WORLDS IN DIALOGUE  WÊRELDE IN DIALOOG - MAFATSHE A PUISANO

8-11 JULY 2009

ABSTRACTS

Balfour, Prof. Robert JSt Austin College, Johannesburg“The House of Fiction: the house as post-colonial trope in the fiction of V.S. Naipaul”

Jan Mohamed (1992) in his work on the postcolonial literature of migrants argues that their “positionality [as] specular border intellectuals” is not merely the combination of initial dislocation, together with a western education, which rules out the possibility of “gregarious acceptance” of any new home culture, but that “homelessness cannot be achieved without multiple border crossings or without a constant, keen awareness of the politics of borders” (1992: 112).

The fiction of VS Naipaul offers selected examples of characters who take the form of migrant public intellectuals (as writers, poets, teachers, administrators or journalists) who epitomise the possibilities of relocation after the binary and totalising structures of power have been fractured and displaced. In other words, through their migration as specular border intellectuals, a new form of community become possible, a community of individuals Bhabha terms the "unhomely"; a new internationalism, a gathering of people in the Diaspora. "To live in the unhomely world, to find its ambivalences and ambiguities enacted in the house of fiction, or its sundering and splitting performed in the work of art, is also to affirm a profound desire for social solidarity”.

In this paper I offer an analysis of the house (of fiction) as a post-colonial trope characteristically problematised by Naipaul, who shows that while offering some intellectual and cultural possibilities of home, finds that these are nevertheless endangered and delimited by the possibilities afforded in a globalised world.

Blatchford, MathewUniversity of Fort Hare“The Narrative of Jacob Gedleyihlekisa Zum of Nkandla”

A plot, according to Aristotle, is that which has a beginning, a middle and an end. And, if we are to believe Jacob Zuma's publicists, the plot against Jacob Zuma was precisely thus. However, few commentators have recognised that the narrative presented by Jacob Zuma's publicists, because it does not rest on factual information,

1

ought to stand or fall by its aesthetic merits. Does it possess, as W S Gilbert noted, "artistic verisimilitude"?

It might seem strange to examine a political narrative through the use of literary analysis. However, this estrangement is only due to the tragic intellectual divides within academia today. In fact, since literature is meant to hold a mirror up to humanity and politics is supposed to reflect the wishes of the electorate, the two appear altogether analogous. Hence this paper will examine the narrative of the plot against J G Zuma according to its relevance to artistic credibility -- or at least, since this is arguably a work of fantasy, subjection to the notorious "willing suspension of disbelief".

The template through which this political narrative will be examined, is that of Edgar Allen Poe's only novel, The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket, a text (it will be recalled) concerning lost ships, mortal peril in southern regions, and the eventual revelation of the hollowness of everything. It will be suggested that there are intriguing aesthetic and intellectual connections between the doomed Pym and the far-from-doomed Zum -- and that, indeed, "a chasm threw itself open to receive us. But there arose in our pathway a shrouded human figure, very far larger in its proportions than any dweller among men". Or, as Karl Marx observed, "the first time as tragedy; the second, as farce".

Szulia, Jagoda & Brits, Karien Adam Mickiewicz University“The classroom as a storytelling space where the Exotic meets and greets the Domestic”

Learning about South Africa in Poland is a difficult task, most of our students will say. Two different countries, two different continents and… a multitude of culture differences. Can a legitimate dialogue between these two worlds take place when all we have at our disposal is a distance of ten thousand kilometers, a set of preformed (mis)conceptions and virtually no first-hand experience of Africa?

According to educational theorist David A. Kolb (1984: 22), personal experience is key to giving “life, texture, and subjective personal meaning to abstract concepts” and “learning is the process whereby knowledge is created through the transformation of [such] experience” (Kolb 1984: 38). What does one do then, if already at the onset of the learning process a vital element is missing?

Our responsibility as teachers (of Afrikaans and culture studies) is to establish an effective learning environment, where one can develop a dialogue with the study object and do more than just observe and register “the Exotic”. We aim at designing an intellectual framework for creative, incorporative learning that would allow the students to construct and partake in “the Exotic” thus making it their own, “domesticating” it, so to speak.

In both our classes, language and culture, we make use of role playing and storytelling – the two teaching devices that we believe best personalize learning. Telling stories or narration is, according to Linde (2008: 3-4), one of the ways people present who they are and their actions in the past in order to form their identity. However, Polish students do not have a South African past and it is here that the two worlds collide. One way to reconcile the cultural conflict is to rewrite the existing dialogues in textbooks to make the students part of the story. As one other teacher

2

said: “The classroom is a place where stories meet [and] [s]tories are places where worlds meet” (Susanna Steele 2009).

Byrne, Prof DeirdreUniversity of South Africa“Ursula K. Le Guin’s Lavinia: a dialogue with Classical Roman epic

In Ursula K. Le Guin’s latest novel, Lavinia (2008), she writes a fictional biography of a minor character in Virgil’s Aeneid. The protagonist and narrator is Aeneas’s second wife, Lavinia, the daughter of a minor Italian king, who helps the Roman hero found the city of Rome. In the novel, Le Guin sets Lavinia’s biography in dialogue with Virgil’s epic, noting also that her protagonist is ‘contingent’ in the Roman text and hence has no ‘body’ and no ‘voice’ in the earlier tale. The work therefore gives a silenced but substantial woman a voice, which reconfigures notions of the male hero’s contribution to the shaping of Western history. Lavinia is an addition and extension to the last six books of The Aeneid, but it can be seen as a gesture of rehabilitating women’s stories, and as a significant contribution to what Carolyn Heilbrun calls 'writing ... women's lives' (1988), or, to put it differently, an attempt to revise 'history' so that it tells herstory as well. While Vigil's focus is on history-making through dramatic actions by men, Le Guin’s focus is (as in many of her earlier works) on the domestic preoccupations of a woman who is concerned with her family and home. My paper will explore the multiple dialogues that Le Guin conducts in her text: a feminist revision of a classical work; an interrogation of the figure of the hero/heroine in a patriarchal historiography; and a postmodernist view of the way history is constructed.

Collins, TonyaUniversity of Mississippi“Pulling It All Together”

The presenter will have open dialogue with the audience with hopes of sharing valuable insight of good and bad Professional Development experiences.

Professional Development is such an important aspect of the educational system. Many educators say PD is needed more and more. Others say their experience from years of teaching do not require added PD. This presentation is geared to enlighten all educators of the great opportunities that PD brings into the educational field. It gives pointers that can easily be adopted into any setting. Effective, comprehensive, results-driven professional development is the key to increased student learning.

The Toolkit to be presented helps you focus not just on technical knowledge that professionals need, but also process skills that may impact achievement of school goals.The schools and districts this Toolkit is based on all used PD to meet educational goals for students, and they were rigorous about that.

The main difference between this and some other approaches is a focus on results.Making professional development a priority makes high-quality teachers a priority. And high-quality teachers make increased student achievement a reality.

Comprehensive, continuous, embedded professional development has been identified as, perhaps, the most critical element in school reform.

3

Unfortunately, high-quality professional development is not typically found in most schools and districts today.Professional development can no longer afford to be “sit and get.”

Cornwell, Prof. GarethRhodes University“J.M. Coetzee’s Elizabeth Costello: Realism, Responsibility, and “The Problem of Evil””

In the first part of this paper (the part that I shall deliver at the conference), I ask some general questions of Elizabeth Costello relating to realism and representation, and to the notion of authorial responsibility. In the second part I focus these questions in a response to Lesson Six in Elizabeth Costello, “The Problem of Evil.”

De Kock, ElmaNWU“Kunsdialoog: ‘n Interdissiplinêre tienergesprek”

In hierdie aanbieding word daar verslag gedoen oor die gesprek wat ontstaan tussen literêre genres (prosa en drama) en kunsvorms (skryfkuns, dramauitvoering, fotografie (of verfilming), boekskepping) in ‘n projek wat met leerders tussen die ouderdomme van 12 en 14 jaar in die leerarea Kuns en Kultuur onderneem word, wat moet voldoen aan die volgende asseseringstandaarde by verskeie geleenthede: 1) die skep van ‘n oorspronklike teks, 2) die dramatisering van ‘n teks, 3) die omskakeling van ‘n narratiewe na ‘n dramateks en 4) die bemarking van ‘n produk. Alhoewel hierdie projek vanuit die leerarea Kuns en Kultuur onderneem word, is daar kruiskurrikulêre dialoog met die taal, geletterdheid en kommunikasie leerareas en die eerste en derde asseseringstandaarde hoort dan ook tot hierdie leerarea. Daar is in die bemarking van die hele projek ook nog verdere kruiskurrikulêre dialoog met die leerarea Ekonomiese en Bestuurswetenskappe.

Die leerders het aanvanklik inligting ontvang rakende die verloop van die kreatiewe proses, waarna hulle hierdie kennis moes toepas gedurende die skryf van ‘n kortverhaal, wat hulle moes skoei op temas wat deur die leerders self bepaal is tydens ‘n klasgeleentheid. Hierdie verhale is beoordeel aan die hand van hulle geskiktheid vir die projekproses en daar sal nou voortgegaan word deur die onderwyser en leerders om die gekose kortverhaal tot ‘n dramateks te omskep. Wanneer die dramateks klaar gekryf is, sal die leerders die dramateks instudeer en dramatiseer. Terwyl die leerders die drama opvoer, sal daar foto’s van die optrede geneem word. Hierdie foto’s sal dan gebruik word in die samestelling van ‘n fotoverhaalboek, wat deur die leerders elektronies en met die hand vervaardig sal word. Dit sal dan bemark word as leesstof vir leerders wat naastenby in hulle ouderdomsgroep val.

De Villiers, Mr. RickUniversity of Pretoria“Sparrow in the Gutter: The Sordid History of T.S. Eliot’s Poems 1920”

4

In relation to the existing criticism of T.S. Eliot’s other works, Poems 1920 has elicited relatively scant study. With the exception of ‘Gerontion’, of which detailed analyses abound, the poems in this collection have been severely neglected. While they are highly allusive and dense, they are no more so than the majority of Eliot’s subsequent works; indeed, it may be argued that the foundation for the schematic framework of The Waste Land finds its origins in the palimpsest techniques applied in poems like ‘Sweeney Erect’ , ‘Mr. Eliot’s Sunday Morning Service’, ‘Sweeney Among the Nightingales’, and the other English poems in the collection.

The paper aims to justify a revaluation of this neglected part of Eliot’s corpus, and offers some biographical insight into the poems and essays produced between 1917-1921. Brief attention will be paid to the affinity between Eliot’s philosophical thesis Knowledge and Experience in the Philosophy of F.H. Bradley and some of Jacques Derrida’s texts.

Dircksen, Prof MarianneNWU“Dialogue between an ancient language and the educational problems in South Africa”The teaching environment at South African universities has changed dramatically over the past ten year. Many students enter university with hardly any knowledge of grammar, they do not learn how to memorise properly and have had little training in systematically analising and solving a problem. Since they have read less than previous generations their spelling is notoriously bad, they cannot express themselves clearly and have hardly any knowledge of the history of modern civilisation. The problem in South Africa is exacerbated by the fact that many of the students who enter university come from a previously disadvantaged background and have received an education which is inferior to that of the privileged white minority. Today’s students have grown up in the age of television and computers, they want to be entertained. They do not like to sit and listen to talking heads but prefer to participate.

This paper illustrates how the discipline of learning a classical language such as Latin provides the student with precisely those skills which today’ s students lack and which they need to qualify as literate products of a university education. It also demonstrates how Latin can be made attractive and enjoyable and meet the requirements of students in the 21st century.

The paper focuses on the advantages of an inductive approach, using the Oxford Latin Course. Teaching strategies to be discussed and demonstrated include: integration, “outcomes based education”, the value of group work, online resources, the acquisition of learning skills, and the unexpected spin off of an improved self image.

Lecturers of classics in South Africa are weathering the threat to their subject by creative and innovative teaching and by being responsive to changes in the educational environment.

Douglas, LynetteUniversity of South Africa

5

“The masculine symbolic order in dialogue with ‘women’s magic’ in Ursula le Guin’s fantasy worlds”

This paper explores the way in which language and the power of naming is used to entrench the male symbolic order in Ursula Le Guin’s world of Earthsea, particularly in the novels The Farthest Shore, Tehanu, The Other Wind and Tales of Earthsea]) and how women, who have been oppressed by being denied access to the language of making, set up a dialogue emerging from their ‘magic’, the ability to bring about transformation. This ‘magic’ arises from the connection women have to the roots of the world, the Dark Powers feared by men. Through this discourse women re-establish their voice and challenge the Law of the Father through the values belittled by a patriarchal society but which ultimately give structure and meaning to life. In the Earthsea cycle Le Guin presents a world where those who control magic yield power in society, and magic is seen as the ability to use words of power, words of making, to establish societal structures. Men, male magicians, for there are no female magicians, have hidden these words from women. Only a few village witches still guard and treasure a few words which they share amongst themselves, but they have been conned into believing that they cannot truly use the words of power. However, as the dragons rise in the west, beings whose only language is the language of Making through which Segoy spoke the world into existence, women find that this language comes naturally to them. It is a language they can understand and which they too can use with power. As men and women engage in dialogue using these words of power, a new society is established and the ethical constructs which had been perpetuated by the patriarchal imperative dissolve allowing the values traditionally considered merely female to become the foundation for a new kind of discourse.

