieved for analysis. Findings indicate that while some institutions have incorporated digital media skills, critical thinking and ethics into their curricula, significant gaps remain in multimedia storytelling, data journalism, media entrepreneurship and AI tools in newsrooms. Furthermore, there is limited emphasis on practical work-integrated learning (WIL), leaving graduates underprepared for the fast-paced and highly competitive journalism labor market. The study recommends curriculum reforms that emphasize practical skills, industry partnerships and adaptability
Vertical representation of gender in the Ghanaian broadcast media
(Informa UK Limited, 2025-1-1) Danso, Samuel; Appiah-Adjei, Gifty; Adjin-Tettey, Theodora Dame
The gender gap in media organizations has drawn research attention in recent years. This study, through the lens of the glass ceiling concept, draws on interview data to explore how gender is represented in managerial positions within Ghanaian broadcast media. The study’s findings indicate that, despite progress towards gender equality, men continue to dominate top managerial positions in Ghana’s broadcast media. The absence of institutional policies specifically targeting gender representation perpetuates these inequalities. Further, informal efforts by some media firms to ensure fair representation lack the effectiveness of formal guidelines and accountability mechanisms. Thus, women in the Ghanaian broadcast media experience the “glass ceiling” effect and are excluded from managerial decision-making processes. The study highlights the importance of promoting gender equity and diversity in leadership within the Ghanaian broadcast media.
Assessing the responsiveness of journalism curricula to the labor market needs in South Africa : a systematic review
(SAGE Publications, 2025-1-1) Muringa, Tigere; Adjin-Tettey, Theodora Dame
Through the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) guidelines, this study evaluates the responsiveness of journalism curricula in South Africa to the evolving needs of the industry. Forty-six reviewed studies literature were retrieved for analysis. Findings indicate that while some institutions have incorporated digital media skills, critical thinking and ethics into their curricula, significant gaps remain in multimedia storytelling, data journalism, media entrepreneurship and AI tools in newsrooms. Furthermore, there is limited emphasis on practical work-integrated learning (WIL), leaving graduates underprepared for the fast-paced and highly competitive journalism labor market. The study recommends curriculum reforms that emphasize practical skills, industry partnerships and adaptability.</jats:p>
The African youth and communicative behaviours in digital spaces
(University of Ghana, 2025-7-1) Adjin-Tettey, Theodora Dame; Yeboah-Banin, Abena Animwaa
As digital media platforms have become ubiquitous in all aspects of media consumption (Kaempf, 2018; Ren et al., 2024), there is abundant evidence that media consumers, particularly young people, are moving away from media to digital media (Kemp, 2021). This is demonstrated by the over 40% of Africans who use the internet regularly (Kamer, 2022) and the significant portion of news, advertising, and entertainment consumed on digital platforms (Rao & Nagaraj, 2022). Digital platforms also serve educational purposes (Adjin-Tettey et al., 2022), as many educational institutions have deployed digital technologies to complement other modes of educational instruction (Anderson & Rivera Vargas, 2020). Additionally, digital platforms serve as an important and foremost opportunity for networking among young people (Koch, & Miles, 2021; Sinanan & Gomes, 2020), self-expression and self-presentation (Guo, 2015), the pursuit of entrepreneurial opportunities (Pano & Gjika, 2020), and political engagement and civic action (Hao et al., 2014), particularly for young people.

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