Like a bridge over troubled landscapes: African pathways to doctorateness

ABSTRACT

This article is based on the journeys of four women who completed their doctorates in the discipline of Sociology. The four former doctoral students studied at the same distance education institution in South Africa, but they hail from Nigeria, Lesotho and Cameroon, respectively. Together with their former supervisor, autoethnography is used to reflect on their academic journeys. In addition to their academic journeys, they also had to navigate personal journeys that included being employed fulltime and regulating expectations towards completing the doctorate within their home country. Moreover, not only difficulties are highlighted but also strategies in overcoming obstacles, such as actively building various supportive networks. The journeys continue after completing a doctorate, for example, when visas to international conferences are denied to scholars with certain African passports. By focusing on the doctoral journeys and beyond, other inequalities in the global academic world is touched upon.

KEYWORDS:

• Doctorates
• autoethnography
• academic journeys
• Africa

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 In South Africa, the term ‘historically disadvantaged institution (HDI)’ became a standard way of referring to universities where the overwhelming majority of the student population is black. It is a remnant of the apartheid era (or enforced racially segregated era) where black students were channelled or even restricted to these institutions. In general, HDIs had less well-developed infrastructure compared to historically advantaged (formerly predominantly white) institutions. Although the significance of the term is diminishing and not entirely relevant to UNISA, it still provides an important perspective and legacy.

2 In South Africa, and many other African countries, a three-year undergraduate degree is followed by a one-year honours degree, a one- or two-year Master’s degree (depending on the programme) and a doctoral degree that is targeted to be completed between three to five years. The aforementioned length of study is based on full-time study and it often takes longer to complete these degrees, especially in a distance education context, as many students study on a part-time basis.

3 A doctorate is often referred to as a terminal degree in some African countries.

4 In many African contexts, ‘school’ is an encompassing term that refers to any educational institution on any level, including tertiary institutions.

5 The Canadian Sociological Association gave an official apology to absent International Sociological Association (ISA) members who were not given visas to attend the ISA Congress in 2018 in Toronto. Sahmicit organised a session at the congress and Marlize, the former supervisor, had to chair that meeting on her behalf.