South Africa: Black Students' Dissent On Afrikaans Campuses Is About More Than Just Language Policy

The student movements that emerged at Tuks, NWU-Pukke and Stellenbosch University (SU) in the days before #FeesMustFall protests, challenged the privileges of whiteness at campuses where Afrikaans is a medium of instruction. The tendency was to reduce students' dissent to just a matter of language. But this would be an injustice, writes PONTSHO PILANE.

A while ago, I interviewed an Afrikaans-speaking student from NWU-Pukke who felt that it was unfair for black students at the campus to demand transformation on the campus. She said there are many universities in South Africa that have English as a medium of instruction and that those who don't want to learn in Afrikaans should go there.

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