School of Social Sciences

Vivian Besem Ojong

Vivian Besem Ojong

Email

ojong@ukzn.ac.za

Contact Number

033-260-5007

Position

(Acting) Dean & Head of School

Discipline

Development

Campus

Howard College Campus

Office Address

672

Degrees Held

  • PhD Anthropology, (University of Zululand)

Research Interests

  • Identity politics
  • Migration, globalization and diaspora Studies
  • African feminism
  • Gender
  • Culture and religion

Teaching Interests

  • Research methodology
  • Theoretical frameworks
  • Migration and globalization
  • Gender and feminism
Selected

Publications

  • Ojong, V. B., Ashe, M. O. and Otu, M.N. 2018. The different shades of Africanity within the Broader South African identity: The case of African migrants. Journal of African Foreign Affairs (JoAFA). Vol. 5 (2).
  • Muesiri, O. A. and Ojong, V. B. 2018. “The African Union of local authorities (AULA) and global trends in regional management of grassroots institutions: Responses and lapses”. Journal of African Union Studies (JoAUS). Volume 7 (1 233-259)
  • Ashe, M. O. and Ojong, V. B. 2018. Population overhang and the Great Lakes Crisis: Rwanda and her Neighbours’’, Journal of African Union Studies (JoAUS), Vol. 7, Issue 2, pp 129-149.
  • Mhandu, J., Ojong, V. B. and Muzvidziwa, N. V.   Modus operandi and the socio-spatial milieu in which immigrant niche markets vis-a-vis informal economic activities. . Journal of Social Development in Africa. Vol. 32, No.2.
  • Mhandu, J. and Ojong, V. B. Virtuous life and enjoyable life:  An overview of the well-being of Zimbabwean migrant women hairdressers in South Africa. Gender and Behavior and IfePsychologIA). Vol. 16 (2).
  • Ndlovu, J. and Ojong, V. B. 2018. Understanding India-South Africa tourism: The impact on the Socio-cultural and economic fabrics in Durban. African Journal of Hospitality, Tourism and Leisure. Vol. 34, No. 1
  • Ojong, V. B. and Ndlovu. J. 2017. She does not want to cook for me: Zulu women and food preparation at the crossroads of courtship and dating. Agenda: Vol 30, No.4
  • The economics of hairdressing and its implications for gender power in Durban South Africa. Journal of Social Development in African. Vol. 32, NO.
  • 1: 91-112
  • Ojong, V. B. 2017. Gender and leadership in Christian religious circles in Africa.
  • Journal of Social Development in Africa. Vol. 32, No.2: 125-140
  • Mhandu, J. and Ojong, V. B. 2017. Undocumented female immigrants in the urban informal sector: An interpretative understanding to informal leadership. Journal of Social Development in Africa. Vol. 32, No. 2: 61-79
  • Ojong, V. B. 2016. The symbiosis between identity and migrant entrepreneurship among Ghanaian women entrepreneurs in South Africa. Journal of Social Development in Africa. vol. 31. No. 1: 111-142.
  • N. B and Ojong. VB. 2016. Entrepreneurial activities as a fundamental handle for the re/construction of masculine identity among Senegalese men in South Africa. Journal of Social Development in Africa Vol. 31. No. 1: 27-53.
  • B. Ojong 2016. The Young Female Body as a Site of Demonic Sexual Abuse: The Case of Christians in Charismatic Pentecostal Churches in Durban South Africa. The Oriental Anthropologist. Vol. 16, No. 2. : 279-289.
  • Ojong, V. B. 2016. Ghanaian migrant women’s involvement in micro-level community development in Ghana through remittances. Journal of Social Development in Africa. 31 : (2)
  • Ogana W and V. B. Ojong 2015. A study of literature on the essence of Ubungoma
  • (Divination) and conceptions of Gender among izangoma (diviners). Journal for the Study of Religion
  • VB Ojong and M. N. Otu 2015. Migration (Bushfalling) as a form of insurance for Cameroonians. Journal of Social Development in Africa 30: (1 )
  • N B Fomunyam and V. B. Ojong 2014. Durban Dahira: A Safety Net and Transnational Junction for Senegalese Mourides in South Africa. Journal of Social Development in Africa 29 (1): 85- 108
  • Ojong, V. B. 2013. Submission, Experience, Empowerment and Human Rights: A conceptual Problematic for Christian Women. Alternation 20 (2): 75-92
  • Ojong, V. B. 2013. Academic Travel: Travelling for Work. Journal Human Ecology: Special Volume on Southern Africa: Human Ecology and Tourism Interactions 43 (1 ): 83-91
  • Ojong, V. B. 2013. The Gender Dynamics of Conducting Fieldwork and its Implications for the Writing of Ethnographies. Alternation 20 (2): 108-120
