From Victim to Villain: A ‘Slight’ of Speech? Media Representations of Township Youth

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Abstract
This paper concerns predictions, reported in the press, which have been made by professional bodies and human rights organizations concerning the long-term effects on black youth of exposure to township conditions. It is contended that these predictions lend themselves to secondary victimization of black youth and it is postulated that they are not based on empirical evidence. Furthermore, they reflect several unquestioned assumptions concerning the nature of personality and childhood which permeate the very hegemonic order they intend to oppose. The implications of this for the future are explored. The difficulties of ever freeing oneself from operating within the categories inherent in a particular dominant ideology are highlighted by the author's own inevitable recourse to those very categories of which the validity is questioned in this paper.

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