Studies in English Literatures (Vol. X1)

No Abstract

A critical evaluation of different models for the possible privatisation of the management of state-assisted rental housing in the Mangaung local municipal area

ThesisState-assisted housing and low-cost rental housing are of high priority in South Africa as a result of the high unemployment rate, high poverty rate, and a critical undersupply of suitable housing. This became very important in 1994 with the first democratic election of South Africa. The aim of the newly elected government is to provide as many low-cost housing facilities to the poor as possible. A very fine balance should be achieved in the provision of low-cost rental housing and state-assisted housing to the poor. This should be managed in such a way that it will be an ongoing facility and so that as many individuals as possible will be provided with suitable accommodation within the restraints of a limited budget. Management of the low-cost rental housing or state-assisted housing has become extremely important for local government. Effective management can make a major difference in client I tenant satisfaction and cost-effective practice. . The workplace challenge of the Mangaung local municipality represents a challenge experienced by many local municipalities in South Africa. The management of the housing portfolio is an impossible task for many. Variables to take into consideration are housing legislation, the national housing strategy, budgetary constraints, and the socio-economic status of the tenant. A review of relevant management models was conducted. Models including tho~ .:; from the private practice were studied and compared. Special attention was given to all aspects of the management of the low-cost rental-housing portfolio of the Mangaung local municipality. A new model is proposed for the effective management of the Mangaung low-cost housing portfolio. This management model would be suitable for use by other local municipalities. The model will address social upliftment, tenant involvement in management, private partnership agreements and market-related rentals to ensure continued economic viability. Attention is given to feasibility and valuation. The implementation of the model and the timeframe for successful completion are discussed

Gemaskerde depressie

Masked depression is a condition in which the classic affective and cognitive symptoms of depression are hidden behind a variety of somatic complaints or behavioural problems. Patients suffering from masked depression are usually incorrectly diagnosed and treated symptomatically with little success. The condition is often encountered in the medical literature from the late 1960s to the early 1980s, but little has been published about it in recent years. This review discusses the changing ideas and approach with regard to masked depression and examines whether they are still relevant today. The literature published in each of the previous decades is studied and specific attention is given to cultural differences in a South African context. Although little has been published on masked depression in the past few years, somatic complaints in depression are still regularly examined in the literature. A significant number of patients with depression are still not correctly diagnosed and masked depression therefore remains relevant. Doctors should be aware of the presenting complaints in these patients and should understand the reasons for somatisation

Two bad-time stories and a song of hope

Please cite as follows:Gagiano, A. 2002. Two bad-time stories and a song of hope. Literator, 23(3):161-178. doi:10.4102/lit.v23i3.348.The original publication is available at http://literator.org.zaUsing three fairly recently published South African texts – David B. Coplan’s In the Time of Cannibals – The Word Music of South Africa’s Basotho Migrants (1994); A.H.M. Scholtz’s Vatmaar – ’n Lewendagge verhaal van ’n tyd wat nie meer is nie (1995) in its English translation, A Place Called Vatmaar (2000) and Mongane (Wally) Serote’s Come and Hope with Me (1994) – this essay looks at the role such texts can play to give public expression to the voices of formerly silenced communities. The essay contends that the deep fissures in South African society require intense efforts in order to make those isolated from one another mutually intelligible. All South Africans need to broaden their cultural vocabularies. This is where texts such as novels and those containing the oral art of neglected communities can function as ‘translations’, and have profound social importance. It can be predicted that rehistoricising writings and culturally recontextualising teaching practices will continue to be required in this country, but also texts that contain the vision of a shared South African future.http://literator.org.za/index.php/literator/article/view/348Publisher's versio

What determines the suspension of budget support?

Although Budget Support (BS) was not designed to push political reform in recipient countries, donors have nonetheless used it to sanction democratic regress. An econometric analysis of all BS suspensions by bilateral donors in the period 2000–11 finds that suspensions effectively do reflect downward tendencies in voice and accountability, and in level of democratic functioning. The larger the in-country BS donor group, the more suspensions. Interestingly, ideological alignment between donor and recipient and aid dependence decrease the likelihood for suspensions, while domestic donor economic growth increases it; and multilateral suspensions have the largest positive effect of all

Trends in pharmacotherapy selection for the treatment of alcohol withdrawal in the Free State Province, South Africa

Background.The selection of pharmacotherapy for the treatment of alcohol withdrawal remains a clinical challenge. Research continues into the underlying pathophysiology of dependence and withdrawal. A spectrum of clinical presentations of alcohol dependence is emerging, yet recommendations and guidelines have remained unchanged for some time.  Objectives. To engage with the problem of translating research into practice, as reflected by the selection of pharmacotherapy for alcohol withdrawal by medical practitioners in the Free State Province, South Africa. Methods. A questionnaire-based survey and interviews were conducted among 121 professionals in both the private and public sectors across the province. A subgroup was formed comprising the 58 doctors who indicated that they prescribe for alcohol withdrawal. Participants worked in private general practice, specialist psychiatry practice, in a state hospital or in a treatment centre. Results. Prescribing practices varied based on practitioners’ geographical distribution and professional capacity. Deviation from standard recommendations included the routine use of clothiapine and antidepressants in withdrawal regimens. Prescribing clothiapine appears to be a local custom. While prescription of antidepressants may indicate unrealistic expectations of therapeutic benefit, there are clear indications that this is maintained to mask the diagnosis of an alcohol-related condition. Prescribing for alcohol withdrawal is therefore not necessarily determined by pathophysiology or efficacy of medication. Conclusion. Withdrawal regimens need to be reassessed by researchers, policy makers and funders, balancing new developments with the real-life experiences and challenges of prescribers and their patients