Du Plessis, Dr, Marietjie

“Die immer teenwoordige, altyd ontwykende genre – die novelle”

Springer beklemtoon in Forms of the modern novella (1975:3,4) dat die novelle ’n unieke genre is met sy eie onderskeibare kenmerke. Ook Leibowitz in Narrative purpose in the novella (1974:9) en Caporello-Szykman in The Boccaccian novella: the creation and waning of a genre (1990:1,2) wys op die eiesoortigheid van die novelle.

Ongeag die magdom literatuurbronne oor die novelle wat die literêre teorie opgelewer het, bestaan daar egter nog steeds verwarring oor die eiesoortigheid van die novelle – dikwels vanweë die lengte van die novelle.

Die opbloei van Skryfkuns as onderrigbare dissipline die afgelope jare en die vestiging daarvan as ’n universiteitsvak word gekenmerk deur Skryfkunsopleiding in verskillende genres. Opleiding in die aard van die novelle en die beoefening van hierdie genre in die skryfpraktyk toon egter leemtes.

Teen die agtergrond van bestaande literêr-teoretiese insigte oor die novelle word daar in hierdie referaat gepoog om die novelle vanuit ’n praktiese Skryfkunsoogpunt te belig. ’n Praktykgerigte skryfteoretiese novellebenadering sal aandag geniet vir toepassing in Skryfkunsopleiding.

6

Hierdie herbesoek aan die novelle is dus daarop gemik om wanopvattings oor die novelle uit die weg te ruim en om aan te dui dat die novelle ’n onderskeibare, onderrigbare prosavorm is.

Foley, Prof AndrewUniversity of the Witwatersrand“Liberalism in the new Millennium: Ian McEwan’s Saturday”

This paper presents Ian McEwan’s recent novel, Saturday (2005), as a liberal response to the peculiarly modern conditions obtaining in the first years of the new millennium. Written in the shadow of 9/11, and set on 15 February 2003, the day of international protest against the proposed invasion of Iraq, the novel explores the ways in which the liberal Western citizen can engage with the contemporary world. Structured as a day-in-the-life narrative, the novel follows neurosurgeon Dr Henry Perowne around London as he tries to come to terms with both the urgent global issues and the problems of urban living which confront him. In so doing, Saturday provides a candid and compelling account of some of the major political, social and personal dilemmas of modern life.

The paper is written from an explicit liberal perspective in order to read Saturday on its own terms of reference as a liberal political novel, where the core liberal principles of individual liberty and social justice are taken seriously and debated within the context of contemporary society. As one critic has noted, Saturday is an example of the best kind of political novel, in which “the evidence and arguments are distributed with careful ambiguity”. And thus the paper will suggest how McEwan’s novel examines such critical questions as how to balance the desire for personal liberty with the need for social security; how to maintain supranational justice while combating the threat of terrorism; and how art and culture can play a role in the development of mutual understanding and respect between people at both an interpersonal and an international level.

Gaylard, Prof GeraldUniversity of the Witwatersrand“Fossicking in the House of Love: Apartheid Masculinity in The Folly”

This paper attempts to analyse a hitherto ignored aspect of Vladislavić’s The Folly, and of Vladislavić’s writing more generally: that of sexuality and gender, masculinity in particular. I argue that Vladislavić’s novella is innovative in its linking of individual subjectivity and psycho-sexuality with the apartheid state and its machineries. In this respect, Vladislavić was prepared to enter regions of the self and psyche and to take the fictional risk of abstract surrealism that few of his contemporaries were, and, I argue, the results were revelatory in their exhumation of buried complexes. In this novel Vladislavić shows that a key mechanism that held the apartheid state together was macho homosociality which soothed the troubled conscience of the white majority via the prosthetic conscience of the leader whose vision led the homosocial pack. The exteriorisation of conscience into the architectonic vision of the highly masculine leader, a vision that involved warlike

7

masculinity and extreme male bonding, was the central psychological mechanism that accompanied Apartheid social engineering in Vladislavić’s analysis. The vision of this heroic leader was extremely structured and structural in every way, involving clear taxonomies, hierarchies and normative imperatives, because it was based upon reactionary fears. Importantly, however, Vladislavić also embodied an alternative to this Apartheid identity and its workings in the text.

Gilani-Williams, FawiziaUniversity of Worcester, England“Lifting the Veil: The emergence of British Islamic Holiday Literature for Muslim Children”

This session seeks to inform scholars and students of children’s literature about the Islamic holidays of Eid-ul-Adha and Eid-ul-Fitr. It seeks to lift the veil on a number of issues relating to children’s Islamic holiday literature making it the latest category of children’s holiday literature. This paper will:

Briefly discuss the void in public libraries and school libraries on Eid literature.

Provide a brief survey of Eid literature available in public libraries in areas with huge Muslim populations: Birmingham, England. Windsor, Canada. Dearborn, USA.

Discuss the emergence of children’s Islamic holiday fiction on Eid-ul-Adha and Eid-ul-Fitr and the attempt the to thwart cultural repression.

Offer a reading of “The Jilbab Maker’s Eid Gifts”, with illustrations, as an example of children’s Islamic holiday literature.

Discuss British cultural assimilation evident in children’s Islamic holiday literature.

Notify that Ramadan is not a ‘holiday’ but an observance. This is something that not only educators, librarians but also publishers lack awareness of.

Provide a booklist of children’s fiction and non fiction titles on Eid. Discuss cultural identity through Islamic children’s holiday literature. Discuss the changing attitude of Muslim publishers towards

illustrations in children’s literature. Discuss how Islamic holiday literature attempts to make the strange

familiar.

Greyling, Prof FranciNorth-West University“Die konkretisering van fiksionele wêrelde in kinder- en jeugliteratuur deur middel van die kreatiewe gebruik van paratekste”

Tegnologiese ontwikkeling bied nuwe moontlikhede vir skrywers – ook wat betref die kreatiewe gebruik van parateks. Parateks, ‘n term wat gebruik word vir verskeie middele wat die hoofteks aan die leser medieer, word deur Genette (1997) verdeel in die periteks (die parates binne die boek soos die omslag, titelblad en inhousopgawe)

8

en die epiteks (die parateks buite die boek soos bemarkingsmateriaal en onderhoude). As liminale middele en konvensies wat die boek aan die leser medieer, is parateks inherent heteronoom en aanvullend tot die teks (Genette, 1997). Paratekstuele elemente kan egter ook gelyktydig verskillende funksies vervul wat die teks op verskeie wyses kan beïnvloed. ‘n Titel kan byvoorbeeld aanduidend van genre sowel as inhoud wees; grafiese elemente kan beide navigerende en narratiewe funksies vervul (Genette, 1997; Drucker, 2008).

Die aard van kinder- en jeugliteratuur leen sigself tot eksperimentering met paratekstuele elemente. Dit blyk egter dat beskikbare navorsing oor die parateks in kinder- en jeugliteratuur grotendeels op die prenteboek en leesmediëring fokus (Nikolajeva & Scott, 2001; Harris, 2009) en dat daar ‘n behoefte aan verdere navorsing oor verskeie aspekte van die parateks is (Genette, 1997; Nikolajeva & Scott, 2001). Hierdie referaat fokus op die konkretisering van fiksionele wêrelde in kinder- en jeugliteratuur deur middel van die kreatiewe gebruik van paratekste. In die drie tekste onder bespreking het die betrokke skrywer/illustreerder/boekontwerper telkens ‘n bepaalde gedeelte van die parateks kreatief ontgin. Die skrywer-illustreerder Emily Gravett brei die fiksionele wêreld van haar prenteboek Meerkat Mail onder andere uit deur die kreatiewe gebruik van die periteks wat primêr as uitgewersteks beskou word (soos die buiteblad en skutblaaie). In die jeugboek Suurlemoen! (Jaco Jacobs) word grafiese elemente in die teksgedeelte inherent deel van die narratief. Die Balkieboek (Martie Preller) illustreer die gebruik van metafiksionele tegnieke in beide die peri- en epiteks om Balkie as fiksionele skrywer te vestig. Aangesien die kreatiewe spel met parateks die grense tussen die teks en die parateks laat vervaag, vereis dit waarskynlik ‘n groter mate van samewerking en onderhandeling tussen al die partye (skrywer, illustreerder, boekontwerper en uitgewer) wat betrokke is by die produksie van die boek.

Grogan, Ms. Bridget

“The Anxiety of Empire: Reading Conrad, Kipling and Malouf”

It is common knowledge that the fear of unfamiliar physical and social landscapes and the perpetual, often uncanny, sense that the colonial location is a space wherein the colonist is unhomed and threatened enter colonial and settler writing. Such writing dramatises the coloniser’ s attempt to diminish colonial anxiety via various rhetorical strategies; in particular, an informing system of binary oppositions proclaiming the coloniser as superior and the colonised as inferior. Bhabha argues that the binaries colonial discourse constructs are inherently unstable: such discourse must posit the colonised as radically other (external to Western culture) whilst simultaneously attempting to construct an incontrovertible knowledge of the colonised (located within Western understanding). Moreover, colonial discourse’s obsession with abjection, dramatised by the dismissal of the colonised as inferior, disgusting and threatening, further emphasizes the instability of colonial binaries. Kristeva argues that identity formation occurs in conjunction with abjection, whereby that which threatens the notion of a ‘clean and proper’ (in this case European) self is rejected. However, the abject, never entirely expelled, hovers perpetually at the borders of the tenuous self, constantly eliciting anxious, repetitive attempts to hold it at bay. The ambivalence and ambiguity of colonial discourse, evident in its contradictions and abjection, make

9

possible the conditions of its own critique. Its apparent fixity (particularly in relation to the racist notion of white superiority) is open to dismantling.

Colonial and white post-colonial literature, by virtue of the ambivalence of the discourse it employs, its own deliberate narrative strategies, and its frequent concern with processes of abjection, reveals the dubious confidence of colonialism. This paper focuses on colonial anxiety as expressed by Conrad’s Heart of Darkness, Kipling’s “The Strange Ride of Morrowbie Jukes” and Malouf’s Remembering Babylon, and read through the theoretical perspectives of Bhabha and Kristeva.

Haire, Dr Karen

“Sol T. Plaatje (1876-1932), creative writer, linguist and researcher and the Negotiation of a Motswana Identity”

The life of South African icon, Sol T. Plaatje, is considered in terms of our thesis, that while he wore the outer trappings of an Englishman and Westerner, he bore the inner sensibilities of a Motswana and an African. Much of the Plaatje scholarship to date has examined his writings in English and the outside influences on them, namely, Shakespeare and the Bible. By foregrounding links with subsequent generations of Setswana literature as well as the cultural imprint and poetic idiom in his Setswana translations of Shakespeare, we aim to balance the existing portrait of Plaatje, as the impeccable Englishman. As we examine Plaatje’s life as creative writer, linguist and researcher, we also highlight the present-day relevance of the tensions and contradictions that characterized his life, a century ago.

Our theoretical framework explains the relationship between bogosi and the Batswana sensibilities. The strong identification historically and culturally, in life, is carried forward in Setswana language, proverb and creative works, and resonates with our thesis that the outer trappings of Westernization that Plaatje exhibited camouflage the inner soul of a Motswana. Our close textual analysis demonstrates affinities between the lion metaphor in Mhudi and metaphors commonly found in praises for dikgosi in modern Setswana poetry; cultural allusions and language that betrays a Motswana worldview in Antony’s praise/eulogy of Marcus Brutus in Setswana as well as sound repetition and rhyme that echo the Setswana poetic and musical sensibilities. In Plaatje we find a deep cultural rootedness in the respect he has for bogosi (the chieftaincy/kingship), even if he is simultaneously critical of blind adherence to hereditary leadership.

Hashemi, MasoudIslamic Azad Universityof Toyserkan“E-mail as a tool for improving University students’ writing skill”

Nowadays, there is a growing tendency among the language learners and teachers of English as well in the use of online technology along with their traditional classes. The term “Online technology” refers to reading, writing, and communication via INTERNET. Writing via Internet to date has been proved to be useful in getting students to practice their writing assignments. Nowadays, writing instructors have their students write their projects while surfing the net, rather than old-fashioned writing styles.

10

World wide web is providing a great amount of information that, without any doubt, can be of great benefit to both teachers and students of English especially those in foreign language settings in which it is not always easy to find enough chance to learn natural use of language. Nowadays, teaching and learning foreign languages is mostly limited to traditional classes. But, www has provided the users with lots of new possibilities such as: e-fax, e-book, electronic libraries, electronic mail (e-mail) and much more.

Today millions of people are using e-mail to send and receive a huge mass of information just in seconds. Now interaction with all the people around the world is getting easier and easier and that is why today we talk about “global village’’ .Today , there are a lot of new possibilities to learn a language in more natural settings . Thus, the present article is trying to show the benefits of using one of the new learning opportunities of (e-mail) electronic mail, in an EFL writing class for both students and teacher in Ira We want to see how and why e-mail may give the students better chances to improve their writing skill and in what ways e-mail may help instructors make their students more interested in writing assignments.

