Exploring the framing of disability in university policies: a comparative study at a selected university in Zimbabwe and in South Africa

Globally, disability inclusion has been brought into the spotlight and has become a significant issue in higher education policy and practice. However, this prominence has brought critical scrutiny to this policy and practice nexus, and challenges are being picked up all over the world. African higher education systems have not been spared from these challenges and universities around the continent are grappling with questions about how students with disabilities can be included, and yet there is limited research about the gap between policy and practice. This raises the question: How are universities on the African continent thinking about and understanding disability in their policy creation and provision? This study is an attempt to answer this question. In order to explore the gap between policies and practice, this study explored the policy framing of disability at institutional level at two African universities. To inform my research process, I was guided by a framework that embraced three conceptual frameworks: Institutional Logics (IL), Carol Bacchi’s ‘What’s the Problem Represented to be?’ (WPR) and the notion of civic epistemologies (CE) by Sheila Jasanoff. The study adopted a qualitative research approach and a comparative research design to compare university policies from University X (UX) from South Africa and University Y (UY) from Zimbabwe. Data were collected from university policy documents and semi-structured interviews with 40 purposively sampled respondents. Data were thematically analysed using themes from the conceptual framework that guided the study.

Grantor dc:publisher.institution

University of the Westen Cape

Year dc:date.issued

2024

Author dc:creator

• Maruza, Fadzayi Marcia

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Chetty, Rajendra

• Disability
• Policy framing
• Universities
• Institutional logics
• Civic epistemologies

Licence

• https://uwcscholar.uwc.ac.za/bitstreams/af769f0e-585c-434a-a49f-722ec2723854/download