Help-seeking by substance dependants presenting to healthcare professionals in the Free State Province

Introduction. Current data regarding treatment needs in South Africa for substance dependence are based on admissions to specialised treatment centres. The data therefore do not include patients presenting to independent healthcare workers and state hospitals. Aim. The aim of this study was to investigate help-seeking behaviour for substance dependence disorders from the perspective of healthcare professionals at various levels of the referral chain in Free State Province. Design. A descriptive study was performed. Setting. Treatment environments in Free State Province accessible to substance-dependent persons. Participants. General practitioners, private psychiatrists, prescribing healthcare professionals at state hospitals and treatment centres, and non-prescribing therapists responsible for management of substance-dependent persons. Measurements. A questionnaire was used to determine the level of help-seeking experienced by the participants regarding various classes of psycho-active substances. Findings. The presentation of alcohol, cannabis, opioid, benzodiazepine, ecstasy, cocaine and inhalant dependency at general practitioners, private psychiatrists, treatment centres and non-prescribing therapists was compared. Different patterns of help-seeking for substance dependence from the various professional groups were detected. Regarding alcohol dependence, 40.3% of private general medical practitioners reported being confronted with alcohol dependence at least once per month, compared with 100% of treatment centre representatives and private psychiatrists, 70.6% of state hospitals and 53.8% of non-prescribers. State hospitals reported the highest frequency for contact with cases of cannabis dependence, compared with the other professional groups, while psychiatrists reported the highest contact with cases involving benzodiazepine, cocaine and ecstasy. Therapists reported a higher level of contact with inhalant dependence, while this group virtually never presented at general practitioners and private psychiatrists. Conclusion. Help-seeking data can be used in conjunction with other data, such as treatment demand data, to inform and adapt policies and practice. Variations in the manifestation of help-seeking behaviour at various groups may be important pointers to conditions that influence help-seeking, and therefore should be investigated further

Identification of depression in a rural general practice

Major depression is underdiagnosed by general practitioners, but the reasons for this are not clear. This study aimed to establish the prevalence of major depression and coexisting generalised anxiety disorder in a rural general practice in the Orange Free State. It also assessed the predictive value of a screening questionnaire for use by general practitioners. The two practitioners evaluated 858 patients over a 4-week period. Those who met the screening criteria, together with a random sample of 60 patients who did not, were re-evaluated by a registrar in psychiatry who was unaware of the findings of his colleagues. Of the patients studied, 134 (15,6%) had major depression; 59 of these (44,0%) also had coexisting generalised anxiety disorder. The general practitioners had . correctly diagnosed major depression in 32 patients (3,7%) before the study started. The screening questionnaire had a 42% chance of correctly identifying a patient with depression and a 97% chance of correctly identifying a patient who did not have major depression. Both practitioners were equally capable at identifying major depression. The study confirmed both the high prevalence of depression in a rural general practice and its low identification rate. It also showed the advantage of using a screening questionnaire to alert practitioners to the possibility of depression in their patients

Environmental and Genetic Determinants of Colony Morphology in Yeast

Nutrient stresses trigger a variety of developmental switches in the budding yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae. One of the least understood of such responses is the development of complex colony morphology, characterized by intricate, organized, and strain-specific patterns of colony growth and architecture. The genetic bases of this phenotype and the key environmental signals involved in its induction have heretofore remained poorly understood. By surveying multiple strain backgrounds and a large number of growth conditions, we show that limitation for fermentable carbon sources coupled with a rich nitrogen source is the primary trigger for the colony morphology response in budding yeast. Using knockout mutants and transposon-mediated mutagenesis, we demonstrate that two key signaling networks regulating this response are the filamentous growth MAP kinase cascade and the Ras-cAMP-PKA pathway. We further show synergistic epistasis between Rim15, a kinase involved in integration of nutrient signals, and other genes in these pathways. Ploidy, mating-type, and genotype-by-environment interactions also appear to play a role in the controlling colony morphology. Our study highlights the high degree of network reuse in this model eukaryote; yeast use the same core signaling pathways in multiple contexts to integrate information about environmental and physiological states and generate diverse developmental outputs

Genome-Wide Analysis of Nucleotide-Level Variation in Commonly Used Saccharomyces cerevisiae Strains

Ten years have passed since the genome of Saccharomyces cerevisiae–more precisely, the S288c strain–was completely sequenced. However, experimental work in yeast is commonly performed using strains that are of unknown genetic relationship to S288c. Here, we characterized the nucleotide-level similarity between S288c and seven commonly used lab strains (A364A, W303, FL100, CEN.PK, ∑1278b, SK1 and BY4716) using 25mer oligonucleotide microarrays that provide complete and redundant coverage of the ∼12 Mb Saccharomyces cerevisiae genome. Using these data, we assessed the frequency and distribution of nucleotide variation in comparison to the sequenced reference genome. These data allow us to infer the relationships between experimentally important strains of yeast and provide insight for experimental designs that are sensitive to sequence variation. We propose a rational approach for near complete sequencing of strains related to the reference using these data and directed re-sequencing. These data and new visualization tools are accessible online in a new resource: the Yeast SNPs Browser (YSB; http://gbrowse.princeton.edu/cgi-bin/gbrowse/yeast_strains_snps) that is available to all researchers