What newspapers tell us about teacher-on-learner violence in South African schools

Abstract

This small-scale qualitative study of newspapers’ portrayal of teacher-on-learner violence in South African schools is informed, firstly, by the World Health Organisation’s definition of violence and four of the World Health Organisation’s six main types of violence involving children and, secondly, by John Galtung’s theory of violence. South African media was used as a database for identifying South African English newspaper articles on teacher-on-learner violence. Qualitative content analysis was employed to systematically work through the identified newspaper articles. Five types of direct teacher-on-learner violence were identified: (1) The physical abuse of learners under the pretext of addressing learner misbehaviour; (2) the normalisation of the sexual abuse of learners by their teachers; (3) teachers’ use of words to systematically humiliate and tear down learners; (4) teachers’ negative stereotyping and discrimination of learners belonging to a different race; and (5) teachers’ malicious neglect of their in loco parentis responsibilities. Looking at teacher-on-learner violence through the lens of Galtung’s theory of violence, this study facilitates an understanding of the multi-layered and complex nature of teacher-on-learner violence and contributes to the existing body of knowledge on teacher-on-learner violence.