Patrick van Rensburg (eBook)

Rebel, visionary and radical educationist, a biography

Kevin Shillington (Autor)

eBook Download: EPUB

2020 | Main
Wits University Press (Verlag)
978-1-77614-606-2 (ISBN)

Infos

This sensitive, compelling biography is a revealing portrait of Patrick van Rensburg, a controversial but heroic anti-apartheid activist and radical educationist whose democratic, anti-elitist vision and energetic pursuit of inclusive, developmental and practical education received international recognition with the Right Livelihood Award in 1981.

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Patrick van Rensburg (1931-2017) was an anti-apartheid activist and self-made 'alternative educationist' whose work received international recognition with the Right Livelihood Award in 1981. Born in KwaZulu-Natal into what he described as a 'very ordinary South African family that believed in the virtue of racism', Van Rensburg became a self-styled rebel who tirelessly pursued his own vision of a brighter future for emerging societies in post-colonial southern Africa. His emotional and intellectual struggle against his upbringing and cultural roots led him to reject his life of white privilege in South Africa. Determined to prevent the emergence of a privileged black elite in post-colonial society, he devoted his life to implementing an alternative, egalitarian approach to education, focusing on quality and functional schooling for the majority. Rewarded with the internationally prestigious Right Livelihood Award for his unique contribution to education, he saw this work as a 'necessary tool of development'. Exiled from South Africa in 1960 because of his involvement in the London boycott campaign that gave birth to the Anti-Apartheid Movement, Van Rensburg moved to Botswana (then Bechuanaland). There he founded cooperatives, provided vocational training and was among the earliest educationists to espouse the discipline of development studies. Perhaps his best-known legacy is the Swaneng Hill School, which he founded to provide an educational home for primary school 'dropouts' through a curriculum that combined theory and practice, and academic and manual labour. He involved his pupils in building their school, running it, providing their own food, and making their own equipment and furniture. Van Rensburg was an innovative and charismatic visionary who captured the zeitgeist of the late twentieth century, and whose work and vision still have resonance for debates in educational policy today.

Inhalt

Acknowledgements Abbreviations and acronyms List of illustrations Maps Introduction Chapter 1 Origins and Identity in South Africa Chapter 2 An Anglophone South African, 1936–1948 Chapter 3 The Making of an Afrikaner, 1949–1953 Chapter 4 Diplomat and Rebel, 1953–1957 Chapter 5 Anti-Apartheid Activist, 1957–1959 Chapter 6 Boycott, 1959–1960 Chapter 7 Into Exile, 1960–1961 Chapter 8 Return to Africa, 1961–1962 Chapter 9 The Founding of Swaneng Hill School, 1962–1963 Chapter 10 Challenging ‘the Ladder to Privilege’, 1963–1965 Chapter 11 The Alternative Educationist, 1965–1967 Chapter 12 Expansion and Replication, 1967–1969 Chapter 13 Time of Crisis, 1969–1971 Chapter 14 Education with Production, the 1970s Chapter 15 Foundation for Education with Production and Spreading the Word, the 1980s Chapter 16 Education with Production and South Africa, the 1990s Chapter 17 Return to Botswana Epilogue Bibliography Index

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 1.7.2020
• Zusatzinfo: 15 b&w
• Verlagsort: Johannesburg
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Literatur ► Biografien / Erfahrungsberichte
• Themenwelt: Sachbuch/Ratgeber ► Geschichte / Politik
• Themenwelt: Sozialwissenschaften ► Pädagogik
• ISBN-10: 1-77614-606-9 / 1776146069
• ISBN-13: 978-1-77614-606-2 / 9781776146062