The majority of the world's children live in low- and middle-income countries, yet the majority of early childhood cognitive research is done with a small proportion of high-income countries. These findings cannot be assumed to apply across all contexts. It is therefore necessary to confront entrenched systems of power and privilege in early…

This research note considers gendered risks within survey research, which, it argues, are a frequently overlooked aspect of this form of quantitative research. By reflecting on the process of conducting exit polls in South Africa, the research note highlights the importance of discussing the gendered practice of research and sexualized harassment…

The report of the Ministerial Committee on Transformation and Social Cohesion revealed that exclusionary practices are commonplace in South African universities. They remain a compelling factor that contributes to student attrition in Master's and doctoral programmes, and they were a trigger to the #RhodesMustFall movement. Universities, oblivious…

This paper explores academic promotion practices in higher education institutions. Promotion of faculty members of universities is one of the major mechanisms in maintaining and improving the quality and efficiency of higher education and research activities in the country. Appointment processes are therefore critical to institutional development;…

This article reflects on the tensions I encountered as an insider researcher during a qualitative study exploring academics' integration of educational technology in a South African higher education institution. While critical qualitative approaches acknowledge research participants' vulnerability to the researcher's interpretation and…

This article reports on the role and value of social reflexivity in collaborative research in contexts of extreme inequality. Social reflexivity mediates the enablements and constraints generated by the internal and external contextual conditions impinging on the research collaboration. It fosters the ability of participants in a collaborative…

Researcher reflexivity, meaning the revealing of the researcher's assumptions and her position vis-à-vis those researched, has by now become commonplace. This article explores such issues in the context of a larger study of transnational adoption for which I conducted interviews with South African birth mothers as both a researcher/interviewer and…

This article discusses North-South-South higher education collaboration as a context for development education. We analyse an intensive course on qualitative research methods and culturally responsive education organized by a network of five universities from global South and global North. The course aimed to enhance qualitative understanding of…

The authors bring together decolonial, place attuned, and critical posthumanist orientations to analyze an event during a residential workshop organized as part of a state-funded research project on decolonizing early childhood discourses in South Africa. An invitation during the workshop to grapple with what might be unsettling by attending to…

This paper, written as a confessional tale, explores the dialectic between the perception of the researcher ("how the multiple positions HE researchers simultaneously occupy in the field influence the framing of the research") and the reception of the researcher ("how the playing out of the researcher's role within the specific…

This paper explores the profound connection between race, gender, and culture in post-apartheid education at a public Afrikaans dual-language school in South Africa. Illustrating how the residues and remnants of apartheid legacies propagate arcane constructions of whiteness through interwoven racial and gendered stereotypes, this research maps the…

Academic literacies research has been identified as an emerging but significant field in higher education. This article extends the discussions around methodology in academic literacies research by drawing on the current text and context debates in sociolinguistics and linguistic ethnography. It uses illustrations from a recent academic literacies…

In this paper, we employ cultural sociology and Braj Kachru's model of World Englishes as theoretical and analytical tools for considering English as a form of capital necessary for widely disseminating research findings from local networks of practice to the greater science education research community. We present a brief analysis of recent…

This paper presents some reflections on the process of creating research, from the point of view of a psychologist working in an academic environment in a developing country which is undergoing social transformation. It explores some tensions between global and local concerns in research, and reflects on the relation between research, art,…

South African women in informal settlements lack access to education and employment opportunities, making them vulnerable to exploitation and poverty. A collaborative narrative inquiry was undertaken to compile the life histories of 16 women, identifying their participation in community building. The process combined popular education and feminist…