CONVERSATION ON RACISM AND ITS MANIFESTATIONS IN HIGHER EDUCATION ENVIRONMENTS: RESPONSE TO PROFESSOR JONATHAN JANSEN
In his article on ‘sniffing out racial intolerance in campuses; Mail and Guardian, 13 August 2010’ Professor Jansen make observations that do not only require a response but need further elucidation. In the article mention is made of ‘an accusatory tone of public discourse that works to further separate ordinary black and white from coming together”. Whilst the above assertion has merit, it is in Professor Jansen’s admission “I know from experience that racial attitudes are not only carried in words but also communicated in other ways”, that the issue of ‘subliminal racism’ in the protected space of academics needs to be understood. The position of academic institutions and the instruments of knowledge generation and dissemination such as academic journals should not be underestimated in the national assignment of redefining the historic stereotypes about intellectualism. Academic institutions as repositories of knowledge and the recorded memory of a country’s future should at all ti...