Academic Life Story of Dr Botlhale Tema
I like being an intellectual. It was a representation ofthe best I could be.
Dr Botlhale Tema is the secretary-general for the South African National Commission for UNESCO. When I interviewed her at the end of 1996, Botlhale was the national director of the non-governmental organisation PROTEC (Programme for Technological Careers). She had also been an associate professor in the Department of Biology at the University of Bophuthatswana. She completed her doctorate in science education at the University of Reading (Britain) in 1993. I interviewed her for about 4.5 hours over three sessions.
Botlhale and I had met briefly at an education conference in 1987. Since 1994 we have met and interacted at various science education conferences and our relationship has shifted from acquaintances towards a friendship. Botlhale was aware of my research project and was supportive and encouraging. When I asked Botlhale to be part of the project she agreed.
Beginnings: education as a value
Botlhale Tema is an African woman born about 50 years ago in a nursing home in Johannesburg. She is the eldest of five children of Davidson and Rhoda Moloto. The Moloto family home was in the Bafokeng Village, close to Rustenburg. At about the time of her birth Botlhale's father was appointed as a school principal and the family lived in that village for sometime. When he was made school inspector the family moved and Botlhale says she never lived in anyone place for a long time. "Mobility was a common trait in my existence."
Botlhale's father, Davidson Moloto, is 86 years old1. Botlhale says she is very close to him "in a African way. He is very important to me". Her father was the first Tswana novelist and his books depicted village life and the Tswana past. In his retirement he joined the Bophuthatswana government as a deputy minister of economic affairs. Botlhale's mother, Rhoda Khwiti Moloto, completed her junior certificate and trained as a primary school teacher. Her mother did not teach after her marriage. Her
I Sadly he passed away in September 1998.
father said 'I won't have a wife who will be working.' Botlhale says, "My parents are very good together. That is why, I think, we can't get married."
Botlhale remembers her paternal grandparents Steven and Elizabeth Moloto. Her grandfather was a minister who held a high position in the Dutch Reformed Church. She describes her grandmother as "a dominee's2 wife" and "the quietest woman I ever knew." Because Botlhale knew her grandfather for a short while (she was ten years old when he died) she understands his influence in terms of expectations. There are family stories about how her grandfather and father got their education and the hardships that they had to endure in this process.
The Moloto family lived in Rustenburg in the Western Transvaal3. There was no educational institution of any note in that area. Botlhale's grandfather completed his standard six there and then went to the Dutch Reformed Training Institute in the Free State to train to become a minister. To get from Rustenburg to the Free State you had to go to Botswana and get a train. In those days Blacks were not allowed onto the peoples' coaches - they had to travel in the open cattle trucks. With the rains, by the time you got to your destination you were swimming in those trucks. "My grandfather got his education the hard way. My father had it slightly better." Her father got his education in the Free State and Rustenburg, uninterruptedly, up to standard eight. Thereafter he would work for a year and study for a year. "He went to Fort Hare and did matric inone year(said with emphasis). He would say that if you wanted to study, you would tie a wet towel around your head to keep awake and therefore he could do two years of matric in one year. My grandfather was so excited and he would say, 'Ketla gotsalla ngwana' (Matric, I couldn't get you, but I have a son who would get you). It was a major achievement. My father finished his degree at 35. I thought that was interesting and I asked him what education meant to him. He said there were two things. One was that to be educated amongst my people was to do things that other people had not done and, secondly to be educated meant that you had to acquire knowledge that seemed just for Whites. I asked what values underlie getting education. He said that in traditional villages without education, before the white man came, strength of character was a very important thing. As time progressed that kind of value was given to educated people.
2This is an Afrikaans word, referring to a minister in the church.
3This area is now in North-West Province.
For me education was an expectation and it was also a very important value within the family. There was no choice linked to education."
On the maternal side, Botlhale did not know her grandfather because he had died before she was born; but she had heard that he was involved with the African National Congress. During her high school years, Botlhale stayed for three years with her maternal grandmother, Pauline Lefanka. "My grandmother was on her own and used to work as a domestic servant. My mother felt guilty about not supporting her. My parents made the arrangement that the children would stay with my grandmother and by my father supporting us he would support her. What I noticed about her was that she was very, very independent. My fat er was supposed to support her, but she would go behind his back and do the laundry for White people. I admired her more than anything. She was a person who would not be pushed around. In our church, the Mothers Union4 used a certain uniform. She refused to do so. Everyone disapproved but she went to church and said she was not going to wear that. She was really proud and strong. I wish I knew her with my eyes of now. When I compare her with my mother, she is equally strong but she has the luxury of being weak at the same time because she is with my father."
Botlhale is the eldest of five children. Her sister Pat, is deputy director in Health Services and lives in Mmabatho. Her brother Pappie is a consultant for Ernest and Young. Marlene is a radiotherapist and lives in Australia. Puli is a lawyer who has a law practice and consults for government. In addition, there was always someone living in the house. A recent count by the family showed that 24 people lived at the house at some time or the other. Since her father was a school principal, if someone came from another village and did not have a place to stay, they ended up staying at the Moloto home.
