Teaching controversial issues in an independent South African boys' school - an autoethnography

Abstract

As a legacy of our troubled past, South Africa continues to grapple with inequality and marginalisation. Regarded as a profoundly unequal society, access to education remains a contentious issue. South African independent boys’ schools are embedded within the intricacies of the South African education system. Almost three decades after democracy, these schools still embody their colonial mandate to produce citizens of the Empire in culture and ethos. This evocative autoethnography explores the complexity of a White, male educator's attempt to teach controversial issues in the formal, informal, and nonformal curricula of the South African independent boys’ school. Complexity theory was utilised to explain the intricate influence of the constituent elements of my teaching practice. Purposeful sampling was used to identify participants for an emic process of critical conversations with co-witnesses and co-constructors of my experience. This was combined with memory work to construct an autoethnographic narrative in the form of short stories. This research reveals the complex relationship between understandings of gender, whiteness, a colonial legacy, and an emergent multiracial elite class of South Africans. In turn, this exposes the nuanced way in which problematic constituent elements of independent boys’ schools influence the teaching and learning of controversial issues. Thus, this study serves as an attempt to place the independent boys’ school into the context of the broader South African education system and offers a nuanced understanding of how learners at these affluent and privileged institutions are taught and learn controversial issues.