This ethnographic study explores the subcultural world of drag performance and beauty pageantry at one of Johannesburg’s landmark gay nightclubs – Club Indigo. It examines how the participants’ consumer identities, material culture, and kinship systems were constructed within and beyond the subculture.

This study explores the various representations of the dictator and the postcolonial condition in what can be termed the African dictator text. Adopting a panoramic approach that selects texts from several regions of Africa, the study critically examines the ambivalence and paradox of power, focusing on the various strategies devised and deployed by African writers

Print media transformation in South Africa has been an ongoing area of debate and contention in the first twenty years of democracy. Especially given the country’s history of colonialism and apartheid, where racism was institutionalised and impacted the character and functioning of the print media. The attainment of true transformation in the press is critical to reverse the injustices of the past and to ensure today’s print media is reflective of South African society and its many axes of diversity.

The starting point for this research is the disjuncture between the functions of elections predicated in democratic theory and the reality of electoral authoritarian regimes. Mainstream democratic theory views elections as the sine qua non, that is, the institutional mechanism through which the essence of democracy - self-rule of the people - is actualized.

Purpose: Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) worldwide are facing increased pressure to meet the needs of non-traditional-age students (NTASs), defined here as 25 and older. However, there is not only a lack of supportive institutional cultures for NTASs who pursue a deinstitutionalised life course, but also scholarly knowledge pertaining to the trends in enrolments and perspectives of NTASs according to different socio-demographic variables.

This thesis is an ethnography of a group of medical doctors in South Africa who produce clinical research based on their patient practice. These clinician-researchers are scarce around the globe but praised as contributing indispensable clinical insights to research in an aim to improve healthcare. In South Africa government and professional bodies recently took action to expand and racially transform this elite of knowledge producers with the aim of remedying the country’s healthcare, perceived as being in crisis. My ethnography centres on the University of the Witwatersrand (Wits), specifically its School of Clinical Medicine, its associated teaching hospitals, and its attempts to grow a so-called culture of research among doctors.

Although South Africa is home to nine indigenous African languages, English remains the dominant official language in democratic South Africa. This continues despite the fact that the country’s Constitution and the Use of Official Languages Act (UOLA) of 2012 oblige the government to safeguard that all official languages are equitably used and indigenous languages developed and promoted.

‘Princess Magogo kaDinuzulu’ is a historical figure whose prominence and acclaim has been primarily documented through ‘Zulu’ historiography. She has been immortalised as the daughter of ‘King Dinuzulu’1, the mother of ‘Prince Mangosuthu Buthelezi’ and an unparalleled musician, imbongi2, instrumentalist, composer, performer and custodian of ‘Zulu culture’.

This study explores the various representations of the dictator and the postcolonial condition in what can be termed the African dictator text. Adopting a panoramic approach that selects texts from several regions of Africa, the study critically examines the ambivalence and paradox of power, focusing on the various strategies devised and deployed by African writers

The question of the determinants of the fertility transitions of countries from sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) has been widely debated in the field of demography. Some scholars have investigated individual-level variables like contraceptive use, delayed age at marriage and participation of women in the labour force. Other scholars have used cultural factors to understand fertility change and patterns in SSA.