Botlhale grew up in a Tswana village and her home language was Tswana. Her grandparents spoke English to each other and to the children. Her parents would have liked them to speak more English, but they found this difficult to do in the village. In the village there were a few Afrikaner families so the only language people knew, outside SeTswana, was Afrikaans.
4The women used black skirts and red jackets.
Bafokeng5was linked to platinum mining, and had modem characteristics. "When I think of my context, I have always lived in a more modem house compared to other people. My home had a zinc roof, not grass like most other homes. What the roof was made up of was a determinant of your class. I also always had shoes. I remember when going to school, putting on my shoes when leaving home, taking the shoes off and becoming 'normal' like the other kids. My family, although we had a zinc roof and had shoes, were not an island and interacted with the rest of the village."
Bafokeng village life was dynamic. Her father was an advisor to the chief. At that time the village was battling with the government for a share of profits from the platinum mines. There would be court cases in the village and when they won the children (called sunbeams, like girl-guides) would march around with small white flags.
The quality that her parents considered most important was humility. Her parents also expected the children to succeed in education. "Education was not linked to a career but was a value." I thought this a significant point and comment. We both then engaged in animated conversation about education being a value. "For me it was a part of character. It went deep, even when you got married and chose a husband, my mother would say: 'when I got married I was faced with choosing a rich man (someone who had a shop) or an educated man. I knew which I wanted. I wanted a man of letters'. The money has open, obvious, social status and education has internal status. In society it is more respected and more valued." As Botlhale spoke about this she said "I have never thought about it this coherently before." Because the concept of education as a value is so exciting as opposed to, for example, education for a career or economic development, we were both animated and fought for the conversation space. I realised my role as a researcher was to listen and I should let Botlhale talk. This was a very exciting part of the interview.
Botlhale comes from a religious home, where religion was a way of life. There was no way that you could have Sunday without church. "As I grew older, religion came to mean something different. It didn't really touch my heart. Now I see it as a kind of spiritual anchor." Botlhale belonged to the Dutch Reformed Church. This was a terrible embarrassment in her youth because the Dutch Reformed Church is linked to apartheid.
5Recently I visited Rustenburg and was amazed to see the difference between the village administered by the Bafokeng and the other villages. Because of the platinum mines, the Bafokeng have more resources and are better off than other African groups in the area.
Further, her husband was the son of a Dutch Reformed Minister. Botlhale indicates that when you are growing up in the village, because you do not know any different, you see all churches as being the same:. "When you start defining yourself politically and you find that you are Dutch Reformed, it becomes an embarrassment." I asked if the church influenced her educational trajectory and Botlhale indicates that for her, "My parents were my total influence in education."
When I asked Botlhale about politics, she started off describing the home ethos.
"My mother and father liked ideas. At home we debated and discussed. When we came from school we had to show that we had ideas. Everybody would sit and talk about them. I do the same thing with my children. We sit, watch TV, comment on it and criticise it. I enjoy people who have ideas." Botlhale described the difference, politically, between people from a village and a town. "When you talk about politics in a village, people in towns do not understand what you are talking about. I knew about apartheid only when I was in matric. I had not interacted with White people as a subordinate until I got onto trains for boarding school where I was called 'kaffir'. I got to know Whites when I was a student at university. The White people whom we knew were farmers. We interacted with them and I was never in a situation where I or anyone in my family worked directly for them. It wasn't something that irked on a daily basis such that we developed rudimentary ideas of the politics of South Africa. We had typical village life concerns - milking cows and collecting water. As we grew older I went to boarding school, got to know the bigger world, picked up ideas about politics, brought them home and they got debated. When we went to university it became more focused and intense. I was at university during the NUSAS6phase. My brother was heavily involved in SASO and he went to into exile. At about the same time my father was about to retire. I don't think he could deal with the idea that he was going to retire and have nothing to do. He got involved in the homeland government. When we ask him now about their involvement he says, 'We got into the homeland situation and I have to sit here and let other people determine how I live. I would rather see if I could fashion that myself. At that time the family was polarised because of politics. The debates at the table were like wars. Interestingly, we came 0 t of it. When my parents were in the Bophuthatswana Government my brother would say, 'Do you want me to kill my parents'. My father
would say, 'Go ahead and kill us. You made a choice, what makes you think we did not make a choice'. That was very significant in my family. You make up your own mind.
We are all very stubborn people. For me politics is not what I am strong at. I am defined mainly by the fact that I have to bring up children on my own. I also am not very good at taking one side to anything. I like to keep my right to see all sides."
