Indigenous knowledge/s of survival: implications for lifelong learning among the Basotho herding fraternity

Abstract

This article foregrounds Basotho male herders' interaction with their environment as a productive platform for informal learning activities poised to address the herders' immediate and context-specific needs. Indeed, understanding how the herders interact and learn through their daily engagements with their environments has a potential to provide substantive baseline insights that could inform Lesotho's nonformal education providers and policy-making forums. Drawing on indigenous knowledge theory, the article explicates the sociocultural perspective of indigenous knowledge with emphasis on how it is acquired and applied by male Basotho herders in order to improve their lives and address their daily herding challenges. The study adopted a qualitative research methodology with a sample of 30 snowball-selected Basotho male herders using interviews, transect walk, and photo voice as its methods of data collection. The data were analysed using the pattern coding method. The findings revealed two main forms of indigenous knowledge that the herders acquired through the herding practice namely, indigenous knowledge as local science and indigenous knowledge as local practice. The study recommends more scientific research that documents Lesotho's specific indigenous knowledge-to develop a holistic nonformal education curriculum and to nurture the rare indigenous knowledge skills of the Basotho male herders.

Bimbingan Teknis Penulisan dan Publikasi Karya Tulis Ilmiah sebagai Upaya Peningkatan Kompetensi Guru Sekolah Dasar dan Menengah di Kabupaten Bantul

“…Program ini berangkat dari ketidak berdayaan kelompok masyarakat yang diusulkan untuk memberdayakan masyarakat dengan penyesuaian tertentu yang akan disesuaikan dengan situasi serta kondisi yang terjadi di lapangan. Pemberdayaan masyarakat adalah upaya membangun daya masyarakat melalui edukasi, motivasi dan membangun kesadaran sosial demi mengoptimalkan potensi yang ada (Morojele, 2017). Selain itu pemberdayaan dianggap sebagai proses kolaboratif antara masyarakat yang kurang berdaya dengan potensi sebagai sumber daya (Mustangin et al, 2017).…”