2012) Deepening students' understanding of democratic citizenship through arts-based approaches to experiential service learning, South African Review of Sociology, 43:2, 76-88, ABSTRACT Inspired by models of community engagement initiated in North-American universities, the Visual Arts Department of the University of Johannesburg (UJ), together with the community-based organisation Tshulu Trust, developed an experimental service learning course aimed at evolving an approach to community engagement appropriate to the South African context. This article assesses the first iteration of this visual arts-based service learning intervention specifically with regard to the quality and content of student learning achieved. The results suggest that the methods and ethical-political approach of the community engagement movement significantly enhance the quality of student learning across the domains of academic enhancement, civic learning and personal growth. Furthermore, visual tools such as Photovoice, relationship-building tools such as Appreciative Enquiry and guided reflection that aims to describe, examine and articulate learning, could be adapted to enhance and deepen the learning of other student groups that regularly spend time in the same community.

Ubuntu is a complex concept, but at its simplest is "human-ness," the notion that individuals' well-being is intertwined with that of others in the community. Th is article examines how ubuntu's multiple meanings off er a potential tool for resilience in South Africa, both for arts organizations and for micro and small businesses. Artist Proof Studio off ers a sustained working example of how creativity can make a contribution towards a more just society using a hybrid arts/business model. Th e arts are particularly important in South Africa for off ering the space to address deep wounds, using artistic collaborations to contribute to resilience and wellbeing. Ubuntu can off er an alternative vision to fi nancing micro and small business to the one currently proposed by international lending organizations that seek to import Western-style models of shareholder primacy, short-term profi t, and privatization of public goods. Ubuntu allows for creative new approaches to business, encouraging hybrid models that are socially focused and economically sustainable. Th e arts have the potential for a signifi cant role in conceiving of ubuntu as a tool for resilience of micro and small businesses and as a way of conceptualizing being human in the business context, helping to envision productive and sustainable activities that advance greater economic sustainability.Th e purpose of an organization always lies outside of itself: it cannot last long unless it serves some greater purpose.Reuel Jethro Khoza ( 2014 ) T his article, an inquiry into ubuntu and the arts as potential tools for resilience of micro and small businesses, represents the start of a collaboration across oceans, disciplines, and perspectives. We are two scholars

As the world copes with two parallel catastrophic events-climate change and COVID-19, this article examines how visual art students in South Africa used the pandemic period to imagine a better world, a green economic recovery, and a closer connection with nature and biodiversity. The visual conversation that this new generation of artists created provides a lens for engaging with a world in change. They generate inspirational and resourceful ideas, calling on us to be participatory and inclusive as a fundamental aspect of being human, evoking imagination to create alternative visions in collaboration with others. New understandings through visual research can provide a foundation for developing collective strategies toward economic and social security, and flourishing individually and as community.

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