UP Law students well-represented at Law Students’ Conference on the Decolonisation and Africanisation of Legal Education

Posted on July 26, 2019

(Fltr:  Zenia Pero, Caroline Letsoalo and Primrose Kurasha)

The Third Law Students’ Conference on the Decolonisation and Africanisation of Legal Education took place on Monday, 15 July 2019, at the University of Venda in the Venda region of the Limpopo Province. The University of Pretoria was represented by law students Ms Caroline Letsoalo and Ms Zenia Pero, who delivered a joint paper at the Conference, whilst Ms Primrose Kurasha, who is pursuing an LLD in the Faculty of Law, attended the Conference on behalf of the Deanery.

Ms Letsoalo, a final year LLB student, and Ms Pero, a final year LLM student, jointly presented a paper on '’Historically white universities and ‘other’ bodies' critical reflections on the ‘white gaze’ decolonisation, and the LLB curriculum'’, which will be published in the 2019 Pretoria Student Law Review edition.

In his address, keynote speaker Professor Tshepo Madlingozi tackled the issue of decolonisation by first noting the ground-breaking nature of the Conference, which he said was commendable as for the first time students were working in tandem with academics to advocate for the decolonisation of the LLB Curriculum and the law as a whole. This, he noted, 'attested to the end of a disconnect between students and academics which had seen only the academics being the face and proponents of decolonisation, and not the students who had to assimilate the decolonised legal literature.'

The debate of decolonisation versus decoloniality versus africanity took centre stage. In addition to this, seven stimuli informing the radicalism of decolonisation were proffered.

First was the challenge to attendees to move beyond their ‘ivory towers’ and conference setups and contribute to progressive politics by advocating for decolonisation, as essentially there could not be a decolonised university in a colonised society.

The second stimulus for discussion dealt with the hidden curriculum versus the open curriculum. It was emphasised that a need to confront the hidden curriculum as opposed to only focusing on the open curriculum was imperative in the decolonisation movement. For example, the hidden curriculum was characterised by politics of citation, the person who gets to speak in class and what was deemed ‘a more acceptable accent’.*

The third stimulus for discussion was critical pedagogy in the form of robust debate fora for topics, which would entice legal debates, such as xenophobia. It was highlighted that critical pedagogy was a manifestation of the ability to go beyond the ‘ivory towers’ and tackle practical issues from a decolonisation perspective. For instance, the University of Pretoria’s Legal Shebeen student body was referred to as the hub of critical pedagogy in the institution.

The fourth stimulus for decolonisation dealt with classism and how the impoverished were decolonising how the law was understood, for example Property law, by taking over the land.

Decolonisation in terms of appreciating and exclusively focussing on indigenous African subjugated norms and values was presented as the fifth provocation, instead of borrowing from African American, Latin American theories or any other foreign literature. As an example, mention was made of Fanon. Decoloniality had to be decolonised, as a focus on these foreign theories and literature which has been happening all along, was a mere form of recolonisation.

The disruptive nature of decolonisation was tabled as the sixth stimulus. It was argued that decolonisation could not be merely co-opted into the university curriculum and become a 'unique selling point' (USP) in institutional marketing as many universities have been found guilty of doing so.

The final stimuli under discussion was cultural imperialism of the 21st Century, which was evident, for example, in the manner in which shack dwellers were redefining the cities and their traditional town planning laws. The question raised was if this could be regarded as a form of decolonisation.

The urge not to return to pre-colonisation of the law and its curriculum, but rather achieving  jurisprudential parity in the form of legal pluralism was tabled as the rationale behind the decolonisation discourse. This was in response to a question raised as to why decolonisation had became a priority.

The Unit of analysis for the Study or Science of Decolonisation suggested that colonisation, and not necessarily colonialism or apartheid, were eras defined in particular time capsules. However, colonisation on the other hand was a continuous status quo defining culture as depicted in lifestyles and education.

The topic Decolonisation versus transformation, and stemming from that Decolonised Constitutionalism versus Transformative Constitutionalism, were discussed in-depth. At conclusion, the following suggested solutions dealt with the efficacy of the decolonisation discourse and the realisation of its objectives:

  1. De-disciplining and overcoming conceptual or disciplinary decadence;
  2. Conceptualising decolonisation, for example by decomposing and understanding he concept of time in a European versus African sense; and the concept of community in a European versus African sense, as the law, decolonised or not, was primarily a reflection of these two concepts regardless of its evolution.
  3. Historical revisionism;
  4. The lived experience of historically colonised groups, such as the Khulumani Support Group, which was fostering judicial redress and social reconciliation;
  5. Philosophical sagacity gained through discussions with sages;
  6. Sociology of emergence;
  7. European sense and how this tool of language facilitated and served as a catalyst of decolonisation; and
  8. African literature.

In the 1 July edition of De Rebus, editor Mapula Sedutla raises the question if it is time for the LLB to change?  She also elaborates on the four main themes for review that the CHE has raised in their report, namely curriculum reform, graduate attributes, social sensitivity and resources.  The CHE's national review report released in April 2017 (Legal education in crisis?, De Rebus, May 2017) aimed to strengthen the quality of legal education provision across South African universities.

* Source:  See “Confronting and Dismantling Institutional Racism” by Tshepo Madlingozi.  

- Author Primrose Kurasha/Elzet Hurter

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