  • Ogana W and Ojong V B 2013. Thin/thick body ideal: Zulu women’s bodies as a site of cultural and postcolonial feminist struggle. Agenda 27 (4): 110-119
  • Ojong V B and Ndlovu J 2013. Food as a measure of complete diplomacy: balancing India-Africa partnership through accommodating taste. Nidan International Journal for the Study of Hinduism 25: 34-50
  • Ojong, V. B. 2012. Indianness and Christianity: negotiating identity/cultural values in the context of religious conversion among South African Indians living in Chatsworth, South Africa. The Oriental Anthropologist 12 (2): 431-444.
  • Ojong, V. B. 2012. The ‘Working-Dead’ in nyongo occult economy in Cameroonian society. Journal of Dharma 37(4): 427-440.
  • Ojong, V.B. 2012. Career-driven migration: a new transnational mosaic for African women. Alternation. Loyola Journal of Social Sciences XXV1(2): 209-227
  • Pragmatic and symbolic negotiation of home for African migrants in South Africa. Alternation 19 (1): 262-279
  • Ojong, V. B. 2012. Strangers in the land: The African others in South Africa-— reflections from within on the role of the diaspora in South Africa. Diaspora Studies 5 (1): 1-13.
  • Ogana, W. and Ojong, V. B. 2012. “Sexual Body ideal among Zulu Women: continuity and change” Indilinga African Journal of Indigenous Knowledge Systems 11 (1): 32-
  • Ojong, V. B. 2011. Symbolic enactments and ritualized constructions of the environment among Pentecostal Christians in South Africa. Journal of Dharma 36 (3): 289-300.
  • Ojong, V. B. and Fomunyam, N. B. 2011. Senegalese immigrant entrepreneurial entanglements and religious/cuttural continuities. Journal for the Study of Religion 24 (1): .23-35.
  • Naidu, M. and Ojong, V. B. 2010. The ‘re-production’ of ‘woman’ and mothering: women in Hindu and Christian religio-cultural traditions. Nidan International Journal for the study of Hinduism 22 (1) 96 111.
  • Ojong V. B. and Muthuki J. M. 2010. Empowerment or reconstituted subordination? Interrogating the dynamics of gender identities in the lives of professional African migrant women in South Africa. Journal of Social Sciences 11: 169-176.
  • Ojong, V. B. Otu, M.N. 2010. Steering the Wagon: Foreign African Academics at the fore-front of knowledge production at the University of KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa, IKAMVA, International Journal of Social Sciences and Humanities 4 (2): 21-44.
  • Ojong, V. B. and Muthuki, J. M. 2010. Religious conversion and the renegotiation of gender identity amongst Indian women in Chatsworth in Durban South Africa. Nidan International Journal for the study of Hinduism 22: 9-21
  • Ojong, V. B. 2010. Motherhood in Lesotho in Encyclopedia on Motherhood. Sage Publications.
  • Ojong, V. B. 2009. Forced reciprocity: Ghanaian participation in remittances. Ikamva, International Journal of Social Sciences and Humanities 3( 2): 75-94.
  • Ojong, V. B. 2008. Religion and Entrepreneurship among Ghanaians in South Africa. Journal for the Study of Religion 21( 2): 63-84.
  • Ojong, V. B. 2007. identity and construction of differences among Ghanaian women entrepreneurs in South Africa IKAMVA International journal of Social Sciences and Humanities, 1 (1): 56-66.
  • Ojong, V. B. and Sithole, M. P. 2007. The substance of Identity: Territoriality, Culture, Roots and the Politics of Belonging. African Anthropologist 14 (1 and 2): 89-99.
  • Ojong, V. B. 2006. The socio-economic impact of African women entrepreneurial activities in South Africa. Africanus Journal of Development Studies 36 (2): 142-153.
  • Ojong, V. B. and Moodley, V. 2005 Leadership and Issues affecting the productivity of women entrepreneurs in KwaZulu-Natal. Agenda Journal 65: 76-82.
  • Ojong, V. B. 2006. “Entrepreneurship and the drive to succeed among Ghanaian migrant women in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa”, in The value of the psychological capital of immigrant entrepreneurs, Leo Dana (ed), Edward Elgar Handbook of Research on Ethnic Minority Entrepreneurship, England: Cheltenhami
  • Ojong, V. B. 2009. Men in women’s spaces: The struggle and redrawing of spaces for entrepreneurial women in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa, in Working Women F, Patel and K, Naido (eds). London: Sage Publications.
Student

