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How to increase your productivity as a researcher
5 Minute Read - When I first commenced my studies as an undergraduate student, I did everything manually. I thought that we had come a long way since people submitted hand-written theses and kept printed out copies of every article they referenced in their bibliography. Wrapping up my PhD thesis, just over a decade since I first set foot in a university lecture hall, I have now come to learn how much further technology has advanced since I first started. But I am also surprised…
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Why we need to start measuring quality of work and how to do it
4 Minute Read - Global inequality has become more pressing in recent decades as social unrest has become ever prevalent and writers on the subject more vocal. The predominant focus of the inequality debate has been on the differences between rich and poor countries; African countries being consistently cited as disadvantaged in this relationship. However, this focus has tended to overlook the inequalities which exist on the continent itself. It is in this area that this special issue of the African Review of Economics and Finance is dedicated as well as studies on stratification…
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Five ways to measure the effects of a crisis like COVID-19 on women
4 Minute Read - Social issues and crises tend to affect women more severely than men. This is why terms like “gender mainstreaming policies”, “gender-responsive interventions” and “gender-based budgeting” have become more popular in public policy discussions in recent years. The case has been made for the need to include gender in every analysis of social policy. But many of the toolkits which have been designed to do so have come up short. This is for a variety of reasons. Some of these shortcomings include…
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6 tips to help you get your New Year’s Resolutions back on track
6 Minute Read - The beginning of the year is the most opportune time to start something new. Consequently, many start off their year with a list of resolutions; from exercising more to drinking less alcohol. Many even spend tons of money investing in exercise equipment, training gear, and other tools needed to make the year a successful one. Unfortunately, only 66% of those who set new year’s resolutions at the beginning of January would have stuck to them 2 weeks into January, 55% by…
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Planning For Success: Strategies for Early Career Graduate Students
8 Minute Read - Does it feel like you fluctuate between the two extremes of the students you saw sitting on the lawn reading an economics textbook or casually hunched over a microscope in a white coat in your university prospectus and the meme of the lady in a business suit frantically working against time while pulling out her hair? If your answer is yes, don’t worry, you’re not alone. Oh, and…welcome to graduate school! But, do not fear, you do not need to feel…
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Pandemic underscores burden women carry doing paid and unpaid reproductive labour
4 Minute Read - Debates about women’s unpaid reproductive labour have been going on since the first woman received cash for her services. Reproductive labour includes cooking, cleaning, and caring for the elderly, the sick and children. It’s important to make the distinction between paid and unpaid reproductive labour. Paid reproductive labour is performed in exchange for money or a wage. Unpaid reproductive labour is done for free, and usually for the household in which the individual lives. This reproductive work has traditionally been undervalued…
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To say a whole damned mouth full
3 Minute Read - During the last few decades a lot of awareness has been created in South Africa surrounding the education of what non-verbal and physical sexual harassment is. The number of sexual offences that have been reported has increased from 64 512 during the 2001/2012 period to more than 66 000 sexual offences reported during the 2012/2013 period. This clearly indicates that people are feeling more empowered to report sexual offences or that sexual offences are on the increase. Either way, though it…
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A SONA with too many plans?
4 Minute Read - The President delivered his State Of the Nation Address (SONA) on the 20th of June; the second one this year. As the South African tradition goes, the state of the nation is dismal. People are living in poverty, they don’t have jobs, inequality does not seem to be letting up, and the economy is just not providing the type of growth which is needed to address these social ills. Though there was some repetition from what was presented in the February…
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The Handmaid’s fictional (but arguably realistic) Tale
5 Minute Read - I recently finished a few seasons of The Handmaid’s Tale (based on the novel by Margaret Atwood), and found the story quite fascinating. What I liked most about it was (though it was an extreme example) its depiction of how quickly freedoms can be removed, but also the demonstration of how social institutions work in reality. For those who don’t know the story, it essentially plays out in a society where fertility has dropped significantly and a regime had been adopted…