Primary and secondary school: not a happy period
Botlhale went to the Bafokeng Preparatory School in the early 1950's. Botlhale laughs as she repeats the word preparatory. Black American missionaries, the Spooners, had started the school. Botlhale says that she does not remember much about her stay there but "what I do remember was that early childhood learning was not a pleasant thing. I remember the [African] teachers being mean and vindictive. I don't dwell on these things, but am referring to it because you asked me." Botlhale indicates that the teachers' meanness was because she was a teacher's daughter and they had no patience with her. "All through my scho ling within communities that knew me that was always the disadvantage. Even when I went to the high school at the same place, our teachers would be horrible and say, 'Look at her. You expect her to know. She is a teacher's child'. I don't remember what I learnt in school. I don't remember one sentence. My mind does that. Itmust have been totally unpleasant."
I ask Botlhale to describe the school. She says that it was big, but she does not remember what she learnt there. "My mind is just blank." Botlhale thinks since this education was before the Bantu Education Act, the language of instruction was English.
When Botlhale was about 12 (in 1957) her father moved her to a Catholic boarding school, St Anne's Primary School in Rustenburg. In standard five and six White nuns taught her. Botlhale thinks her father may have moved her because of the Bantu Education Act. This Act, passed in 1953, placed education for Africans under the control of central government, and its underlying philosophy was to train Africans for menial job. This Act also called for the transfer of all church and mission schools to the state. This transfer was to take place on 1 April 1955. Itis most probable that the
6NUSAS was the National Union of South African Students and SASO was the South African Student Organisation.
Bafokeng Preparatory School, handed over control to the government. The Roman Catholic Church did not hand over their schools and continued operating, with its own curriculum and without state aid.
Botlhale enjoyed studying at St Anne's and made many friends. She performed at the top of the class and her school reports were good. The medium of instruction was English and they were encouraged to read many books. She studied arithmetic but "it was never my strong point and even now I am not a figures person." The school did not offer science and her father decided to move her out of that school.
Botlhale tried to get the reasons about this decision from him. "I am getting kids into science [in Protec] and I can give you a rational argument about why we have to get them into science. We would talk about the importance of scientific jobs and the economy. My father would not give you that kind of reason, but say that, for him, science was an unexplored field. He would say that it had aura that you would be doing something that other people hadn't done." Botlhale adds laughingly, "Another reason for my father removing me from St Anne's was that I wanted to become a nun and he could not bear it."
Botlhale returned to Bafokeng High School for her Junior Certificate (Form I, Form II and Form Ill). Her father had been principal at this school but was now promoted as school supervisor. This meant that her father travelled around and her mother moved to the family farm in Pilanesburg. Botlhale stayed with her grandmother in the township for those three years.
Botlhale says she performed well in Form I and II, but in Form III again felt the negative responses from her teachers because she was a teacher's daughter. "I remember one teacher that beat me so badly my father had to come to school." She says that the teachers were competent in their subject areas. Botlhale did well in most subjects but barely survived maths and science.
In addition, this period was characterised by the self-consciousness of teenage years. "A very troubled time. Boys were becoming an issue and that was disturbing. St Anne's was all girls. I remember it as a very uncomfortable time of my life. That was when I got to know boys, knew that they existed and knew they could have a relationship with you on a level that you didn't really understand. Itwasn't a particularly happy and pleasant time."
The Junior Certificate examination was a public examination and Botlhale says she barely made it. "I would not put any value in terms of educational ability on that. I just could not concentrate. That's all I remember. I could not concentrate. It was a time about sudden puberty and self-awareness. My performance did not please either me or my parents."
For Form IV and V Botlhale went to boarding school again. She says that "this is a side that discomfits me and it was a period of difficulty." Her father wanted her to go to Kilnerton High School in Pretoria. This was an elite mission boarding school. Many of the top brass Africans of Botlhale's age went there. The brother of Botlhale's principal at her secondary school mentioned Modise Sekitla High School. He told her (and her family) that the school was very good, had a very good English teacher and it was an African school. For Botlhale that was a period of her self-definition [as an African]. She said she wanted to go to that school and refused to go to Kilnerton. "I flatly refused to go to Kilnerton because everyone else went there. I said I wanted to go to this school. 1 have never made a bigger mistake in my life."
Modise Sekitla was a boarding school in Hammanskraal. Botlhale speaks with difficulty, "I cannot reconcile that experience. Even now. I wish I had never been there. 1 haven't come to terms with that part of my history. I am speaking about this for the first time. When 1 don't like something I blank it out." As Botlhale talks it is clear that she had a bad experience at the school. She describes the school as a "dump." The physical conditions were horrible. There were times when there was no water. They would get water from a river, put lime in it and we had to drink that. Botlhale says she couldn't tell her parents because this had been her choice. "1 stayed in that dump as best as 1 could and bathed with cold water." Worse than the physical conditions were the psychological conditions. "The principal was such a crook. He would encourage boys to fight and to steal. This was an African effort! I could not tell my parents."
As Botlhale speaks about the school it is clear that this is first time she is visiting a difficult past. She reflects on the positives at the school. "I liked the school in the sense that it encouraged independence. You think for yourself and you are self-determining."
The English and the history teachers were very good. Botlhale says she had a very good foundation in terms of thinking. But these teachers only came to school three times a week, not on Mondays and Fridays, because they were alcoholics. Botlhale was very