Supervision

  • Moodley, L. C. 2008. An exploration of the reasons surrounding Indian businesswomen’s involvement in home-based business in Shallcross. Msoci thesis. University of KwaZulu-Natal
  • Otu, M. N. 2009. An exploration of the lives and livelihoods of African professional migrants in institutions of higher learning: The case of University of KwaZulu-Natal. MA thesis. University of KwaZulu-Natal.
  • Fomunyam, B. N. 2011. Migrant adjustment and regrouping: the case of Cameroonians in Durban, South Africa.
  • Siphamandla Mtsolo 2018. Re-negotiation of identity of those who become physical disabled during the course of life, issues of acceptance, adaptation and coping strategies.
  • Shongwe, E. D. 2008. From genocide to gacaca: Historical and socio-political dynamics of identities in the late twentieth century in Rwanda (The perspectives of the Durban based Rwandese). (PhD in Anthropology), University of KwaZuluNatal. (co-supervisor Prof Sithole Pearl)
  • Muthuki, J. M. 2010. Transnationalism and the (re) construction of Gender identities amongst foreign studies of African origin at the University of KwaZuluNatal, South Africa. University of KwaZulu-Natal (PhD in Gender Studies).
  • Naidu, U. M. 2011. Shaping plastic bodies: A critical study of how the African female body is inscribed and disciplined. University of KwaZulu-Natal (PhD in Anthropology).
  • De la Porte, S. 2011. Shifting care dynamics: the moral economy of care and its challenges in the context of the HIV/AIDS pandemic in KwaZulu-Natal (PhD in Anthropology).
  • Otu, M.N. 2013 The role played by foreign African migrants in the promotion of African scholarship in the Faculty of Humanities, Development and Social Sciences at the University of KwaZulu- Natal (PhD in Anthropology),
  • Ogana, N. W 2015. “Food decisions and cultural perceptions of overweight and obesity: the case of Zulu women in Durban, South Africa. University of KwaZuluNatal (Co-supervisor Prof Julie Parle) (PhD in Anthropology).
  • Hingston, C.A. 2015 “Gender contestation in the migration site: the case of Nigerian migrants in Durban, South Africa. University Of KwaZulu-NataI (PhD in Gender Studies).
  • M’ungisi, N. 2015 “A comparative analysis: contestation of two system of political representation: Isiphakanyiswa and Ngcolosi traditional communities. University of KwaZulu-Natal (co-supervised with Dr M. Naidu) (PhD in Anthropology).
  • Fomunyam, B. N. 2015. ‘Brotherhood solidarity and the (Re) negociation of identity among Senegalese migrants in Durban. University of KwaZulu-Natal (PhD in Anthropology)
  • Gatfied, R. C. 2015. “Beadwork identity as brand equity: an analysis of beadwork conventions as the basis of craft economies in KwaZuiu-Natal with specific emphasis on the beadwork of amanyuswa. University of KwaZulu-Natal (PhD in Anthropology), co-supervised by Prof M. P. Sithole
  • Ntshekane Goodness Gumede 2018. Local Community participation in coastal Tourism. University of KwaZulu-Natal (PhD in Tourism).
  • Lungile Prudence Zondi 2018. The life and experiences of young women living on the streets of Pietermaritzburg CBC and surrounding. University of KwaZulu-Natal (PhD in Anthropology).