In searching for the potential that lies in African societies, the chapters of this volume consider relationships between knowledge, education and social structure from multiple angles, from a macro-continental scale to national education systems, schools and local communities. The themes that cut across the chapters include education as a mode of transmitting values, the contrasting effects of school credentials and knowledge for use, politics and interactions among people surrounding a school and knowledge acquisition as a subjective process. The rich empirical analyses suggest that the subjective commitment of, and mutuality among, people will make the acquired knowledge a powerful 'tool for conviviality' to realize a stable life, even given the turmoil created by rapid institutional and environmental changes that confront African societies.

Education in Southern Africa is a comprehensive critical reference guide to education in the region. With chapters written by an international team of leading regional education experts, the book explores the education systems of each country in the region. With chapters covering Botswana, Lesotho, Madagascar, Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa, Swaziland and Zimbabwe, the book critically examines the development of education provision in each country as well as local and global contexts. Including a comparative introduction to the issues facing education in the region as a whole and guides to available online datasets, this handbook will be an essential reference for researchers, scholars, international agencies and policy-makers at all levels.

Writing Namibia: Literature in Transition is a cornucopia of extraordinary and fascinating material which will be a rich resource for students, teachers and readers interested in Namibia. The text is wide ranging, defining literature in its broadest terms. In its multifaceted approach, the book covers many genres traditionally outside academic literary discourse and debate. The 22 chapters cover literature of all categories in Namibia since independence: written and performance poetry, praise poetry, Oshiwambo orature, drama, novels, autobiography, womens writing, subaltern studies, literature in German, Ju|hoansi and Otjiherero, childrens literature, Afrikaans fiction, story-telling through film, publishing, and the interface between literature and society. The inclusive approach is the books strength as it allows a wide range of subjects to be addressed, including those around gender, race and orature which have been conventionally silenced.

The Namibian constitution makes full provision for education as a fundamental human right and freedom. Three years into independence, as part of the government’s educational policy, the ‘Education for All Policy’ was launched as a stepping stone to free quality education. However, inequities have become widely pronounced within the Namibian educational system. Democracy and Education in Namibia and beyond debates the education–democracy nexus in Namibia and the southern African context. It defines and explores the meaning of democracy and related concepts. It also looks at what democracy means in the context of human rights and access to education. The ten chapters in this collection interrogate the strengths and limitations of education as an instrument of social change and question whether or not the Namibian educational objectives and practices do develop and help to sustain a democratic culture in Namibia. The authors in the collection have drawn material from their own teaching and research experience across the fields of education and social science in Namibia and beyond, and present their findings in a pedagogical framework suitable as a challenging text for tertiary students. At a time when education is in crisis, especially in South Africa where strident calls for free tertiary education and Africanisation of the curriculum are spreading like wildfire, this book gives scholarly insight into the history and social conditions that gave rise to our current predicament.

Transitional societies—struggling to build democratic institutions and new political traditions—are faced with a painful dilemma. How can Government become strong and effective, building a common good that unites disparate ethnic and class groups, while simultaneously nurturing democratic social rules at the grassroots? Professor Fuller brings this issue to light in the contentious, multicultural setting of Southern Africa. Post-apartheid states, like South Africa and Namibia, are pushing hard to raise school quality, reduce family poverty, and equalize gender relations inside villages and townships. But will democratic participation blossom at the grassroots as long as strong central states—so necessary for defining the common good—push universal policies onto diverse local communities? This book builds from a decade of family surveys and qualitative village studies led by Professor Fuller at Harvard University and African colleagues inside Botswana, Namibia, and South Africa.

An analysis of teacher education reforms in Namibia in the post-independence era, from the perspective of government personnel, teacher educators, and teachers themselves. This book examines post-independence teacher education reforms in the southern African country of Namibia from the perspective of various actors in the reform process: Ministry