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Mail & Guardian
paulo freirelatest news & developments
Students protest against apartheid in 1976. (Photo by Keystone/Getty Images)
APARTHEID

Lessons from South Africa’s past for a future of collective empowerment

Education’s role in fostering critical consciousness and political engagement has been side-lined in favour of a narrow focus on individual success and economic competitiveness

  • Vashna Jagarnath
6 min read
Peruvian theologian Gustavo Gutiérrez died on 22 October at the age of 96. (Catholic Register)
BLACK CONSCIOUSNESS MOVEMENT

How ‘shantytown’ priest Gustavo Gutiérrez changed the world

He developed liberation theology, rooted in the lived experience of the oppressed, and committed to transforming unjust social and political structures

  • Richard Pithouse
7 min read
To maximise AI’s potential in peace, justice and governance, governments, NGOs, multilateral institutions and the private sector must invest in ethical AI research, data-sharing initiatives and regulatory frameworks. Photo: File
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE

Effective methods of teaching students in the age of AI

Students need to learn creative and critical thinking, so they can work with AI, while they are at university and in the world of work

  • Edmund Terem Ugar
7 min read
People’s hero: A mural depicting Amílcar Cabral who was the foremost leader of the struggle for the independence of Guinea-Bissau and Cape Verde from Portugal. (Photo by GUIZIOU Franck / hemis.fr / hemis.fr / Hemis via AFP)
ABAHLALI BASEMJONDOLO

How Cabral, Fanon and Freire shaped the struggle against apartheid South Africa — and still inspire

Amílcar Cabral was assassinated 50 years ago today. His thought, which sometimes arrived in South Africa via a circuitous route, speaks to our current crisis with undiminished…

  • Richard Pithouse
8 min read
Epitome of ethics: Author and cultural critic bell hooks insisted that care, love and spirituality were the core of black feminist practice and freedom. Photo: Karjean Levine/Getty Images
ACADEMIA

A spirit guide to ethical black feminist thinking and praxis

bell hooks’s refusal to ‘get in formation’ foregrounded healing as the foundation to a communal liberatory agenda

  • Moshibudi Motimele
9 min read
Some schools, predominantly the better-resourced schools, have been able to carry on with teaching online whereas in many other schools, learners have had to make do with a couple of radio and television lessons. (Graphic: John McCann)
CORONAVIRUS

Education is a political and ethical matter

Knowing the learners and teachers and what they need is essential to reform in the school system

  • Muki Moeng
5 min read
The freedom to think independently, and allowing others the same freedom, is central to our democracy (Graphic: John McCann/M&G)
BASIC EDUCATION

Critical thinking enhances performance

The ability to think analytically and beyond surface-level information is a skill that brings solutions to the world’s issues

  • Clive W Kronenberg
8 min read
The colonial education system debarred a multitude of voices from engagement in constructing our worlds and knowledge systems, says the writer. (John McCann)
EDUCATION

Race is an obstinate variable

The education system needs a revolution so that black people’s academic achievements will improve

  • Staff Reporter
7 min read
As many educators have pointed out over very many years, education is not a neutral process (John McCann/M&G)
ALTERNATIVE SCHOOLING

Un-schooling is better for children

Education in South Africa is a mess but alternative education is, well, an alternative

  • Terry Bell
6 min read
(Graphic: John McCann/M&G)
CURRICULUM

Curriculums must include local content

Decolonised education is one that incorporates local information that is relevant to all learners

  • Gert Van Der Westhuizen
  • Khomotso Ntuli
7 min read