Abstract

Using twenty-six newspaper articles as textual data, critical race theory as theoretical framework, and qualitative content analysis as the research method, this media case study reports on an incident of racial violence at a secondary school in South Africa. The study identified examples of cultural, physical, verbal, and institutional racism. It also found that parents, the police, security firms, political parties, pro-Black and pro-White extremist individuals and groups, and learners from neighboring schools played a role in the intensification of racial violence at the school. The learners’ home environment, the community’s innate racial attitudes, the dominance of the White Afrikaans culture at the school, the teachers’ pro-White attitude, and the fact that the racial and cultural composition of the staff did not reflect those of the learners were identified as reasons for the racial conflict at the school. The study highlights the negative effects of the racial incident on both Black and White learners’ academic and emotional well-being, school discipline, as well as the financial and emotional security of White households. Several newspaper articles offer suggestions on how to curb racism at schools. Finally, this study found that the journalists mainly gave voice to Black parents and politicians in their framing of the incident. This may result in a distorted picture of the incident and its aftermath. Rather than denying the existence of racism in schools, the retrieved South African newspapers have highlighted the normalization, pervasiveness, and permanency of racism at (some) South African schools.