No culture to this

22 March 2013 – Week 12

Kommentaar deur die Redakteur, Pieter Coetzee:

 

Universities* are born from culture, the culture of a specified group of people who has grown in civilization, embracing a collective set of values which they want to explore by advancing their culture through education.

Because of this, it was mainly through religion that the different cultures started their own universities in their search for wisdom, philosophy and to create a platform to discuss their views on different subjects. This knowledge which came from human self lead to new scholarships and instructors to put it to practice by educating students in other fields than theology and philosophy but also in astrology, law, medicine, literature, arts, mathematics and science.

The only reason the state played a part in the establishment of universities was the fact that church and state were so entwined during medieval times, the period in which the first universities were established, that the one could not function without the other.

Eventually it was through universities that students, philosophers and teachers finally realized that state and church should be separated in order for a university to function to its full potential and accept that humanism** and universities were a strong impetus for the scientific revolution.

To achieve these requirements, it is expected that the source of new trainees would at least have achieved the qualifying level of education (including literacy) to be allowed as scholars to these institutions. In a system where culture controls these requirements, there should not be any problem.

Afrikaans is one of a handful indigenous African languages, and the only one in Southern Africa, which has established itself as a language that qualifies for teaching at university level. This can mainly be attributed to the fact that the culture of creating universities for people sharing the same collective values were present in a specific group of citizens in South Africa. The Universities of Potchefstroom (now Noordwes), Free State and Stellenbosch, and later followed by Rand Afrikaans (now University of Johannesburg), were the direct result of a communal culture to promote culture through education.

Things can go drastically wrong when state try to hi-jack this role from culture. This is what we are experiencing in Africa and more specific, South Africa. All these universities experience serious problems concerning the expectations of students who are only accepted on a representative basis rather than a cultural one. It should also be noted that people of different races who are willing to be educated can share the same culture although they may have different traditions. Traditions, however are also flexible and can be changed by civilization and education.

The main reason for this is that the state has not reached the cultural level of starting their own universities in their search for wisdom and education, thinking that this can be acquired by dominating the existing universities to conform to their way of thinking, enforcing their political stance and viewpoints by withdrawing their financial support.

Going back to the short history of the Afrikaner following the outbreak of Democracy and freedom, introduced by the ANC, The oldest Union is South Africa, Solidariteit, has achieved to grant bursaries to students not qualifying for bursaries because of their so called privileged background, for a total of R12,3mil for studying at South African Universities. This money came from contributions made by a single ethnic group in South Africa and no contribution from the state. Some of these students are now starting to qualified and are paying back their interest free bursaries in order for other disadvantaged Afrikaner kids to realize their dreams to obtain an university qualification.

One can only ask what Cosato and the ANC have done to realize the dreams of their youth, other than disrupting the whole educational system and sending their youth to Cuba to be trained in a foreign language as medical doctors.

 

Additional literature:

Ref: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

*The word “university” is derived from the Latin universitas magistrorum et scholarium, which roughly means “community of teachers and scholars.”

** A focus on knowledge coming from self, from the human, has a direct implication for new forms of scholarship and instruction, and was the foundation for what is commonly known as the humanities. Examining the influence of humanism on scholars in medicine, mathematics, astronomy and physics may suggest Although the connection between humanism and the scientific discovery may very well have begun within the confines of the university, the connection has been commonly perceived as having been severed by the changing nature of science during the scientific revolution.

such institutions should have four main “objectives essential to any properly balanced system: instruction in skills; the promotion of the general powers of the mind so as to produce not mere specialists but rather cultivated men and women; to maintain research in balance with teaching, since teaching should not be separated from the advancement of learning and the search for truth; and to transmit a common culture and common standards of citizenship.”

 

***Solidariteit: The Afrikaner-union established in 1902 to help the impoverished Afrikaner nation regaining its dignity and work opportunities following the scorned earth war-strategy fought against the British colonialists, where the British burned down farmsteads, destroyed the crops and sent women and children of all races to concentration camps.