Hashemi, MasoudIslamic Azad Universityof Toyserkan “The impact(s) of teaching word-formation knowledge in increasing the EFL learner’s reading comprehension skill”

Nowadays there is an increasing attention to the teaching and learning of vocabulary in order to facilitate the learners' reading comprehension ability. For many years the programs that prepared the learners for their future reading tasks offered little or no attention to the effective teaching of the relevant lexicon by the instructors and the one hand and the learning and acquiring a sufficient bank of lexicon by the learners on the other hand. The ability to learn new words easily and effectively appears to have vanished. Word-formation knowledge which is one of the most systematic ways of enhancing word power will increase the learner's ability to read difficult texts without continual reference to unabridged sources. It will also offer the pure pleasure of adding to their store of useful knowledge.

During the present research, the researcher has tried, hopefully, to investigate whether teaching word-formation knowledge would have any impact/s on increasing the computer students ' reading comprehension skill or not . So, 50 computer students in the form of two groups (each 25 students) were chosen from among many other students. Both groups (experimental and control) received a pre-test and a post-test. But the experimental group received a treatment on word-formation knowledge and the other did not.

The results obtained through various statistical methods such as T-test and matched T-test confirmed high rate of progress in experimental group and the rejection of the null hypothesis.

This study shows the effective role that word-formation knowledge played in increasing the computer students' reading comprehension ability at Islamic Azad Touyserkan branch.

Hashemi, MasoudIslamic Azad Universityof Toyserkan

11

“The Role of Gender in Language Learning Strategies of EFL Learners”

Learning style is defined as the manner in which and the conditions under which learners most efficiently and effectively perceive, process, store, and recall what they are attempting to learn. Gender is among a number of factors that has been found to influence student learning style and learning strategies.

Language learning strategies are specific actions or techniques that learners use to assist their progress in developing second or foreign language skills (Oxford, 1990). For example, Lazlo seeks out conversation partners. Strategies are the tools for active, self-directed involvement needed for developing L2 communicative ability (O'Malley & Chamot, 1990). Research has repeatedly shown that the conscious, tailored use of such strategies is related to language achievement and proficiency.

Language learning strategies are believed to play a vital role in learning a second language, as they may assist learners in mastering the forms and functions required for reception and production in the second language and thus affect achievement (Bialystok, 1979). Many researchers have suggested that the conscious use of language learning strategies makes good language learners (Naiman, Frohlich & Todesco, 1975; Oxford, 1985; Wenden, 1985). Researchers believe that strategies of successful language learners can provide a basis for aiding language learners (Rubin, 1975; Reiss, 1983). O ’Malley, Chamot, Stewner-Manzanares, Russo & Kupper (1985) asserted that the learning strategies of good language learners, once identified and successfully taught to less proficient learners could have considerable effects on facilitating the development of second language skills. Therefore, if language teachers know more about effective strategies that successful learners use, they may be able to teach these effective strategies to less proficient learners to enhance these learners’ language skills. During the present research , the researcher has tried , hopefully , to show the important role that gender factor plays among the Persian native speakers who use some strategies in the process of language learning .

Havenga, Ms. Kirstin University of Johannesburg“Casey Motsisi - the neglected son of the Drum decade”

“It is not easy to say something new; it is not enough for us to open our eyes, to pay attention, or to be aware, for new objects to suddenly light up and emerge out of the ground.” - Michel Foucault, The Archaeology of Knowledge (1972)

Many critics and authorities on the writers of the Drum decade - these include Michael Chapman, Dorothy Driver, Mike Nicol and Tim Couzens - would perhaps argue that the amount of work on this period and these writers has reached saturation. Much analysis on the works of Can Themba, Nat Nakasa, Es’kia Mphahlele, Lewis Nkosi, Bloke Modisane, Henry Nxumalo, Todd Matshikiza and Arthur Maimane is available to scholars of South African literature, but there is one writer that has been critically neglected. Karabo Moses Motsisi (known as Casey Motsisi) is the single most important reason for undertaking this paper. Casey Motsisi, though mentioned as a member of the Drum circle, remains on the periphery and has never been the object of a major study (whether article, dissertation or book). The scant attention that has

12

been paid to Motsisi’s work means that assessments of the Drum period are deficient. Based on original preliminary research on various aspects of Motsisi’s writing, this paper will aim to make a start in restoring him to his rightful place as an exciting and innovative writer in a fascinating period. In the process of demonstrating his place in the ‘canon’ of African writers, I will look at some prominent issues including aspects such as social identity, repression and cultural values presented in his writing during the Drum decade. Specifically this presentation will focus on social representation in Casey Motsisi’s lesser-known short fiction.

Hove, Mr. Muchativugwa LibertyNorth-West University, Mafikeng“Imagining the nation: autobiography and (un)homed identities”

This paper locates autobiography and memoir within the broad definition and study of identity formation and narrating the nation. The validation of autobiography and memoir is to inscribe identity and project voice, through recourse to selective memory, so that the (re)positioning of the self emerges not only as interrogating the period of becoming but also revealing the fragility and elusiveness of that identity.

In examining Peter Godwin’s memoirs – Mukiwa and When a Crocodile Eats the Sun – this study insists on the elusiveness of mediated identity relative to the privileges, authority and systems of power articulated by the nation state. In narrating a genealogical self and inscribing its position relative to social, power and political spaces, autobiography and memoir insist on transitory rather than permanent identities that cumulatively shape the narratorial identity. This narratorial and mediated identity is crucial in its very ambivalent location relative to the nation and those that wield and regulate authority in the same nation space. What emerges is a conflictual version to the grand and authorised narratives of the nation.

Mukiwa, for instance, interrogates white Rhodesia – the colonial and colonised space – its legislature and war against the black liberation movements. In this period, power and privilege reside in whiteness because of colonial appropriation. At the end of this autobiography, independence emerges to erase and sanitize the colonial disease; dissenting voices take to reconciliation and prosperity and enterprise are celebrated. In the sequel, When a Crocodile Eats the Sun, the inexorable struggle for independence has shifted power and privilege to black majority. Peter Godwin inserts himself into the political furore of land acquisition in Zimbabwe and adopts a voice and identity whose difference with those in Mukiwa is phenomenal.

This paper therefore seeks to examine the (in) consistencies of imagining self and the appropriation of identities in autobiography and memoir. It re-conceptualises the critical dimension of the selectivity of memory in scripting self and seeks to interrogate the multivalent identities that emerge. The dictum that history is scripted from the position of those in power and authority is explored to establish the dynamics of domination and subordination: the spatial, moral, social and political location of the dissident narrator relative to the constituent events of the narrative is crucial to an understanding of the veracity and historicity of autobiography.

Hove, Mr. Muchativugwa LibertyNorth-West University, Mafikeng

13

“Polyphony and polygraphy: African first-language speakers at a private schook in South Africa”

As part of its social and corporate marketing, The Telkom Foundation has funded twenty learners from previously disadvantaged schools to enrol at a private school called the International School of South Africa (ISSA). The results of the proficiency test the learners took upon enrolment indicated they were lacking in cognitive academic language proficiency (CALP) skills, especially reading and writing. The current qualitative study involved the use of a questionnaire for the participants, consultations with the learners’ parents and guardians, an examination of the ISSA entry and exit syllabuses, and my own observations to assess the participants’ language needs. This analysis was linked to the literature on mother tongue instruction and English second language acquisition. One of the findings was that the participants’ change-over from mother-tongue instruction to using English as the language of learning and teaching had been done prematurely when the learners had not yet acquired sufficient academic cognitive skills. This practice emasculated the learners’ academic potential. In the transposition o fhte learners from disadvantaged schools, the pedagogic discourses priviledged second language over mother tongue. Univocal modalities of monologue in implementing syllabus specifications thereatened processes and possibilities of dialogue with learners’ previous experiences. However, the findings also indicated that intervention that could empower the participants and accommodate transcultural experiences was possible through, for instance, the use of a relevant and efficient syllabus. In the present study, such a syllabus allows for the use of the mother tongue as a resource to access CALP skills the participants lacked. The study could be used to facilitate easy transition of learners from government to private schools, and in the process enhance the acquisition of the higher skills needed in English language pedagogy.

Kleyn, Ms. Leti & Snyman, Prof. MarithaUniversiteit van Pretoria“Haai, Jaco Jacobs, wanneer skryf jy ’n regte boek? Die kanonisering van Afrikaanse kinder- en jeugliteratuur”

Die verskyning van die eerste literatuurgeskiedenis van die Afrikaanse kinder- en jeugboek , Van Patrys-hulle tot Hanna Hoekom (2005), was op sigself reeds ’n aanduiding dat die genre kinder- en jeugliteratuur in bekende Afrikaanse literatuurgeskiedenisse soos die van Kannemeyer (1978; 1983; 1988, 1990 en die bygewerkte, opgedateerde uitgawe van 2005) en Van Coller (1998, 1999 en 2006) nie genoegsame aandag geniet het nie.

Die ontvangs van hierdie werk was egter in drie opsigte kommerwekkend. Eerstens het dié omvangryke publikasie (hulpmiddel wat volgens die persverklaring geskik is vir “vakspesialis soos biblioteekkundiges, navorsers op die terrein van kinder- en jeugliteratuur en voor- en nagraadse studente aan tersiêre inrigtings, maar ook vir die algemene leser soos ouers, onderwysers en ander belangstellendes”) bykans geen aandag in boekeblaaie geniet nie. Slegs één resensie het in die breë media verskyn, die van Hennie van Coller in Volksblad (November 2005). Die tweede kommerwekkende aspek is dat die ontvangs ’n (her)bevestiging van heersende persepsies onder akademici, literêre navorsers en geskiedskrywers was; en in die

14

derde plek die voortgesette verwydering toon tussen “literêre rolspelers” en die breë publiek (die teikengroep).

In hierdie referaat sal daar aandag gegee word aan kanoniseringspraktyke in die Afrikaanse literatuur met spesifieke verwysing na die (beperkte) plek van die kinder- en jeugboek in literatuurgeskiedenisse. Ander relevante kwessies wat aandag sal geniet, is die bekroning van kinder- en jeugliteratuur, probleme in die boekbedryf met betrekking tot volhoubare ontwikkeling en publikasie van Afrikaanse titels sowel as die nagevolge van ’n apatiese houding jeens ’n genre wat nie “genoegsame status” het om as deel van die groter Afrikaanse literêre kanon oorweeg te word nie. Die bekendmaking van enkele verkoopsyfers, uitgewerspraktyke en ontvangs van hierdie genre(s) beloof om toehoorders regop te laat sit …

Kruger, Ms. HaideeNorth-West University“Narratology meets translation studies (again): Developing a cognitive- contextualist narratological approach for the analysis of translated South African children’s books”

While some scholarly work (see Bosseaux, 2007; Hermans, 1996; Kruger, 2001; Levenston & Sonnenschein, 1986; May, 1994; O ’Sullivan, 2006; Van Leuven-Zwart, 1989, 1990) has been done on the interface between narratology and translation studies, much of this work has proceeded from a structuralist paradigm which discounts both context and reader. This paper proposes to develop an alternative translation studies / narratology interface that may account for both these elements, in addition to the textual elements. The more specific aim of this is to provide a set of narratological tools useful for the textual analysis of translated children’s books, and which may also be usefully extended outwards to investigations of how contextual forces and readers’ responses shape and are shaped by the textual elements of translated narrative.

With this aim in mind, the approach developed draws on structuralist narratology, as the narratological nucleus, but gives preference to contemporary postclassical narratologies, such as contextualist narratology and cognitive narratology. It extends Bortolussi and Dixon’s ( 2003) argument for a clear distinction between textual features and reader constructions into the domain of translation. In this, the focus is particularly on narration, and on the process of reader identification, as well as the fact that much existing research in the borderspace between narratology and translation studies is focused on narration. The arguments draws on an analysis of two translated South African picture books: Waar’s Jamela? (Daly, 2005) and Lekker verjaar, Jamela! (Daly, 2007).

Labuschagne, Ms. DaleneUniversity of Johannesburg“Deconstructing utopia in science fiction: irony and the resituation of the subject in Iain M. Banks’s The Player of Games”

A common perception of SF is that it consists of unproductive texts that fail to offer incisive comment on the social conditions of existence. Such a perception is largely a

15

result of the singular function of utopia in SF. SF is habitually associated with the utopian, which presents a causal structure of either/or logic in which predetermined definitions of the subject matter restrict the position of the individual subject. Whether it envisages the creation of an ideal or forewarns of the apocalyptic, the utopian is teleological; therefore the subject (both the individual and the subject matter) has no choice but to be what has already been decided for it to be. However, I wish to argue that through SF’s ironic deployment of utopia’s fixation with ends, the subject (matter) is liberated. Irony offers a both/and kind of logic that transgresses the bounds of predetermined definitions, allowing room for the suspension of choice so that the genre may continually interrogate the possibilities of its own existence. The process of interrogation describes a deconstructive trajectory in which the text evades termination, a procedure that amounts to an infinite series of self-deconstructive moves, resulting in the recurrent resituation of the subject matter in discourse. Implicit here is the continual renegotiation of the traditional view of SF, a reconsideration that discerns a difference between utopia and SF. This article considers the notion that there are, indeed, certain SF texts that consciously perform this difference, of which Iain M. Banks’s The Player of Games is an example. References to this text will demonstrate that, in a coincident gesture, irony both preserves the utopian fixation with ends and abolishes it, presenting an affirmative moment that allows the genre to survive through contestation.

