I've just spent the past 2 hours trying to capture the events of the day - events that took me through a whole range of emotions, both positive and negative and that threatened to conjure up the full spectrum of the most counter-productive stereotypes held in the South African psyche. I resisted (I'd like to think I did anyway!). I've been forced to confront my dual roles in the research context - as insider and outsider - and powerfully realise that I cannot exclude my history from how I see, engage and represent the research context and myself in that context. To borrow from Lynn Mario de Souza - my history is a fundamental part of the context. How can I possibly try to exclude it from my position as researcher?
I'm sitting here reflecting on the day, revelling in the energy and buzz that makes this place what it is. The contradictions that define our daily lives, our journey to find meaning and to make sense of what is happening in our country and why we act, behave and think the way we do and to find that bits of common ground that join us together, sometimes, irrespective of race or belief.
I met some of my ex-students in Long Street for drinks,which was the perfect antidote to the day. I sat there most of the time just smiling - looking at some more young people being all they can be in this country, although acutely conscious of quirky features that defines our society's ways of being. It's at time like this that everything honourable about being a teacher just make sense to me and just makes me smile with a serious sense of pride.
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