Abstract
This article offers a sociological explanation of the formation of school culture at a special-needs high school in Cape Town. The objective of the research was to understand “placemaking” in a school setting – in other words, how a school is endowed with meaning and comes to express behaviours that display particular values, assumptions and beliefs, and the effect this has on the prevailing school culture. Canaan School (pseudonym) is located in the Western Cape and accommodates learners with various special educational needs. As at other special-needs schools, the teachers at Canaan pursue the same objective as their mainstream counterparts: preparing their students sufficiently to complete the CAPS-based National Senior Certificate requirements in Grade 12.
My research was aimed at explaining how Canaan navigated the everyday exigencies within which it sought to accommodate learners and educators from diverse demographic and “disability” backgrounds in a space deemed as “inclusive”. The findings of this article are based on data that revealed decisive dimensions that had significantly affected the dynamics that make up the school’s institutional culture today. I adopted a “socio-spatial” lens, which suggests that space is created through the interaction of various spatial dimensions (Lefebvre 1991). My contention is that a place is continually made and remade, influenced by factors such as time, history, politics, power, race, gender and religion. Institutional culture consists mostly of “invisible” attributes, such as values, assumptions and beliefs, which are expressed in the behaviour of those making up the institution. My research was an attempt to uncover these invisible dimensions through a triangulated analysis of qualitative data. Situated within the interpretivist paradigm, this study followed an ethnographic research approach. Qualitative data was collected in the course of a school year by means of extensive participant observation as well as both unstructured and semi-structured interviews.
I start off by presenting a synoptic history of Canaan School, from its establishment in the late 1930s through to the time of my research study in 2019. I refer to the school’s institutional habitus, comprising a system of resilient, transposable patterns of socio-cultural dispositions and practices invested in an institution through its cultural history, and which continue to operate in the institution. Institutional habitus refers to “educational status, organisational practices and expressive order, expectations, conduct, character, and manners” (Çelik, 2017:12). The description of the school’s history over a period of roughly 70 years is presented alongside Hunter’s (2019) historical periodisation. Hunter develops the concept of “white tone” as an analytical perspective to explain the shifting nature of schools’ institutional culture in South Africa since the official implementation of apartheid in 1948. To Hunter, “white tone” is found when cultural whiteness is invested with a type of “prestige” at schools in South Africa – a concept I adopted to explain how the institutional habitus of Canaan School operated during my time at the school.
In a second theoretical dimension I investigate the spatial features of Canaan School’s institutional culture, drawing on Lefebvre’s (1991) spatial triad, namely perceived/physical space, conceived/mental space, and lived/social space. The spatially inscribed “lived” dimensions, as expressions of the school’s institutional culture, are discussed with reference to two core themes: managerialist practices, and the positioning of the teachers in the school space and culture.
I show how school culture at Canaan School was constructed through its historical development and has since been reconfigured through the people who interact with the school. Placemaking involves a dynamic interaction between Lefebvre’s three fields of space mentioned above. From the historical discussion it becomes clear how Canaan School was founded and operated as a whites only, Afrikaans special-needs school, partly owned and managed by the Dutch Reformed Church. I present data to argue for the particular realisation of the institutional habitus “in action” in terms of Lefebvre’s three spatial dimensions and explain the reorganisation of “white tone” in the lived realities of Canaan School. I further argue that the institutional tone is today typified by managerialism, which can be attributed to the school’s neoliberal institutional functioning. These managerial practices have been playing a formative reorganising role in the lived realities encountered by the managers, teachers and learners at the school.
My findings reveal that as the institutional culture of the school unfolded over the years, the school and its teachers were positioned in specific ways. The school expresses its Afrikaans, Christian “white tone” through the unwritten rules prevalent in its daily operations and its prestige as a leading special-needs institution in South Africa. It is also found that Canaan’s institutional tone has come to be characterised by a discourse of managerialism. This institutional culture provides the context within which the teachers act and operate, which, in essence, isolates them in their classrooms.
Keywords: inclusive education; managerialism; neoliberalism; placemaking; spatial theory; school culture; special educational needs; special schools
Lees die volledige artikel in Afrikaans
Die isolasie van onderwysers by ’n spesiale skool in Kaapstad deur neoliberale bestuurspraktyke
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