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'You've Always Seen Me as a Person First': An Autoethnography on Humanising PhD Supervision

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Title: 'You've Always Seen Me as a Person First': An Autoethnography on Humanising PhD Supervision
Language: English
Authors: Bongekile P. Mabaso (ORCID 0000-0002-0675-9136)
Source: Transformation in Higher Education. 2025 10.
Availability: AOSIS. 15 Oxford Street, Durbanville, Cape Town, 7550 South Africa. Tel: +27-21-975-2602; Fax: +27-21-975-4635; e-mail: publishing@aosis.co.za; Web site: https://thejournal.org.za/index.php/thejournal
Peer Reviewed: Y
Page Count: 10
Publication Date: 2025
Document Type: Journal Articles
Reports - Research
Education Level: Higher Education
Postsecondary Education
Descriptors: Doctoral Students, Supervision, Supervisory Methods, Educational Environment, Humanization, Colonialism, Foreign Countries, Blacks, Predominantly White Institutions, Doctoral Programs, Decolonization
Geographic Terms: South Africa
ISSN: 2415-0991
2519-5638
Abstract: As a black South African student from a disadvantaged background, my journey through doctoral studies at a historically white university revealed the complex, simultaneous dynamics of humanising and dehumanising processes within supervisory relationships. This autoethnography examines how supervisory relationships operate within contested institutional terrain, challenging linear transformation narratives through Ubuntu philosophy and Kronenberg's humanisation-dehumanisation continuum. Through analysing 25 of my personal diary entries spanning four years of my doctoral degree, I trace five interconnected themes that reflect the negotiation of contradictory institutional dynamics within academic spaces. The findings reveal how spatial negotiations, epistemic tensions and institutional fragmentation coexisted with authentic mentorship, safe space creation and strategic agency development. Rather than a linear movement from exclusion to inclusion, I experienced ongoing navigation of spaces marked by constraint and the possibility for agency. My supervisors' humanising practices operated within rather than external to colonial structures. This supervision exemplified Ubuntu's relational ontology where authentic relationships emerge through rather than despite contradiction and tension, enabling strategic navigation of institutional contradictions through accumulated relational practices.
Abstractor: As Provided
Entry Date: 2026
Accession Number: EJ1492006
Database: ERIC
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  Data: As a black South African student from a disadvantaged background, my journey through doctoral studies at a historically white university revealed the complex, simultaneous dynamics of humanising and dehumanising processes within supervisory relationships. This autoethnography examines how supervisory relationships operate within contested institutional terrain, challenging linear transformation narratives through Ubuntu philosophy and Kronenberg's humanisation-dehumanisation continuum. Through analysing 25 of my personal diary entries spanning four years of my doctoral degree, I trace five interconnected themes that reflect the negotiation of contradictory institutional dynamics within academic spaces. The findings reveal how spatial negotiations, epistemic tensions and institutional fragmentation coexisted with authentic mentorship, safe space creation and strategic agency development. Rather than a linear movement from exclusion to inclusion, I experienced ongoing navigation of spaces marked by constraint and the possibility for agency. My supervisors' humanising practices operated within rather than external to colonial structures. This supervision exemplified Ubuntu's relational ontology where authentic relationships emerge through rather than despite contradiction and tension, enabling strategic navigation of institutional contradictions through accumulated relational practices.
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    Languages:
      – Text: English
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        PageCount: 10
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      – SubjectFull: Doctoral Students
        Type: general
      – SubjectFull: Supervision
        Type: general
      – SubjectFull: Supervisory Methods
        Type: general
      – SubjectFull: Educational Environment
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      – SubjectFull: Humanization
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      – SubjectFull: Colonialism
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      – SubjectFull: Foreign Countries
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      – SubjectFull: Blacks
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      – SubjectFull: Predominantly White Institutions
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      – SubjectFull: Doctoral Programs
        Type: general
      – SubjectFull: Decolonization
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      – SubjectFull: South Africa
        Type: general
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      – TitleFull: 'You've Always Seen Me as a Person First': An Autoethnography on Humanising PhD Supervision
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              Type: published
              Y: 2025
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