Original Research - Special Collection: Youth marginalisation as a faith-based concern

Capabilities expansion for marginalised migrant youths in Johannesburg: The case of Albert Street School

Wadzanai F. Mkwananzi, Merridy Wilson-Strydom
HTS Teologiese Studies / Theological Studies | Vol 74, No 3 | a5041 | DOI: https://doi.org/10.4102/hts.v74i3.5041 | © 2018 Wadzanai Faith Mkwananzi, Merridy Wilson-Strydom | This work is licensed under CC Attribution 4.0
Submitted: 20 April 2018 | Published: 16 October 2018

About the author(s)

Wadzanai F. Mkwananzi, SARCHi Chair in Higher Education and Human Development Research Group, University of the Free State., South Africa
Merridy Wilson-Strydom, SARCHi Chair in Higher Education and Human Development Research Group, University of the Free State., South Africa

Abstract

In this article, we used the capability approach as normative grounding to analyse a particular faith-based intervention targeting ‘youth at the margins’ – in this instance, marginalised migrant youths from Zimbabwe living in Johannesburg, South Africa. We used Albert Street School (AS School), run by Johannesburg’s Central Methodist Church, as our case study to show how this faith-based organisation, through its focus on education, created not only spaces for marginalised youths to aspire towards a better life but also practical opportunities to convert their aspirations into action. Drawing on first-hand accounts of 12 Zimbabwean migrant youths who had completed schooling at AS School, as well as of representatives of both the school and the CMC, the article first sketches the Zimbabwe-South Africa migration context post 2000. A discussion then follows of AS School as a faith-based intervention which addresses the constrained capability for education amongst marginalised migrant youths.

Keywords

aspirations; capability approach; education; faith-based organisations; human development; marginalised migrant youth; social competence

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