[Un]blurring the Challenges Facing Post-Graduate Students in South African Universities: An Afrocentric Youth Perspective

Abstract

South African senior academics do not accentuate the importance of the “publish or perish” mantra as required for young emerging scholars. This continued unfair and/or unjust practice is perpetuated further by a lack of attention to the problem, including less interest in research country-wide by some senior academics. It is in this context that—where this injustice is reported—it is often undermined and/or side-lined, or even critiqued. This paper is revisiting all of the various challenges faced by young emerging scholars in South African universities. Due to the complicated nature of the conduct of research in South African universities, the author did not pin-point any university by name, as this is the practical thorn that is evident country-wide and has been a systemic, strategic instigation to side-line emerging scholars in producing knowledge through various methods of gate-keeping. It is also delaying post-graduate students in the system for them to not see the importance of the continuation of post-graduate studies. Afrocentricity has been deployed as a theoretical lens, together with unstructured interviews and document reviews to collect data.