Layton, Ms. DeliaUniversity of Johannesburg, South Africa“‘Talk deep to write deeper’: an exploration of the value of talk in developing Cognitive Academic Language Proficiency (CALP)”

First year university students, for whom English is an additional language, face the dual challenge of having to master English to the required level and to learn how to function in a new (academic) discourse community. The extent to which students gradually adapt to a new identity in learning the language of the academy or ‘academic literacy’, is reflected firstly in the ways in which they engage in lively debate (dialogue) in the classroom and thereafter in their writing.

This paper presents the findings of a research project conducted in 2007 on a group of first year university students at the University of Johannesburg, for whom English was not a first language. The research findings showed that the process of ‘deep’ talk enabled students cognitively to challenge and engage with each other’s ideas as a means towards developing their own arguments. In doing so, they began to ‘mimic’ academic discourse, moving from what Cummins (1996) has termed ‘basic interpersonal communication skills’ (BICS) in the direction of ‘cognitive academic language proficiency’ (CALP). The research also found that giving background reading material prior to holding a group discussion helped inform and deepen the talk, which in turn helped students develop stronger positions and acknowledge opposing viewpoints, thus strengthening the arguments in their academic essays.

The research suggests that first year students in South African universities, the majority of whom come from a socio-cultural background wherein the oral tradition is strongly emphasized, can enhance the development of their academic literacy by frequent and regular opportunities to engage in interactive group discussion.

16

Lindfors, Prof. BernthUniversity of Texas“Audience Responses to a BBC Broadcast of Wole Soyinka's THE LION AND THE JEWEL”

The paper will examine audience responses to a BBC radio broadcast of Wole Soyinka's THE LION AND THE JEWEL in May 1966. At this time Soyinka was rapidly gaining a reputation in Britain as a major African playwright, and though THE LION AND THE JEWEL is among his most accessible plays, some British listeners had difficulty following the action and understanding cultural nuances in the drama. However, most listeners responded favorably to the production, enjoying the humour in the situations depicted.

Lindfors, Prof. JudithUniversity of Texas“Children’s Oral and Written Language Acquisition: Dialogue or Disconnect?”

Dialogue in this paper is the interaction of two language systems -- oral language and written language -- as 5- and 6-year olds living at a domestic violence shelter begin to read and write.  These children's early literacy engagements, recorded in the author's journal over a 5-year period, show that the children brought into active and continuing dialogue the oral language system they already had and the written language system they were learning.  Three features of the children's oral/written language dialogue were especially noteworthy:  (1) authenticity (communication purpose), (2) meaning-orientation, (3), individuality.  The author contrasts this dialogic early literacy with educational approaches which serve to disconnect the child's oral and written language acquisition.

Mabeqa, ThokozileUniversity of the Western Cape“Translation of proper names in children’s literature from English into isiXhosa”

This study aims to investigate proper names of characters in children’s literature translated texts from English into isiXhosa. It has been realized that some translators opt to retain English proper names of characters in their translated texts. This seems to be confusing to the target readers since they cannot connect the names with their culture, and also of the fact that it becomes difficult for them to remember and to pronounce the words since they are in a foreign language to them.

The functionalist or skopos theory proposed by Vermeer suggests that in order to have a translation that addresses the needs of the target readers one has to realize the culture and the living conditions of the target readers. It also suggests that a translation should perform a particular function to the target readers and have an aim as well. This suggests that if the issue of proper nouns in translated children’s literature is not taken cognizance of, the translation could not perform its function to the target readers.

17

It is important as well to take cognizance of the cognitive level of children as far as written texts are concerned. Cultural and social issues have an impact on the cognitive level of children, and that should be the stepping stone of any translator of children's literature.

Makalela, Dr. LeketiUniversity of Limpopo“Black South African English in Limpopo: A study of institutionalized inter-ethnic features”

The past fifteen years of research on Black South African English (BSAE) have seen a proliferation of studies documenting BSAE as an emerging outer circle variety with distinctive features. As a result, arguments for internal codification and influence toward existing standards were also advanced. However, it is noteworthy that there are no studies as yet, which systematically compared BSAE features across ethnic groups that speak various indigenous African languages. The aim of this study was to draw a profile of inter-ethnic features of BSAE among speakers of Sepedi, Tshivenda, and Xitsonga of a three years period, using oral and written speech protocols. Analysis of frequencies (Chi-square) and correlation measures (co-efficients) show common salient features which were observed with high frequency modes across an ethnic spectrum of the participants involved in the study. Given this finding, arguments for BSAE as a stabilizing variety with (i) geographical strength, (ii) inter-African language base, and (iii) institutionalization trends are discussed within the World Englishes paradigm. In the end, suggestions for further research and classroom implications for English language teaching are made for adaptation in comparable situations.

Makalela, Dr. LeketiUniversity of Limpopo“Narrative interpretation of HIV/AIDS messages: A study of multimodal communication in rural Limpopo”

The increasing spread of HIV/AIDS pandemic in rural areas of South Africa despite a plethora of messages directed at the youth has come to cast doubt on the efficacy and relevance of these messages in these remote areas. Empirically, there is a dearth of research on alternative multimodal communication strategies, inspired by local and culturally germane modes of information transmission to inform material design and expand comprehension opportunities. The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of manipulated narratives into available HIV/AIDS content aimed at low literate and rural target population in Limpopo. Experiments with six modal conditions, each combined with the manipulated narrative text were conducted among grade 10 learners. Both One-Way ANOVA and correlations analyzes of the learner responses show differential treatment of the message content protocols among the participants, according to different dimensions of the narrative text in the six conditions. Using cognitive load model, I argue for the need to pay closer attention to the rhetoric styles used by local communities and a bottom-up approach to advertising materials for these communities. Although the results are inconclusive, larger

18

implications for health communication for rural and comparable low literate communities are discussed for consideration in other relevant contexts such as life orientation classes.

Makapan, Mr. MakenaNorth-West Provincial Legislature“Setlhogo: Maikarabelo a Tlhabololo le tlhabololo le tiriso ya puo ya diatla e e neng e ikgatholositswe, e bile e kgaphetswe kgakala ke bokoloniale tota le puso ya jaanong ya demokerasi ”

PUO ke mokgwa wa tlhaeletsano magareng ga babuisani ba babedi, ba bararo go ya kwa godimo le tlhaeletsano magareng ga ditlhopha tsa batho. Tlhaeletsano ga e felele magareng ga batho ka nosi. Motho o kgona go tlhaeletsana le diphologolo, dinonyane le ditshedi tsotlhe tse di farologaneng.

Ka jalo, rona gompieno fa, jaaka re kopane jaana re tsile go buisana le go thusana ka dikakanyo mabapi le tlhabololo ya dipuo tse di farologaneng tsa semmuso. Nna ke batla go leba seabe sa Puso mo tlhabololong le tshomarelo ya Puo ya Diatla ya Aforika Borwa [South African Sign Language].

Ka ntata ya pitso kgotsa kokano e e rulagantsweng e, ke tsile go leba mokgwa wa tlhaeletsano o o sa tlwaelegang. Mokgwa o ke batlang re o leba ke: “POIFO YA SE SE SA ITSIWENG” Ka ntata ya gore ke tsile go tsepamisa puo ya me mo go poifo ya se se sa itsiweng, kgotsa poifo ya se se sa tlwaelegang nna ke tsile go bua ka ga sone se nna ke sa se itseng, e bile ga ke dumele fa ke tla tsoga ke itse se ke batlang gore nna le wena, rona rotlhe re bue ka ga sone.

Ka fa tlase ga setlhogo se sa Dithekenosekeipi ke tsile go leba mokgwa wa tlhaeletsano o bontsi jwa rona re sa o tlwaelang, e bile bangwe ba rona re tshaba go dirisa mokgwa o wa tlhaeletsano ka ntata ya gore re sa o itse. Bangwe ba rona, ebile re tshaba le go ithuta one. A yone e ka se dirwe nngwe ya Dipuo tsa Semmuso tsa Aforika Borwao?

Malatji, Ms. ShirleyCentral University of Technology, Free State“ Digital folklore storytelling in human resource management? An m-learning breakthrough”

After different deliberations at seminars concerning teaching and learning, some lecturers still cannot strike the right cord in making teaching and learning to be mobile. Mobile learning, referred to as “M-Learning” in this work, is able to pick up a folklore story from Humanity’s faculty, break it into a sizeable method of teaching with the aim of accelerating understanding of Human Resources Management as a learning content, in an unforgettable way. One essential feature of folklore stories is that animals are personified as HR managers who occupy offices of authority. In framing this presentation, a folklore story has been chosen and DVDeed to illustrate the m-learning breakthrough, believing that competent teaching is about going extra mile digitally.

19

Mamet, Ms. ClaudiaUniversity of KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa“Translating Afrikaner disillusionment with the Boer War: An analysis of dialogic expression in Elsa Silke’s English translation of Ingrid Winterbach’s Niggie”

The central concern of this paper is to uncover how Afrikaner disillusionment with the Anglo-Boer War is transferred into the English translation of Winterbach’s Niggie. Tha author focuses on the translation strategies Silke utilizes to translate this uniquely Afrikaans experience into the English version, To Hell with Cronje. Disillusionment with the war is depicted in numerous ways in the novel but I am interested specifically in the way in which disillusionment is expressed through dialogue. This is particularly because of the intensity of anger and disappointment that is captured in the characters’ conversations about the war. Selected dialogue between the characters, referring directly or indirectly to their disillusionment with the war, will be analysed to determine which translation strategies have been chosen. Through such an analysis, the way in which Silke depicts Afrikaner disillusionment with the Anglo-Boer War in To Hell with Cronje can be established.

Since the 1990s translation strategies have increasingly shifted away from source orientation towards target orientation. In an attempt to appeal to a wide English-speaking South African readership, this paper will begin with the assumption that Silke’s To Hell with Cronjé tends towards a target-oriented translation. It must be noted that from the 1990s in South Africa there was a growing interest amongst Afrikaans writers to portray the futility of the Anglo-Boer War in their fiction. The desire of Afrikaans authors to have such Afrikaans literary works translated into English has also risen sharply primarily due to market demands. At this time when Afrikaans novels with a similar theme of Afrikaner disillusionment during the Anglo-Boer War are being translated into English, hopefully my research can contribute to the debate around contemporary translation trends of these literary works and stimulate further studies of cultural translation of Afrikaner war experience in South Africa and even abroad.

Manase, Dr. IrikidzayiUniversity of Venda“Imagining post-2000 Zimbabwean perceptions of land and notions on identities in Catherine Buckle’s African Tears: The Zimbabwe Land invasions and Beyond Tears: Zimbabwe’s Tragedy”

The paper considers representations of contestations over societal perceptions of land and identities between some farmers and the nationalist elite in post-2000 Zimbabwe as represented in Catherine Buckle’s African Tears: The Zimbabwe Land Invasions (2000) and Beyond Tears: Zimbabwe’s Tragedy (2002). It examines the experiences that Buckle, a white commercial farmer near Marondera, faced during the early phase of the land invasions in relation to the nationalist dialogue on land and identities dominating the represented government’s post-2000 anti-imperialism project and politics of land invasions and occupations. Traditional postcolonial perspectives on imagined and national identities postulated by Anderson (1983) and Gellner (1983), and discussions on the centrality of land in the formation of personal and social

20

belonging and other identities, as postulated by Alexander, McGregor and Ranger (2000), Ranger (2005) and Alexander (2007) are considered in relation to the specific historical and social conditions influencing the competing perceptions of land and the re-imagining of contemporary identities in post-colonial Zimbabwe. Therefore, the nature of Buckle’s representations of her experiences under siege on her farm and its impact on perceptions of the space of the farm and social and national identities, are examined in relation to the state’s post-2000 dialogue seeking to fossilise a singular political history, national memory of land and hegemonic determinations of who belongs and does not belong in contemporary postcolonial Zimbabwe.

Mba, Mrs. Nonyelum ChubuzoUniversity of Abuja“Generations and Gender Discourse in Nigerian Drama: An x-ray of Culture in Selected Works”

Nigeria is a federation with a conglomeration of cultures which evidently subjugates the woman to a second fiddle. Its traditional norms and parental interference in the lives of youth form the basis of generation conflict in homes and society at large. The developmental trend in the global world demands reform in certain obnoxious traditions that affect the lives of women and youth in Nigerian society. There is interplay of generation incompatibility and social prejudices which generate a lot of argument. Feud, whether inter-communal or family based, is global based and manifest into social strata, cultural prohibitions, and developmental deterioration. Value standard is stigmatized with societal identity and tagged to culture which is a projection of people’s way of life. The summation of the interactive discourse of the above topic is the effective manipulation of language by the authors in question in their x-ray of culture and its implication for globalization. Selected works of J.P. Clark, Tess Onwueme, James Ene Henshaw, Femi Osofisan, and Zulu Sofola were explored in this paper.

