Decolonising and Humanising Pedagogies in South African Postgraduate Education

Abstract

Indigenous knowledge systems (IKS) have been marginalized in higher education institutions that have mostly followed Western paradigms of teaching, learning, and research. The prevalence of western pedagogies and worldviews has prompted certain stakeholders, such as the #FeesMustFall movement, to ask for the decolonization and humanization of South African higher education institutions' curricula. This chapter employed a qualitative document analysis (QDA) method to investigate how IKS could be used as a foundation for decolonizing and humanizing pedagogies at South African universities. It used Ubuntu's indigenous philosophy to elicit meaning, understanding, and case studies in which Ubuntu enshrines norms and values commensurate with African worldviews and epistemologies in order to humanize pedagogies. The study concludes that IKS is a social capital that can change the way universities design and apply pedagogies for teaching, learning, and research. The indigenous pedagogical praxis is the link between decolonization and humanization of higher education.