Absent fathers and the lack of discipline in township learners : a pastoral challenge

Abstract

The aim of the study is to describe and determine the factors impactacting on township learners due to absent father. We have determined, that no study has yet been done in South Africa regarding this topic. “The impact of absent fathers on township learners” The absent father is considered to cause a barrier to learners in their daily lives given the challenges of life. His absence is perceived to have bred insecurity, a lack of a primary male role model and a lack of masculine love, care and guidance. The researcher is challenged to ask the following questions: 1) Can a child overcome feeling of abandonment, rejection and anger? 2) Are learners’ self-esteem affected when their fathers are absent? 3) If men forsake their families, will this action results in children suffering psychological wounds becouse of being rejected and abandoned? 4) Can this cause ill-discipline, like refusal to take orders and authority? 5) Is church prepared to play a meaningful role? Participants consisted of 8 adolescents, four boys and four girls from Phola Township, local high school called Mabande H S School in Mpumalanga Province. Data was collected by means of personal interviews and recorded. Special consent letters were given to parents. A qualitative method was selected as an inquiry process that is best suited to the understanding of the social or human level. A questionnaire (structured interview) gave learners the opportunity to express and share their own experiences and their inner most feelings of rejection. The researcher was born and bred in a rural area but has worked as a minister of religion in the Phola Township Pentecostal church for the past 16years. In his first appointment after ordination, he acquired a teaching employment in a local school in order to support himself. The researcher as an educator for the past seven years has come across with many traumatic cases emanating from this socio-economic challenged township. Most of the cases in this economically challenged area, are cases in which children are raised in single parent homes. In his role as school teacher, the researcher observed and was challenged to further investigate, to what extent

iii having an absent father was impacting on learners who were coming from this situation.