McCabe, Dr Rose-marie

“Introducing an intercultural dialogue in mainly rural ESL and EAP classrooms by means of language learning materials”

This paper argues for the application of an integrated approach to the design and development of English second language teaching materials with regard to the cultural content of the reading passages and general language activities. The need for a supportive area or bridge between the home environment and the academic environment was indicated in a study involving mainly rural first-entering rural university students at the University of Limpopo. Pertinent to this study is Sapir’s statement that “no two languages are ever sufficiently similar to be considered as representing the same social reality” (Sapir 1949: 162) and so people speaking different native languages pay attention to different aspects of reality (Kumaravadivelu 2008: 18). Hence, the reality described in the language textbook and its activities may be so distant from the reality of the language learner that it hinders language learning instead of promoting it. Hence this paper investigates the idea of a

21

so-called ‘third space’ into which the concept interculturality and dialogue about interculturality is slotted. The paper also examines the role of English as an international language because it also influences decisions on what and how to teach English as a second or foreign language and particularly in a tertiary environment where disadvantaged rural students require English for Academic Purposes.

McKenzie, Mr. John

“The Real in the Reel: Negotiating the dialogue between the referent and the represented”

This paper explores the different types of discourse evident in a range of film documentaries based on the Galapagos Islands, especially drawing attention to the educational value of films like SharkWater that, both in form and content, empower learners to believe that the individual is not simply subject to discourse but also is invited to be an active constructor of knowledge and action. This paper supports the arguments of Tallis who both defends realism as a genre (1998) and who also identifies radical post-structuralists as the "enemies of hope" (1999). As the loss of hope is a critical factor in youth suicide, it is arguable by analogy, that a collective loss of hope produces a dangerous dystopia.

There is an urgent necessity to recuperate the referent from the radical post-structuralist position which, in asserting that there is nothing outside language and the notion that the signified is forever deferred, potentially undermines, in an educational context, learners' belief in the efficacy of literature and film to represent the real and their capacity to exercise agency in the world as part of their responses to text. Whilst critical literacy necessitates the problematising of the representation of the referent, there is also the need for learners to have some faith in the truth value of environmental discourse and its relationship to nature itself, and in the context of global challenges to the environment, to believe that they can make a difference.

Consequently, this paper challenges documentary makers to consider the ethical implications of the act of documentary film-making and further invites educators to select resources and teaching strategies that enable hope. Eco-criticism above all must signify for learners the hope of being involved in the recuperation of nature itself as part of their response to its representation.

Meyer, Ms. SusanNoordwes-Universiteit“Heterotopiese ruimtes van krisis en die natuur se genesende invloed in Chinchilla (Nanette van Rooyen)”

Michel Foucault’s concept crises heterotopia is used to interpret and describe the main character’s unique experience of particular places in Chinchilla (2007). The study focuses on the manner in which nature becomes part of the experience of crises heterotopias, and how the natural environment creates a space conducive to the overcoming of trauma within the novel. Images and experiences of nature offer the main character a bridge to a verbal expression of traumatic events of the past that otherwise could not initially be expressed; contact with and influences from nature

22

contribute to a new spiritual calm, energy, and perspective. Care of nature’s creatures leads to the recognition of aspects of the main character’s own situation, and provides the associative stimuli for reliving the suppressed traumatic events, thereby helping to lift the silence, which aids the healing of the novel’s traumatised character.

Mohamadi, Hiwa & Nilipour, Dr Reza Kermanshah University of Medical Sciences and Health Services, Shahid Beheshti Blvd, Kermanshah, Iran & Institute for Research in Fundamental Sciences, Teheran, Iran“The influence of language dominance on stuttering severity in Kurdish-Persian bilingual students who stutter”

Objective: The manifestation of stuttering in bilinguals is interesting and important from clinical and theoretical point of views. There are controversial reports about factors that affected severity and type of dysfluencies in native and second languages of bilingual stutterer. This study is examined the effect of language proficiency on stuttering severity in Kurdish-Persian bilingual stutterer.

Methods: In this descriptive-analytic study, 31 Kurdish-Persian bilingual students who stutter, ages 10-12 years were selected. We assessed two 10-min of spontaneous speech in Kurdish and Persian by Stuttering like Dysfluencies Scale to diagnose the stutterer students. These two samples were analyzed also for language complexity and lexical diversity indexes to obtain the language proficiency.

Results: All participants acquired Kurdish as native language at home and learned Persian as second language at school. They began to learn Persian from 5. The language complexity in Persian was higher than Kurdish significantly. Lexical diversity in Persian was higher than Kurdish but there difference not significant. The severity of stuttering in Kurdish was lower than Persian.

Conclusion: According to this study Kurdish was native language of participants but Persian was dominant because the language proficiency in Persian was higher than Kurdish. This condition may be due to educational system in Iran that only use Persian in school and media and omit any other language such as Kurdish. The severity of stuttering in dominant language is Higher than Kurdish as non-dominant language. The social-psychological factors such as negative experiences by Persian as educational language may be play an important role. The emotional and motivational factors such as positive emotional relationship to native language are the other explains to this condition.

Mojalefa, Prof. MJUniversity of Pretoria“Depiction of Johannes Mokgwadi’s divinatory poems”

Although praise poetry by black South Africans has received some critical attention, there are still some researchers (discussed below), who find it difficult to understand the structure of this poetic form. Opland (1983:159), for example, assumes that every poem has to have a structure similar to that of poetry written in one of the languages of the West, such as English, and finds the absence of such structure in praise poetry worrying. The same criticism raised by Opland, writing on isiXhosa oral, is also voiced by some critics (e.g. Rycroft, 1960) with regard to modern Sepedi poetry,

23

saying that it is no longer oral, but rather written, and so should have more in common with Western poetry. However, Groenewald (1993:12-31) states the opposite view, namely, that traditional oral and modern written Sepedi poetry are similar in many respects to each other and to Western modes (especially where the Western mode in question is that of oral Anglo-Saxon poetry), differing only in content, as this paper attempts to show.

Comparable to Anglo-Saxon alliterative verse, African oral poetry is largely not based on meter, where meter is defined in terms of the recurrence of stressed and unstressed syllables. African languages, in general, and poetry in the African languages, in particular, are not characterized by stress, but rather by such aspects as tone, length, patterns of repetition, and unusual grammar (Shipley, 1972:102).

This paper explores the depiction of Johannes Mokgwadi’s divinatory poems with special reference to the structure, role and tools of performance of divinatory poetry. In this exploration the art of divination as practiced by the Bapedi is briefly examined by referring to the divinatory apparatus (i.e. the set of ditaola ‘divinatory bones’, the principal ones being knuckle bones, plus a few totemic bones) and to the process of divination in order to depict the position of a traditional healer as an intermediary figure between the gods and his people. Cultural verse forms in ‘the poetry of divinatory bones’ will be outlined through a discussion of (a) metrical compositions, (b) long-measure verse, (c) long-measure 'echo' verse, (d) divinatory poems with linked hemistichs, (e) divinatory poems with repeated segments, (f) long-measure triplet verse, and (g) verses of four, five or more hemistichs. Form designs in poetry of the divinatory bones are bound up with what they were intended for, as well as the manner in which they were recited. Divinatory poems are intended for listening and not reading, for communication with ancestors and not for performance before an audience in public gatherings.

Mostert, Dr. AnnamarieSacred Heart College Research and Development UnitPoster Presentation “Informal and formal language learning and teaching in multilingual contexts: an exploration of worlds in dialogue”

The first poster presents Cummins’ (1982) metaphor of an iceberg to illustrate the continuum between the development of learners’ basic interpersonal communication skills (BICS) and their cognitive academic language proficiency (CALP). The continuum is organized around 4 quadrants overlaid onto the iceberg image. The vertical axis represents the cognitive demands of language that ranges from non-academic to academic tasks. The horizontal axis highlights the role of context in learners’ language development. It represents the range from context-embedded to context reduced content. This framework initiates dialogues between language learning and teaching content and context as a technoscape of language teaching.

A copy of the English as LoLT Course demonstrates a practical application of this technoscape in four primary schools in Phuthaditshjaba in the Thabo Mofutsanyana District of the Free State. A baseline study conducted in 2002 informed the development of the course. The course was implemented for 18 months and evaluated at the end of 2004. The original English as LoLT Course material will be displayed on a table below the poster.

24

The framework further highlights the importance of context to support learners’ language development . Three posters that follow briefly present three diverse, multilingual language learning and teaching contexts in three Free State education districts: Phuthaditsjhaba (Thabo Mofutsanyana District); Jacobsdal (Xhariep District) and Virginia (Lejweleputswa District). Each context offers unique opportunities for dialogues between cultures and identities (ideoscapes); places (landscapes); different languages, art forms and technologies (mediascapes) and economic conditions for language learning (financescapes). These dialogues are briefly described.

Relevant course material that reflects the application of these worlds in dialogue to diverse multilingual contexts since 2007 to date will also be on display.

Munro, Prof. Allan JohnTshwane University of Technology“Teaching Playwriting in a Research Environment: Dialogues in Practice-based Research”

The writing of plays is supposed to be a creative process that comes about through creative writing practice, and its outcome is an artistic artefact. Research is supposed to be an analytical/reflective process that comes about through accepted (or emergent) research practice, and its outcome is a publication. Practice-based research (also known as “practice as research,” or “studio-based” research) is supposed to argue that the discoveries made “in” practice can only be made “through” practice, but what is its outcome?

Methodologically, the connection between the two processes lies in “exegesis” or “ discourse analysis,” I believe. But the problem/dialogue lies in the tensions/discussions between the exegesis of character, plot, theme, and the like (as shaped and formed by the demands of the theatrical medium) and the exegesis of the creative output (process and practice) as shaped and formed by the demands of the “research medium.” Experience shows, however, that in the “practice as research” domain one ends up “writing plays” in such a way that the process and product are conducive to be effectively analysed exegetically or through other appropriate research methods – a potentially skewed creative process in terms of the play, because one is writing for “two audience types.” Although the two processes (of creative writing and research writing) are in dialogue, the demands of university outcomes have the potential to unbalance the process. Indeed, there is a strong element of conflict in this dialogue.

This paper will attempt to traverse the terrain of this conflict, drawing on Sawyer’s sociocultural understanding of the creative process, with specific attention paid to the dialogue between evaluation and elaboration. It will then engage with some useful exegetical discourse practices that are shared in the conflict moment and suggest ways where both creativity and research in practice can “talk.”

Nel, Prof. AdeleNWU“Marlene van Niekerk in gesprek met Marlene Dumas: ‘n metatekstuele lesing van Memorandum: ‘n verhaal met skilderye”

25

Words and images drink the same wine. There is no purity to protect. Marlene DumasDie doel van hierdie referaat is om ‘n metatekstuele dialoog tussen Marlene van Niekerk, in haar roman Memorandum: ‘n verhaal met skilderye (2005), en die beeldende kunstenaar Marlene Dumas se oeuvre te identifiseer. Memorandum word gekenmerk deur multitekstualiteit, sodat die leser noodwendig betrek word in ‘n “spel van verwysing en dekonstruksie van verwysing, van herkenning en vervreemding” (Van Niekerk, 2006). Hoewel Dumas nêrens eksplisiet in die literêre teks genoem word nie, kan sy op grond van Umberto Eco se sogenaamde intertekstuele kennis, dit wil sê die leser of kyker se vermoë om indirekte verwysings na ander tekste te herken, by ÿ kreatiewe verkenning van Memorandum betrek word. Sodoende word gefokus op die gesprek en gevolglike kruisbestuiwing tussen literêre en visuele tekste. Dit is veral die katalogusopstel vir ÿ retrospektiewe uitstalling in New York (2005), onder die titel: “Marlene Dumas – Selected works”, wat as belangrike metateks betrek word. Die katalogus het as inleiding ÿ uitvoerige essay deur Marlene van Niekerk getiteld, “Seven M-blems for Marlene Dumas”, waarin sy die essensie van Dumas se werk op pittige en oorspronklike wyse bespreek. My gevolgtrekking na aanleiding van hierdie essay is dat die embleme wat Van Niekerk aan Dumas toeken, ook op Van Niekerk en Memorandum van toepassing gemaak kan word. Indien hierdie embleme ontgin word, kan dit die belangrikste aspekte van die roman verreken, en terselfdertyd die lees van Memorandum verander en verryk. Dit is voorts Van Niekerk se interpretatiewe uitsprake oor Dumas se oeuvre wat veral lig werp op nie alleen Dumas se oeuvre nie, maar ook op Van Niekerk se eie skryfwerk indien dit met mekaar in verband gebring word. Die veelkantigheid van Van Niekerk se skryfproses en moontlike denkprosesse word gevolglik ook betrek.

Nel, Dr CarismaNWU“A Dialogue on Adolescent Literacy in the Content Areas”

Across the country, there is a perception that our adolescents are not learning the knowledge and skills needed to effectively function in today’s global economy. This perception is fueled by international and national assessments: A number of assessment studies in recent years have shown that the educational achievement of learners in South African schools is unacceptably poor. The Department of Education’s systemic evaluations, conducted in Grade 6 (in 2004) show very low levels of literacy and numeracy among learners. Learners averaged 38% for language (LOLT), 27% for mathematics and 41% for natural sciences (DoE, 2005). A significantly higher percentage of learners across all three learning areas are functioning at the “Not Achieved” level (63% in Language, 81% in Mathematics and 54% in Natural Sciences), with a relatively small percentage of learners – 28% in Language (LOLT), 12% in Mathematics and 31% in Natural Sciences - functioning at or above the required Grade 6 level (that is “Achieved” and “Outstanding” combined). In addition, the past three years have shown no improvement in the pass rate in the senior certificate examinations for secondary school leavers. Four international studies confirm the poor performance of South African learners. These are the Monitoring Learning Achievement (MLA) project, the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMMS), the Southern Africa Consortium for Monitoring Educational Quality (SACMEQ) study and the Progress in International Reading Literacy Study (PIRLS).

