A decolonial analysis of the post-apartheid media representation of student protests in institutions of higher learning in South Africa

Abstract

This qualitative research explores the post-apartheid traditional news media representations of student protests in institutions of higher learning. The study focuses on three institutions of higher learning in Pretoria. These are the University of South Africa (UNISA), University of Pretoria (UP) and. Tshwane University of Technology (TUT). The study argues that colonially derived de-humanising media frames were used by mainstream news media which in turn desensitized the public from legitimate student grievances. The research focuses on how the press news media covered and represented the protests that took place in institutions of higher learning between 2015 and 2023. The qualitative study is an offshoot and a reaction to constantly debated news representations where it pertains to these prevalent protests by the marginalised. The protests’ intermittent eruptions in various institutions of higher learning in the country since October 2015, have posed a lot of questions and an exposure of how the post-apartheid establishment has failed to completely eradicate the inherent colonial social structure. This study employs the decolonial epistemic perspective, a humanising pedagogy, and the critical political economy of the media approach as the theoretical lens aimed at illuminating conversations on the perpetual epistemic hegemony perpetrated by the established status quo through the post-apartheid traditional media outlets in the representation of student of protests in institutions of higher learning.