Flourishing in fragility: how to build antifragile ecosystems of learning, that nurture healthy vulnerability, in fragile environments in the Western Cape (South Africa) with at-risk learners

This research is a qualitative, autoethnographic study of antifragility in fragile spaces. It was written using data from Applied Theatre workshops, rehearsals and exercises; as well as questionnaires, semi-structured interviews and open discussions in focus groups with at-risk learners from Quintile 1-3 high schools, their educators, senior management staff, parents, caregivers and peers. Methodologically, social constructionism functioned as the schematic map that positioned the writing/writer between the self and others, and provided the philosophical scaffolding necessary to elucidate data analysis and interpretation. Institutional theory and organisational culture centered the analytical framework once thematic analysis had been conducted across the data sets. This reflexive, feminist paper exhumes and explores fragile spaces in Western Cape Quintile 1-3 schools, using drama and conscious, performed acts of vulnerability (on and off stage) as a means of activating antifragility in the performer and the observer. The data collection took place in the Western Cape in South Africa, and specifically refers to learners and their networks and blended learning ecosystems in that context. Noted conversants include Brown, Taleb and Butler. The findings of this study include a shift in how we define “success” in a fragile environment and an acknowledgment of antifragility as a strategy that is always in motion. Static achievement and a singular definition of learner excellence are shown to be the undesirable opposite of iterative antifragility and adaptive, holistic executive function and socio-cultural competence; and learner wholeness (as experienced and embodied by the learner themselves) is referred to as “flourishing”.

Grantor

Graduate School of Business (GSB)

Year dc:date.issued

2019

Author dc:creator

• Youngleson, Penelope

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Nilsson, Warren

• Vulnerability
• Antifragility
• Learning Ecosystems
• Applied Theatre
• Institutional Theory

Handle dc:identifier.uri

http://hdl.handle.net/11427/32352

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:open.uct.ac.za:11427/32352