26

Literacy development is a complex, multi-layered, and ongoing process that does not end in the foundation phase. Today’s literacy demands are expanding exponentially. Adolescents are expected to process and critically evaluate incredibly large amounts of information in print and multi-media formats. Part of what makes it so difficult to meet the needs of learners in the intermediate, senior and FET phases is that these learners experience a wide range of challenges that require an equally wide range of interventions. Some learners still have difficulty simply reading words accurately, while others can read words accurately, but they do not comprehend what they read, for a variety of reasons. In addition, the problems faced by these learners are exacerbated when the language of learning and teaching is not their mother tongue. It is clear that the demands of competent adolescent reading literacy instruction, and the training experiences necessary to learn it, have been seriously underestimated by schools and universities, especially Faculties of Education.

The purpose of the presentation is to focus on the following questions: Is adolescent literacy important? How is adolescent literacy growth different than growth in the

Foundation Phase? What are the most important instructional challenges? What instructional improvements need to occur in the Intermediate,

Senior and FET Phases?

Nesari, Ali Jamali & Hashemi MasoudIslamic Azad University of Toyserkan“The Question of Center in Luigi Pirandello's Six Characters in search of an Author”

The objective of this study is a deconstructive reading of Luigi Pirandello 's Six Characters in Search of an Author. The pivotal maxim of deconstruction is the paradoxical nature of language and the unwanted contradictory statements. According to deconstructionists, such contradictory statements are produced in all situations that use language as the medium of communication. Any deconstructive reading will focus on dissenting voices, contradictions, oppositions, and paradoxes. This study also concentrates on the paradoxes embedded in the Six Characters in terms of first, discovering the binary oppositions on which the text tries to build itself, second, challenging and questioning the reliability of such oppositions, third, trying to turn them upside down and, finally, holding them in suspense to reach to an impossible path or an 'aporia' where it is impossible to decide. So, the text remains finally unreadable and undecidable, any reading being necessarily a misreading. Since deconstruction is not a method or strategy outside the text to be imposed on it but a way to trace the labyrinth of the text to reveal how it has already dismantled and deconstructed itself, this study is no parasitic means of reading the text brought upon it from outside. Rather, it is a careful trial to follow the twists of the Six Characters and to show how it asserts contradictory opinions concerning identity, the concept of author, text, actor, etc. to prove finally that the text affirms paradoxical assertion and therefore, it affirms nothing. It tries to prove that the Six Characters as an extended stretch of language is "full of sound and fury, signifying nothing."

Ngwenya, Prof ThembaNWU

27

“The Mafikeng campus learners’ perceptions of the North-West University language policy in meeting their learning needs”

One of the hallmarks for which the old South Africa was notorious was its continual violation of the majority of its citizenry’s language rights. To effect redress, the current South African constitution has accorded the eleven major languages of South Africa official status. There is, however, some discontent about this redress in language policy at the micro-level such as at the Mafikeng campus of the North-West University (NWU). A historically black homeland institution, the Mafikeng campus has been merged with a historically white Afrikaner campus, formerly called Potchefstroom University for Christian Higher Education. The merger has, with regard to language policy, resulted in learners' perception at the Mafikeng campus that the institution still operates within the Apartheid framework where English and Afrikaans enjoyed hegemony and South African indigenous languages suffered marginalisation. In a descriptive study based on Spolsky's (2006), Van Schoor's (2003) and Venter's (1998) models or organisational transformation, this paper used a pen-and-paper questionnaire comprising closed questions (for focusing attention on the areas being examined) and open-ended ones (for eliciting information that may not have been covered by the other question-type), and observations (for cross-checking the information gathered through the questionnaire) to investigate the perceptions of 705 undergraduate and post-graduate students at the Mafikeng campus regarding the degree to which the NWU language policy met their learning needs at their campus. The findings suggest that while a few positive changes have resulted from the implementation of the NWU language policy, for the majority of students, the question of mother tongue instruction and the notion of institutional autonomy at the NWU need urgent interrogation. The study could be used to inform policy makers on harmonising macro-level language policy imperatives with micro-level pressing needs.

Nkamta, Mr. Paul NepaplehNorth-West University, Mafikeng“Linguistic hegemony and advertising in Cameroon: the case of Douala”

Despite the vast research conducted on linguistic hegemony in Cameroon, very little has been done in the domain of advertising. Much of the research has tended to focus on linguistic hegemony in administration and education. In addition to the approximately 280 indigenous languages, Cameroon has two official languages, namely, English and French, which are currently the only languages used for advertising. The 1996 constitution of the Republic of Cameroon proclaims English and French as the two official languages and, as far as indigenous languages are concerned, the constitution only states that they will be “promoted” and “protected”. But, in effect, indigenous languages are marginalized. One of the areas in which this marginalization is evident is advertising. Consequently, there is some discontent among many of the people who speak the indigenous languages. Many argue that while the exclusive use of English and French in advertising accords these languages unfair advantage, the leaving out of their tongues denies them access to information and participation in the economic development of the country.

28

This study was mainly qualitative and examined the current state of affairs regarding advertising in Douala-Cameroon. For data collection, a question, interviews, and observations were used. The focus areas were billboards, posters and fliers, wraps of commercial products, magazines and newspapers. The findings suggest that to improve relations between the speakers of the indigenous languages in Douala, especially those who speak neither English nor French, and the speakers of the official languages, advertising should include the use of the major indigenous languages, and perhaps Cameroon Pidgin English too, a lingua franca widely spoken in the country.

Ntwana, Ms. ThenjiswaUniversity of the Western Cape“How Okrutna becomes Akhona: The Translation of Proper Names in Children’s literature”

This paper discusses the translation of names in children’s fantasy literature and highlights the importance of names in translating this particular text type. First, it defines what it is meant by “names” and attempts to present some of the most important types of “meanings” usually conveyed by names. Then, it discusses the issue of readability in the translation of these narrative elements. The main question which this paper will also be responding to is: What is more important – to create a text which will be accepted in a target cultural environment or to preserve the formal and aesthetic original in order to evoke interest in a foreign culture? One of the works used in the paper is “The Madiba Magic” (Xhos translation: “Ikhubalo likaMadiba”), a children’s storybook authored by about 20 people and translated in to isiXhosa at Praesa (University of Cape Town).

Ouma, Mr. Christopher EWUniversity of the Witwatersrand“Dialogic Childhoods: Chronotopicity in Chimamnda Ngozi Adichie’s Half of a Yellow Sun”

This paper seeks to examine the spatio-temporal importance of the University town Nsukka in Chimamnda Ngozi Adichie’s Half of a Yellow Sun. It seeks to examine how the teenage narrator Ugwu navigates this new space and time through an epistemological journey mediated by a textual and ethno-linguistic landscape. Nsukka is not only a toponym at this particular time of the Biafran war but a metaphor and metonym for an Igbo ethno-ideoscape. Ugwu the teenage narrator therefore has to navigate these new intellectual landscape via the English and Igbo text, often times trying to find a dialogic interspace between these two. Ultimately in a highly charged narrative and ideological landscape that is the Biafran war Ugwu the teenage narrator becomes part of an intricate textual strategy for Adichie, who seeks to find a ‘conversation’, a dialogue within a highly controversial narrative landscape of the Biafran war.

Pearman, Akisha

29

Eduardo Mondlane University“New Perspectives: Seeing English Through Photography”

As an English Language Fellow, the presenter has worked at the University of Eduardo Mondlane’s Tourism School in Inhambane, Mozambique for the past year and a half. Currently, UEM is going through a complex system of curriculum reforms, so the Tourism School, distinctively, has the potential to break the mold of how education happens, learning develops, and how degrees are earned in the country. Electives, independent projects, and extracurricular activities like clubs are some examples of how to enrich the traditional grind of classes.

After a brief lesson demonstration, the presenter will explain one of the projects she completed last year: The Photography in English Club. On the surface students learned technical camera and basic photographic critique skills. However, being a language teacher, the presenter was also able to focus more on the holistic language skills students could acquire including discussion and pragmatic skills, questioning and answering, describing and analyzing, comparing and contrasting, asking for and giving opinions, reflective practice, critical thinking, showing your personality in a foreign language, laughing in a different language and learning to find your voice using a foreign language.

The club itself only had five members but at the end of the semester many more students, faculty and staff were affected in the way they saw students engaging with a subject as well as the way they saw the interactive teaching and learning of language. Most importantly, it showed everyone involved how English as a global language can change from a series of rules and structures and become a way to describe realities, negotiate meaning, and learn about others.

Philippi, Mr. JaredCongolese American Language InstitutePoster: “Nothing But the Truth: HIV/AIDS, Television, and ELT in the Democratic Republic of Congo” (Poster)

As part of an ongoing effort to combat the growing HIV/AIDS epidemic in the Democratic Republic of Congo, the U.S. Embassy Kinshasa has teamed up with Smallpower, a Kinshasa based NGO which creates television programs and short films crafted to promote realistic beliefs about disease and violence. The result of this collaboration is the production of Rien Que La Verite (Nothing But the Truth), a DR Congo based dramatic television series aimed at HIV/AIDS awareness and prevention. Rien Que La Verite is filmed in DRC, has a Congolese cast, and is presented in French and Lingala. Since its premiere in 2008, RQLV has been broadcast across the DRC to much success.

In an effort to build on this success, the process of creating ELT materials to accompany RQLV is now underway. Even though RQLV is not broadcast in English, its high production value, level of authenticity, positive audience response, as well as the critical situation of the HIV/AIDS crisis in DRC make it a worthwhile catalyst for the teaching of English. The finished product is to serve as supplemental material for English classes across DRC while further raising and reinforcing HIV/AIDS awareness.

30

Teacher training workshops are also being held for Congolese teachers of English so that they may have a hand in the production of these materials. The goal of the workshops is to promote HIV/AIDS awareness and education through the viewing of Rien Que La Verite, which in turn acts as a catalyst for a discussion on topics such as teaching controversial issues in the classroom, as well as ELT materials design and development. On the final day of the workshops teachers create their own HIV/AIDS related ELT materials. Some of the materials produced will hopefully make their way into the final RQLV ELT material.

Postel, Dr GitteNMMU“Mediums, metaphors, mediascapes. The modern South African sangoma in various texts.”

After 1994 the role of sangomas has become increasingly important and debated in South Africa. Once marginalized people, able to exercise openly only parts of their profession in local settings, they have now found solid ground within both rural and urban communities and sometimes developed into figures that function at a national or even international level, reclaiming the political and spiritual influence they had in a traditional setting. In certain media- or ideoscapes their presence accentuates the cultural borders of deterritorialized ethnic groups, but at the same time, by the pluriform nature of their tasks and the universality of their spirituality and rituals, they may feature within the script offered by other mediascapes and ideoscapes as metaphors that overcome these differences. In South African literature the presence of shamans, diviners, sangoma’s and “witches” has increased remarkably since 1994. Peter Merrington published a book with short stories about an eclectic sangoma in Cape Town. In several novels sangomas play a sometimes less central, but always rather important role, for instance in Anne Landman’s The devil’s chimney, Eben Venter’s Horrelpoot, Anna Louw’s Vos, Dido’s ‘n Stringetjie blou krale. Felicity Wood wrote a biography of Khotso Sethuntsa, the millionaire medicine man, who had featured in other mediascapes for decades. Brett Bailey produced a very successful play when retelling the story of the alleged sangoma fetching Hintsa’ s skull from a Scottish farm, a story that had been covered extensively by both South African and British news media. When analyzed against the background of Appadurai’s theory, and seen as a dialogue between separate media and identities, these texts can reveal an interesting development in South Africa’s changing cultural landscape.

Schmidt, JenniferRhodes University“Ghost Girls and Sponsorbabes: Dystopian Performances of White Femininity in Lauren Beukes’s Moxyland”

The overdetermined visibility of white South African women’s bodies and their positioning, historically, as the object of visual pleasure and a “sexy” reinforcer of white privilege suggests that looking relations are powerfully linked with how post-apartheid whiteness is gendered. Given the visibility particular to South African whiteness, I argue that the young white female subject’s body becomes a site that

31

mediates hegemonic whiteness and interrogates white privilege through her now-precarious role as a “star” for the gaze of the dominant culture. One text that problematizes how young white women’s bodies are looked at in the post-apartheid cultural landscape is Lauren Beukes’s recent novel, Moxyland. Set in the Cape Town of 2018 and featuring a ‘corporate apartheid’ government that disciplines with an effortlessly casual chic, Beukes’s speculative text highlights how the hegemonic power of whiteness maintains itself through a rigorous self-normalised body practices and gendered commodification, with a heightened emphasis on visuality. Kendra Adams is a photographer who has recently agreed to be implanted with nanotechnology that will keep her youthful skin smooth and “improved ” in exchange for branding herself permanently as a ‘hipster’ advertisement for the sports drink, Ghost. Through Kendra’s attempts to document the process of becoming a ‘ Ghost Girl’ juxtaposed with the multi-media manipulation of her image, Beukes deftly limns how the micropolitics of female embodiment is linked with the ‘global flow’ of whiteness.

