Lived experiences of black women academic researchers at the University of South Africa

Abstract

This study, The lived experiences of black women academic researchers at the University of South Africa, investigated the factors that impacted on the lives of the black women academics at Unisa in the College of Education. It was a phenomenological study wherein the participants shared their lived experiences through in-depth interviews. This was a qualitative study that employed an interpretive paradigm. This permitted the view that reality is multiple layered. It took into account the various viewpoints of the participants as different realities that were narrated in this report by using the verbatim quotations of the participants. The findings revealed that Black women academic lecturers at Unisa faced challenges in the teaching and learning area. They had no ownership of modules that they taught because they were not primary lectures. They experienced racism and alienation from both Black and White academics that have long been at Unisa. White staff questioned their qualifications and, they received no orientation in the teaching of ODL modules. In the research area, challenges concerned the supervision of postgraduate students and article writing for publication. It also arose that they received less support from senior colleagues and from their supervisors in their personal studies. There was general complaint about the 2010 Unisa mentoirship programme but there was commendation of the recent CEDU mentorship programme. The participants felt that Unisa should introduce academic support programmes that would cater for staff over the age of 50 because the current programmes only cater for those below 50 years of age.