Abstract
This chapter examines the interpretations and meaning-making amongst young people at Rhodes University, South Africa, of political party messages during the 2016 local government elections on social media. In addition, the chapter seeks to understand whether youth at Rhodes University actively sought out political party messages on social media or whether the messages they encountered were incidental on their timelines. Finally, the chapter provides an understanding of whether the media messages resonated with the young people and spoke to the issues faced by them in their particular context. Using qualitative research methods and through the lens of Stuart Hall’s models of reception analysis, the chapter uncovers the particular relationship that young people had with political party messages on social media in the 2016 local government elections. It argues that rather than the often-lamented apathetic youth, these young people are actively engaged and highly critical of what they engage with online.
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- 1.
In mid-December 2017, with relatively little consultation or planning, Zuma announced that in 2018 free higher education would be provided to all new first year students from families that earn less than R350,000 per year (Areff & Spies, 2017).
- 2.
The 2017 statistics of South Africa’s internet population show that 15–34 year olds make up 65.77% of internet users. Available at https://mybroadband.co.za/news/internet/251063-what-we-know-about-internet-users-in-south-africa.html.
- 3.
A colonialist mining magnate and politician, Rhodes was a zealous British imperialist who used his significant financial power as head of the De Beers diamond group and his political influence as Prime Minster of the Cape Colony (1890–1896) to pursue an expansion of the British territory by founding Rhodesia (present-day Zimbabwe and Zambia) and by working towards the realisation of his vision of a Cape to Cairo railway (Oxlund, 2016).
- 4.
The 1976 Soweto uprising was a series of demonstrations and protests led by black school children in Soweto that spread countrywide. The uprising profoundly changed the socio-political landscape in South Africa. Students from numerous schools began to protest in the streets of Soweto in response to the introduction of Afrikaans as the medium of instruction in local schools. It is estimated that 20,000 students took part in the protests. They were met with fierce apartheid police brutality. The number of protesters killed by police is suspected to be 176, but estimates of up to 700 have been made. In remembrance of these events, 16 June is now a public holiday in South Africa, named Youth Day (SAHO, 2017).
- 5.
UCKAR is the University Currently Known as Rhodes, a name students and staff came to use to refer to Rhodes University to indicate a desire to have the institution’s name changed (Qambela, 2016).
- 6.
All participant names are pseudonyms provided by the researcher.
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Malila, V., Pela, N. (2020). Youth, Elections and Social Media: Understanding the Critical (Di)Stance Between Young People and Political Party Messaging. In: Ndlela, M., Mano, W. (eds) Social Media and Elections in Africa, Volume 2. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-32682-1_6
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