Sewlall, Prof HarryNWU“Memphis, Tennessee: A Metonym for Rock ’n Roll, or the Child of the Blues”

The 1991 Booker Prize-winning novelist Ben Okri, while traveling in the Deep South after Barack Obama’s victory in the November 2008 presidential election, wrote of the city of Memphis, ”Elvis is everywhere. He is the lingering deity of Memphis. But this is also the home of the blues, and blacks here are more upbeat than their brothers and sisters in rural Virginia.” The images of Elvis Presley, who earned the sobriquet “King of Rock” early in his career, and that of BB King, the exemplar extraordinaire of the Blues, are ubiquitous in the city of Memphis, which may be regarded as a metonym for the Blues and Rock ‘n Roll. The cultural jugular of the city is Beale Street, which Peter Gurlanick tells us “lured” Sam Phillips (who recorded the early Elvis in his famous Sun Recording Studio) “in a way he would never be able to fully explain”. Drawing on Foucault’s notion of heterotopias, as well as Jakobson’s work on metonymy, this paper explores the hybrid musical spatiality of the city of Memphis and its environs, as well as its iconic status in the evolution of Rock ‘n Roll which was engendered by the Blues.

Mdaka, Mrs. Pinki & Shaughnessy, Ms. ColleenUniversity of Fort Hare“Integrating Values Into First and Additional Language Teacher Education and Classrooms”

The National Curriculum Statement states that values should be a part of what is taught in the South African education system. However, the discussion of what or whose values should be taught and how they should be integrated into teacher education or South African classrooms is rarely had. Activities grounded in intercultural communication theories and culturally-relevant pedagogy in which the student-teacher will evaluate, and possibly discover, their own values will be

32

explained. Based upon using these activities in teacher-education courses at the University of Fort Hare, techniques for use to incorporate the teaching of values into Senior Phase and FET phase classrooms have been developed and will be explained.

Sheppard, Dr. PamUniversity of Pretoria“Shaping Curriculum in Language Education: Transcontinental Collaboration between South Africa and the United States”

This paper begins by describing the course delivery models employed to teach three state-mandated classes for teachers of English language learners in the State of Georgia, an area heavily impacted by the exponential growth of immigrant families in recent years. The state board for teacher credentials currently requires that these educators receive specific training in the area of English to speakers of other languages (ESOL) teaching methods, culture in the classroom, and first and second language acquisition. This necessitated a government e-learning initiative to reach all teachers in the state. For five years, Dr. Pam Sheppard delivered the three courses statewide online and on the University of Georgia (UGA) campus, thereby meeting a critical need for teacher education for those practitioners prohibited by distance to drive to campus for class. The presenter will communicate strategies employed to create community online as well as provide examples of course content and assignments. Dr. Hanlie Dippenaar will describe her teacher preparation courses at the University of Pretoria (UP) and outline her collaboration with Dr. Sheppard on their project to use the intellectual property of Dr. Sheppard’s courses at UGA to improve and enhance the teacher preparation courses at UP. This collaboration and sharing of ideas has involved the downloading of the intellectual property of Dr. Sheppard and uploading it into the appropriate courses at UP. This collaboration and sharing of assignments has also necessitated a close look at UP curriculum design and reflection on how all the courses might be enhanced and improved. Open discussion will follow the presentation.

Shum, Mr MatthewUniversity of KwaZulu-Natal“Driving the White Man into the Sea? Thomas Pringle’s “Makanna’s Gathering””

Thomas Pringle’s “Makanna’s Gathering”, written in 1825, is, on the face of it, a polemical endorsement of Xhosa retaliation against colonial injustice. The poem has as its focus an address to his troops by the Xhosa prophet figure Makanna/Nxele before their attack on British and other forces garrisoned in Grahamstown. In Pringle’s Narrative this address is described as follows: “[B]efore they were lead on to the assault, [they] were addressed by Makanna in an animating speech, in which he is said to have assured them of supernatural aid in the conflict with the English, which would turn the hail-storm of their fire-arms into water”(1834:282).

Pringle’s freely imagined rendition of this event invokes what must have seemed to readers of the time a veritable demonology of Xhosa aggression and the desire completely to annihilate the white settlers. In its opening stanzas in particular, the

33

poem is imbued with the novelty of Xhosa names and a Xhosa mythology that traffics in images of a natural world infused with supernatural power. Here Makanna is transformed into a belligerent exotic, calling forth the revenge of the elements themselves on the usurping colonists.

In an analysis of the poem I consider, among other things, what influences might have lead Pringle to depict the Xhosa in a way that ostensibly supports their failed endeavour. I argue that rather than reading the poem, as some have done, as an early ‘protest’ poem, it should be understood as a form of African picturesque, part of the spectatcle of empire rather than an indictment of it. I also consider the function of the poem’s extensive notes as a miniaturised ethnology, tethering its subject matter to a controlling body of knowledge.

Sieberhagen, Hettie & Potgieter, ASNWUStudent-Learner Dialogue: A Journey Towards Clarity”

Problem StatementStudents participating in distance education on tertiary level experience unique obstacles along their academic journey. Since contact between students and lecturers is limited, they have to rely mainly on written material for clarification as to content and instructions. The study letter in particular should provide guidance. The material is invariably written in English, which is not necessarily the mother tongue of the students. Consequently they are often uncertain and feel isolated during the course of their studies. The aim of this paper is to identify problem areas related to accessibility of language and clarity of formulation.

The objective of the paperThe objective of this paper is to create a possible template for study letters for distance learning tertiary students, featuring clear formulation and accessible language that will be understandable for students whose home language is not English. Although this will particularly address the needs of students of the NW U it will hopefully also serve as guideline to other institutions facing similar problems.

Research design and methodologyA detailed text analysis of sample study letters used at the SCTE and CAPLE as well as student enquiries and correspondence received by lecturers, form the basis of this qualitative study. The paper focuses on language usage and formulation of text rather than format and content.

Findings Analysis of enquiries from students has shown academic vocabulary and formal language to be inaccessible as students have difficulty in comprehending instructions relating to their assignments. This leads to confusion, which may have a detrimental influence on the academic performance of students. Frequent enquiries about assessment methods and rubrics indicate that students need specific and clear instructions regarding the assignments and examination.

Singh, Jaspal Kaur Northern Michigan University

34

“Dialogues, interactions and collaborations in Ahmed Essop's The King of Hearts”

Can there be dialogue, interaction and collaboration among non-white constituencies in non-Western cultural spaces? What are the long-term effects of “contact and intractable, unequal conflict” within the Contact Zone (Pratt)? As Pratt claims, reading the art of the Contact Zone can produce, “imaginary dialogue” which can lead to “miscomprehension, incomprehension…” within modern nation-states (“Arts of the Contact Zone” Ways of Reading 507). When Rastogi attended the Seminar “New Directions or Same Old? Afrindian Identity and Fiction Today” in South Africa in 2005, one Indian attendee stated, “Every Indian has a story to tell… but no one is interested in listening to us” (Afrindian Fictions 21). Rastogi claims that South African Indians at the seminar expressed “rage at an inward-looking Afrocentricism, a sense of unbelonging in the rainbow nation, despair at the insularity of South African Indians, and frustrations over disavowal of the Indian past” (Afrindian Fiction: Diaspora, Race, and National Desire in South Africa 22). Can the ravages of apartheid be healed? Ndebele maintains, “the past, no matter how horrible it has been, can redeem us. It can be the moral foundation on which to build the pillars of the future” (South African Literature and Culture: Rediscovery of the Ordinary 155)?

In this paper, the author examines Essop’s The King of Hearts, published in 1997, three years after the historic elections of 1994, in order to examine Essop’s break with his past representation of interracial solidarity and instead focus on his representations of the failures of multicultural democracy. It will be argued that the attempts in his fiction are for dialogue with the citizens of a modern nation-state to collectively work in the direction of transforming South Africa into a truly democratic nation-state. Is his attempt at dialogue through autoethnography and transculturation imaginary, leading to miscomprehension, or does it produce collaboration and mediation leading to reconciliation?

Skhosana, ButiUniversity of Pretoria“Re-explication and the classification of amaNdebele traditional praises”

AmaNdebele praises were first recorded in 1921 by Fourie in his religious doctoral study conducted amongst the amaNzunza sub-group. Since then van Warmelo followed in 1930 and other modern traditionalists emerged after isiNdebele was officially introduced in schools as a subject in 1985.

Traditional praises as one of the most valuable and important oral performances serve various purposes such as thanks giving, praising (of an individual being or group), liaising with the ancestral spirits and also introducing ones new social status name amongst African societies. Each type of praises is according to its content, significance, and performance different from each other and very much important that they should be well explained and classified according to the specific African cultural society.

According to the earliest and as well as the so-called modern amaNdebele traditionalists such as Fourie (1921), van Warmelo (1930), Ntuli (1995), Masango (1994) and Van Vuuren (1983) make no clear distinction between the various

35

traditional praises of amaNdebele. IsiNdebele traditional publications for use in schools, for instance, exclude manhood name praises most probably because of the association of these praises with the amaNdebele cultural rites that are strictly surrounded by secrecy.

The aim of this paper is, therefore, to analyse and discuss the various praises that amaNdebele value and perform. The discussion of the various types of praises, namely i) praises of chiefs, ii) praises of significant individuals, iii) clan praises iv) manhood name praises and iv) isithambo will be under the sub-headings content, significance and performance. In conclusion the paper will show how important and culture bound are amaNdebele traditional praises as well as the role they play in the stages an individual’s life especially male persons.

Smit-Marais, SusanNWU“Converted spaces, contained places: Robinson Crusoe’s monologic world”

Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe (1719) is primarily defined by a mythic conversion experience as the novel’s core narrative structure traces the hero’s transition from social isolation and disconnection towards self-actualization and social re-integration. As sole survivor of a shipwreck, Crusoe has to survive in, and adapt to, a space which he initially experiences as alien and threatening. After almost two years on the island, Crusoe gradually begins to transform himself along with his environment. By the time he leaves the island 28 years later, he has become a resourceful and capable ruler over an economically viable cultural monopoly.

This conversion process is exemplified by Crusoe’s appropriation of the island, as this space becomes the site onto which all of Crusoe’s anxieties and aspirations are inscribed and consequently, the island is ‘transformed’ from untamed wilderness into a cultivated ‘paradise ’ that bears testament to both Enlightenment rectitude and Western accomplishment. As such, the central aim of this paper is to examine how Crusoe’s conversion of an unknown, marginal and ambiguous geographical locale into prototypical British colony, is defined by various processes of spatial conversion and cultural inscription.

According to Phillips (1998:12), adventure stories – such as Robinson Crusoe – constructed a concrete cultural space that represented a social totality in an imaginatively accessible and appealing manner. Such a cultural space, though imaginary, naturalized constructions of ‘home’ and empire by interpreting the unknown in terms of the known. Crusoe’s island is thereby transformed into an utopia of eighteenth century, British, middle class values. Defoe therefore managed to naturalize and normalize constructions of space which before were unfamiliar to his 18th century readership. In the process, the island space is recasted as a monologic world, a place that stands oblivious to the various ambiguities, inversions and contradictions contained within its representation.

Spencer, BrendaUnisa

36

“Additions to the Marking Code Designed to Address Controversies in Writing Instruction in an ODL context”

This paper focuses on response to student writing in an open and distance learning (ODL) context, specifically on additions to the current marking code used in first-level UNISA writing modules in the English Studies Department. Controversies at the heart of writing instruction (including issues of fluency/accuracy, process/production and response that relates to content/form or local/global issues) have implications for response to student writing. Difficulties are exacerbated in an ODL teaching context when a marking code is used. At present response to student writing contains a jumble of recommendations and students are given little indication of the best revision strategy to adopt. Commentary on content suggest that students need to return to the thinking phase while form-related correction suggests that surface editing is required in order to ‘perfect’ the text. In addition, there is little indication of the relative importance of error and the marking code is, per definition, negative in orientation. Four additions to the marking code are proposed as possible means of alleviating the problem. Samples of marked scripts will be supplied and the response of lecturers to the proposed changes will be presented.

Terblanche, Prof EtienneNWU““Shall I at least Set my Lands in Order?” T. S. Eliot’s The Waste Land and C. G. Jung’s Quaternity”

The assumption that the human ego tends to fluctuate in degrees between inflation, that is, the ego’s false identity with or imitation of deity, and deflation, that is, healthy connection with God or Self without identifying with Self (Edinger 1992) brings into focus a new reading of T. S. Eliot ’s The Waste Land. C. G. Jung has long held the view that human wholeness relates itself to the symbolic numbers of three and four, and The Waste Land dramatically and poignantly arrives, in open manner, at vividly-modernized Sanskrit patterns of three and four. This prompts one to consider the prospect that the poem ends, or opens into, a profound sense of wholeness.This prospect sheds further light on a recurring critical problematic in response to The Waste Land: whether its fragmentary and paratactical procedures allow the reader to recombine its materials into a sensible whole, or not (Ransom (1923), Wilson (1924), Leavis (1932), Brooks (1937), Moody (1979), Edwards (1984), Brooker and Bentley (1991), Kaufmann (1992), Albright (1996), Armstrong (1998), among others). Careful reading shows a dialectic of inflation and deflation to be at work throughout it. This fluctuating pattern therefore binds the poem . Indeed, as inflation reaches its most intense and dangerous levels—of secular madness underpinned by an apparently-insurmountable oppositional split (or “twoness”)—the symbolic patterns of three and four begin to overcome the dilemma, as found for instance in the Emmaus passage. By way of an open end to this pattern, as has been mentioned, the poem subsequently arrives at the integrity of its modernized Sanskrit quaternity (“threeness in fourness” ). The fluctuations of inflation and deflation and this ultimate quaternic integrity embody a reading of the poem as a whole in every sense of the word. From this perspective, The Waste Land presents no less than a modern

37

individuation: almost impossibly so in modern time, it amounts to a poetic discovery of primal health between the levels of individual- and supra-egoic being.

