Browsing by Author "Le Grange, L. L. L."

Now showing 1 - 5 of 5
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    Can postpositivist research in environmental education engender ethical notions within higher education?
    (Higher Education South Africa, 2001) Waghid, Y.; Le Grange, L. L. L.
    In this article we contend that postpositivist research in environmental education can contribute towards promoting ethical activity within higher education. We argue that postpositivist inquiry breaks with utilitarian and uncritical assumptions about research in environmental education and also creates unconfined spaces for ethical notions such as truth-telling and sincerity, freedom of thought, clarity of meaning, non-arbitrariness, a sense of relevance and respect for people and evidence. Drawing on recent case study research in environmental education involving higher education institutions, we show that ethical notions of postpositivist research can engender self-determination, trust and respectful collaboration among diverse people.
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    Challenges for higher education transformation in South Africa : integrating the local and the global
    (2002) Le Grange, L. L. L.
    Higher education in South Africa is faced with an important challenge, how it will cope with the tension between the universal claims of global science on the one hand, and on the other the equally compelling claims to recover the African past (Scott 1997:18). In this article I explore how this challenge might be taken up, by arguing that Western knowledge systems and Indigenous knowledge systems can work together if the representational aspect of knowledge is de-emphasised and the performative side of knowledge is emphasised. I use Turnbull's (1997) ideas of performativity and spatiality to show how seemingly disparate knowledge traditions might be able to be performed together within local knowledge spaces. I point out that although globalisation has homogenising tendencies it also opens up spaces for new identities and the contestation of established values and norms (Stromquist & Monkman 2000). In a socially distributed knowledge system partnerships between higher education institutions and indigenous peoples might create new knowledge spaces which could have transformative effects for academics and indigenous communities.
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    (De)constructing systems discourses in South Africa's White Paper 6 : Special Needs Education
    (Faculty of the Humanities, University of the Free State, 2003) Van Rooyen, B.; Newmark, R.; Le Grange, L. L. L.
    White Paper 6, on Special Needs Education, released in July 2001, is a response from the South African government’s Ministry of Education to the inclusion movement. In this article we examine systems discourses in this policy document. We discuss their implications, as we deconstruct them for inclusion or exclusion. We do not construct conclusions, but rather (de)construct the polyphony of voices, truths and realities speaking into and out of White Paper 6. This article thus offers an alternative approach to policy analysis.
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    Exploring new knowledge spaces in environmental education : the case of a South African/Australian institutional links project
    (Higher Education South Africa, 2001) Le Grange, L. L. L.
    In this article I reflect on how a changing South African socio-political milieu provided space for collaboration among Australian and South African higher education institutions. I describe how the different activities of a project entitled, "Educating for socio-ecological change: capacity-building in environmental education", provided challenges for all participants in the light of processes of globalisation and internationalisation currently prevalent. I provide insights on how participatory processes of critical engagement, reflection and dialogue have served as opportunities for capacity enhancing in environmental education.
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    Research and development in higher education : rating or not?
    (Higher Education South Africa, 2003) Waghid, Y.; Le Grange, L. L. L.
    Editorial Research and development in higher education: rating or not? Y Waghid* & L le Grange University of Stellenbosch Research and development has become a primary focus of the higher education landscape in South Africa over the past decade, particularly focus- ing on producing "knowledge interests" which take seriously the advancement of academic research and the construction of knowledge for social relevance The practice of research has become synonymous with the construction of knowledge by critical inquirers who use their disciplinary bases to explore multiple dimensions of epistemology which include aspects such as experience and reality, foundations, realism.