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Cultures of Positivity: Interconnectedness as a Way of Being

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Handbook of Quality of Life in African Societies

Part of the book series: International Handbooks of Quality-of-Life ((IHQL))

Abstract

In this chapter we argued that a good quality of life and well-being is manifested in a culture of positivity emerging from meanings made in people’s embeddedness in relationships and life contexts. Interconnectedness is a fundamental quality of being human, and to a great extent determines people’s quality of life and meaning experiences. We adopted a broad conceptualization of quality of life including a eudaimonic well-being perspective in which meaning and positive relationships play a core role. We described a Meaning and Relatedness Well-being model (M&RW) comprising of meaning and relatedness as core facets, with assumed dynamic interactions between intrapersonal, interpersonal, social, community and ecosystem levels within the intertwinedness of biological and cultural situatedness. We used the M&RW model as backdrop to illustrate interconnectedness as a way of being well particularly in African contexts as manifested in lay people’s experiences drawing from previous empirical research.

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Change history

  • 13 May 2020

    The author regrets that the initial book was published without including the line to acknowledge the funder which has been updated in the chapter.

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Acknowledgment

This work is based on research supported in part by the National Research Foundation (NRF) of South Africa (Grant no.106050). It is acknowledged that opinions, findings, conclusions, and recommendations expressed are those of the authors and that the NRF accepts no liability in this regard.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Africa Unit for Transdisciplinary Health Research, North-West University, Potchefstroom, South Africa

    Marié P. Wissing, Lusilda Schutte & Angelina Wilson Fadiji

  2. Education and Skills Development Unit, Human Sciences Research Council, Cape Town, South Africa

    Angelina Wilson Fadiji

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  1. Marié P. Wissing
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Correspondence to Marié P. Wissing .

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  1. Faculty of Education, University of Pretoria, Pretoria, South Africa

    Irma Eloff

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Wissing, M.P., Schutte, L., Wilson Fadiji, A. (2019). Cultures of Positivity: Interconnectedness as a Way of Being. In: Eloff, I. (eds) Handbook of Quality of Life in African Societies. International Handbooks of Quality-of-Life. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-15367-0_1

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