Thomas, Prof. KimberleyMzuzu University“Space, Place, and Linguistic Landscapes: Ecological Influences on an Ecologically-Minded Foreign Language Instructor”

In this paper, I discuss ecological literacy and how my differing ecologies have affected my role as a foreign language instructor. First, I define ecological literacy.Second, I discuss (my awareness of) how differing ecologies have shaped my attitude towards teaching English as a foreign language and working with L2 speakers.Third, I discuss the ways in which being ecologically-literate as a foreign language instructor allows me to be more reflective regarding my teaching practices and the ways in which environment influences the language learning context regarding language use in and out of the classroom. My approach to this research project, focusing on ecological circumstances as well as professional experience and personal characteristics, grew out of the theoretical traditions of narrative inquiry (Connelly & Clandinin 1987, 1988; Clandinin & Connelly, 2000) and the empirical traditions of narrative study in TESOL and second language acquisition which deals with language learner autobiographies; teacher education studies which look at the ways in which teachers’ narratives inform their practice (Schön, 1983; Bell, 1997c; Jalongo & Isenberg, 1985); and narrative accounts of language use, particularly narrative accounts of language learning gathered from language educators (Belcher & Connor, 2001; Casanave & Schecter, 1997).

Ullyatt, Ms. GiselaUniversity of South Africa, Bloemfontein“The Buddha at Blackwater Pond: Some reflections on mindfulness in Mary Oliver’s poetry”

Although her first volume appeared in 1963, Mary Oliver’s poetry has come into particular prominence since she won the Pulitzer Prize in 1984 for American Primitive, and, more recently, the National Book Award (1992). Taking the natural world as the primary aspect of her vision, her writing has been linked with several traditions including the Romantic, the Transcendentalist, the visionary American of Whitman, Emerson, Dickinson, and Frost as well as with the eco-poetry movement. Although such connections certainly cannot, and should not, be discounted, one influence that has yet to be explored in depth is the presence of Buddhist thinking in her poems. A considered dialogue between Buddhist thought and Oliver’s oeuvre serves to enrich one’s understanding of both.

In using the term, ‘Buddhism’, the author is more than aware of the international range and diversity of the various schools and traditions which fall into such a broad classification. Thus, it needs to be stated that, in dealing with its subtitle’s subject, the paper employs the general Buddhist principle of Mindfulness or samma sati (Pali) common to all Buddhist practice.

This paper begins by introducing the Buddhist concept of Mindfulness: ‘Overall, mindfulness is a process of being constantly aware of the arising and passing away of

38

states – experiences, thoughts and feelings – and recognizing that all things change and flow on in the stream of life’ (Thompson: 2000, p49). Notions such as ‘Being in the here-and-now’, ‘constant awareness’, and ‘concentrated attention’ are discussed in a selection of Oliver’s texts such as ‘Mindful’ and ‘Rice’, demonstrating how Oliver dovetail concepts of Mindfulness with her poetry.

Ullyatt, Prof. TonyUniversity of the Free State“An abstract model of conjecturality: labyrinths, mazes and some metaphors arising”

The purpose of this paper is to address some of the problems that arise when authors use labyrinths - and mazes, too, although to a far lesser extent - as metaphors. Part of the confusion may be traced to the manner in which labyrinths and mazes are defined. In itself, the process of definition leads to the erroneous assumption that the words, ‘labyrinth’ and ‘maze’, may serve as synonyms, for reasons which will be discussed. Equally problematic is the way in which authors tend to assume that there is only one essential form of labyrinth, when, in fact, there are several, each with distinct meaning, whether explicit or implied. Unravelling these issues is important because they affect the meaning a reader derives from the authors’ use of labyrinths as metaphors.

The first part of the paper will deal with problems of defining labyrinths and mazes while the second will be given over to a brief discussion of the forms and functions of labyrinths and mazes. The third section will focus on a number of metaphors, drawn from recent fiction and non-fiction texts, to exemplify specific aspects of the problem in more detail.

The paper will be illustrated.

Uys, Mev. CharmaineNWU“Die verband tussen herkenning van hoëfrekwensiewoorde en die leesvaardighede van leerders in die grondslagfase”

Probleme in taalontwikkeling kan aanleiding gee tot leerprobleme wat negatiewe gevolge vir die leerder kan inhou. Aanvanklik word leerders in die skool geleer om te lees en skryf. Later behoort die leerders aangeleerde leesvaardighede te gebruik om te leer en aangeleerde skryfvaardighede om dit wat geleer is, weer te gee. Indien leerders nie voorafgenoemde vaardighede bemeester nie, sal hul vordering op skool ernstig gekortwiek word.

‘n Verdere verswarende faktor in die milieu van die Suid-Afrikaanse onderwysbestel is die ingewikkelde sosio-politiese geskiedenis van die land wat groot onderrignood by veral voorheen benadeelde skole in agtergeblewe gebiede laat ontstaan het. ‘n Verslag van die Ministeriële Komitee oor Onderwys in Agtergeblewe Gebiede (2005:10, 43) lê klem op die behoeftes en vaardighede van leerders; opleiding, toewyding en bevoegdhede van onderwysers; sowel as toegang tot onderrigmedia in agtergeblewe gebiede.

39

Ten spyte van die implementering van die Nasionale Kurrikulumverklaring Graad R-9 (Skole) en Graad 10-12 (Skole) is ongeletterdheid steeds ‘n ernstige probleem in Suid-Afrika. Aan-gesien die basis van alle lees- en skryfvaardighede in die Grondslagfase gelê word, is dit nodig dat drastiese stappe geneem moet word om seker te maak dat leerders reeds in hul eerste jare op skool leer om met begrip te kan lees.

Hierdie studie is daarop gemik om ‘n beduidende verband tussen hoëfrekwensiewoorde en lees-vaardighede (gemeet aan woordherkenning en leesbegrip) te bewys en ook om leerders se leesvaardighede te verbeter deur die aanleer van hoëfrekwensiewoorde. Hierdie studie lewer ‘n bydrae tot die onderwysmilieu wanneer daar bewys word dat die onderrig van hoëfrekwensiewoorde deur middel van hierdie Leesonderrigprogram tot die verbetering van die leesvaardighede (gemeet aan woordherkenni ng en leesbegrip) van leerders in Graad 3 lei. Die Leesonderrigprogram is gebaseer op ‘n gebalanseerde lees-benadering waarin die hoofkomponente van lees geïntegreerd met hoëfrekwen-siewoorde onderrig word. Die Leesonderrigprogram is begrond in die behavioristiese en kognitiewe leerteorieë, sowel as die transaksionele leesteorie.

Van der Westhuizen, Prof BetsieNWU“Narratiewe energie – verbaal en visueel - in kinderboeke vir diverse lesersgroepe”

Alhoewel daar dikwels van goeie kinderboeke gesê word dat dit ook volwasenes kan boei, is daar ook dié sort kinderboeke wat selfs duideliker voorkom asof hulle wel kinder as primêre lesersteiken het, maar dat volwassenes soos ouers, bibliotekarisse en onderwysers as sekondêre lesersgroep die boeke óók sal kan geniet. Hierdie boeke word in die kontemporêre vakliteratuur verskillend benoem – oorgansliteratuur in Afrikaans, of in Engels “cross-over ficton", "books for dual audiences" of "books for dual addressees". Kenmerkend van hierdie soort boeke is dat die narratiewe energie (sp“nning en boeikrag) daarin kinders moontlik om meer konkrete redes en volwassenes moontlik om meer abstrakte redes kan boei. Dit kan egter ook wees dat kinders en volwassenes tematiese insigte net verskillend verwoord - op grond van faktore soos belangstellingsvelde, ervaring en minder of meerdere gevorderdheid in taalontwikkeling. Sulke boeke kom onder andere voor in die oeuvre van Philip de Vos, wie se kinderverhaal Bella Donna Prima Donna (geïllustreer deur Cora Coetzee), met die opera Tosca as onderbou, as oorgangsliteratuur beskou kan word. The Mouseboat / Die Muisboot geskryf en geïllustreer deur Paddy Bouma, sal kinders moontlik boei omdat die verhaal gaan oor muise en rotte, sluise en keerwalle in die Lotrivier; volwassenes sal moontlik geboei word deur die visuele interteks tussen werke van Franse filosowe soos Foucauls, Derrida en Lacan. In Wonderful Earth! / O aarde! Wat nou? deur Nick Butterworth en Mick INkpen, word die skeppingsverhaal en die geskiedenis van die mens se wetenskaplike uitvindings en die effek daarvan op die vlak van die kinderleser vertel, maar volwassenes sal die ontstaangeskiedenis van die heelal, ekologiese verval en die appèl op die mensdom op meer omvattende wyse raaklees. Die doel met hierdie referaat is om drie kinderverhale te analiseer ten opsigte van die wyse waarop narratiewe energie telkens in dieselfde teks op verskillende wyses vir kinders en volwassenes betekenisgenererend kan wekr.

40

Van Heerden, Joha-MariUniversity of Johannesburg“Steven Erikson’s Coltaine of the Crow Clan in dialogue with the traditional fantasy hero”

This paper will discuss Steven Erikson’s Deadhouse Gates (2001) in order to discern how his representation of the fantasy hero is established in relation to traditional fantasy. My focus will be on the heroic figure of Coltaine of the Crow Clan. In his role as a Fist (a military governor of the Malazan Empire), Coltaine is tasked with the evacuation of 30,000 refugees from Hissar, which is under threat of rebellion by The Whirlwind. As he leads the refugees and remnants of the Malazan 7th army 100 leagues across hostile territory towards Aren, the views of Coltaine (member of a conquered tribe, now in service to the Malazan Empire) change from barbaric and uncivilised to respect, whether grudging or genuine. In traditional fantasy, such as The Lord of the Rings (arguably the prototype for heroic fantasy), the heroic figure is generally ‘pre-constructed’ and received by the reader as a character possessed of a predetermined destiny. Erikson’s treatment of the hero is innovative in that he focuses on how this role is established from an external point of view, rather than being predetermined. Erikson’s construction of the heroic figure critically examines the extent to which that figure becomes heroic through his or her own actions, but also focuses on the way in which perception influences this heroic mantle. By placing Erikson’s representation of heroism in fantasy in dialogue with works of traditional fantasy, this paper will demonstrate significant divergences as well as affinities between Erikson and his antecedents.

Van Renen, Dr. CharlesNMMU“Playful, perplexing, irreverent, engaging – metafictive fun with picture books”

For at least the past twenty years there has been a growing critical interest in picture books. While sometimes grouped into categories such as ‘interactive’ and ‘wordless’, modern picture books appear in an extraordinary variety of approaches and formats. Attention has fallen increasingly on examples revealing ‘postmodern’ or ‘metafictive’ qualities, as authors and illustrators appear to extend the boundaries of the picture book in terms of both content and form. The challenging of conventions relating to story structure, book format and other literary norms leads to a degree of indeterminacy and varying interpretations about their ‘meanings’. Sometimes described as ‘playful’, such books frequently draw readers into textual games and offer a wealth of verbal and pictorial wit.

Responding to these kinds of picture books – or any of good quality – can be both challenging and enjoyable for readers over a wide age range. In the context of teacher education, the exposure of students to picture texts may help to extend their own reading horizons and to introduce them to a valuable resource in the classroom. Picture books can add a further dimension to learning when the verbal texts are not in the readers’ home language, as was the case in an activity undertaken with some Education students at the NMMU. The fact that some of the examples displayed

41

‘postmodern’ features seemed to add to their interest value and to promote positive responses and several requests for further activities of this sort, rather than to exacerbate existing challenges with the use of English.

Viljoen, Prof HeinNWU“Literary Liminalities”

Going across the threshold, in Arnold van Gennep and Victors Turner’s dramatic views of ritual, opens up an indeterminate zone where social constraints are loosened and transformations can take place that could lead to a new sense of community. For the past five years our research group has been analysing such liminalities in a range of literary texts from South Africa and elsewhere. In this paper I will present a synthesis of our research. We have found a wide range of liminal characters in diverse liminal settings, often closely connected with different kinds of borders. Some of these spaces can be described as “essentially” liminal. Though a spontaneous communitas arises in most cases, it cannot be maintained. The border between self and other often asserts itself strongly in the end. There seems to be a strong link between transformation and the abject. Yet many of the texts do create new hybrid possibilities for people to live together. The analyses also raise the questions whether writers need to be liminal (or need to take up liminal positions) in order to write and whether literature itself can be regarded as an essentially liminal space.

42