Lesotho’s educational system and development are largely influenced by missionaries and colonisers who taught the three ‘Rs’ (reading, writing and numeracy skills) to the Basotho. Most of those enlightened Basotho were to carry on the duties of either educating others or as missionary workers. Some became clerks, interpreters, police officers, nurses and Sunday school teachers. This article is an account of a functionally literate Mosotho male adult learner who was herding livestock and taught himself reading and writing skills. In his narrative, Hlalefang (not his real name) compares literacy to money and a watch or a clock. He further expresses how people like him have managed to muster some basic and restructure the cognitive and oral history and archival memories, through intuitiveness. The story is based on the work of Paulo Freire where culture influences the discourse of literacy. A qualitative narrative story-telling approach was used to relate Hlalefang’s lived-experiences as he navigated his ways and challenges using orality acquired through various life encounters. This inspirational cultural narrative demonstrates that culture and social uses are imperatives in functional literacy. The article challenges those in adult education, literacy, development practitioners and policy-makers to consider some aspects of culture and to be innovative in their approaches to multi-literacies.

The (15) is meant to bridge economic disparities by assisting the poor, this study is located at an intersection of two schools of thought about this policy -those in support of and those against it. Jeffrey Sachs' Millennium Villages Project underpins the theoretical framework of this study as it gives hope for those critics who believe that Africa will forever be dependent on foreign aid and hand-outs. Qualitative and document analysis methods were used to collate and analyse journals and diaries kept by grant recipients in fifteen

Background: Political and economic upheavals in the current millennium globally have displaced millions of people, making cross-border and forced migration a reality. Many refugees are forced out of their countries and flee to other countries to find new languages with which they are not familiar. South Africa as a signatory to the 1954 UN Convention on refugees and stateless persons accepts refugees (asylum seekers) from all over the world. The displaced persons are mostly illiterate in English and the indigenous languages of their new settlement countries.Objectives: The study was set up to investigate the socio-economic value of literacy in the lives of refugee adults in South Africa. Hence, in this article, literacy refers to the ability to read, write, calculate, communicate and function in any language with a basic understanding in one’s environment.Method: This ethnographic qualitative study used interviews, observations and focus group meetings to explore how literacy matters in the sustainable development of entrepreneurial activities among the refugee adults and youths in South Africa. The study is grounded in Paulo Freire’s critical pedagogy theory and has some implications for adult literacy throughout the developing world where millions of adult refugees find themselves vulnerable.Results: The study revealed that refugee adults learn functional literacy in English and other 11 local South African languages informally as communication skills for the survival of their small businesses and for social and economic use in their ‘adopted home’. They find it difficult to get employment in the formal sector and often use their ingenuity to create their own jobs for survival and livelihoods in informal trade and entrepreneurship.Conclusion: The article concludes that within the public adult learning interventions by the Department of Basic Education, where literacy programmes are offered, refugees should be encouraged and supported in attending formal classes to deal with their livelihoods and small businesses for survival.

In Basotho culture men, women, girls, and boys each have different festivities to engage in when praying for rain. Rain festivities are organised and performed during the drought months from November to January of each year. This study examines the indigenous knowledge systems embedded in the different festivities as performed by males and females, and how they are understood and practised by diverse groups in Basotho society. The practices form part of the culture of Basotho that is still fundamentally practised in the rural areas of Lesotho, in spite of the advent of western education and Christianity. The article discusses the prayer for rain festivities and weather predictions and their relevance to the contemporary climate and weather-changing phenomenon and patterns. The study adopted a qualitative approach, and a sample of 40 Basotho men, women, girls, and boys—including traditional leaders and community elders in the four rural villages in Leribe district participated in interviews and focus group meetings. The thematic analysis described the narratives and discourse of the festivities and their cultural significance. Lesotho has experienced climate change, which has affected its people over centuries—hence they continue to explore changing patterns of climate and weather conditions. In line with their cultural beliefs, Basotho believe that rain and other environmental conditions are sent by their ancestors. Thus, rain festivities and prayers form part of their indigenous knowledge and contribute to the debate on climate change and its effects on the lives of African communities and their culture, particularly those of Basotho. Thus, the study concludes that African communities in general—in this context Basotho, have been engaged in climate change discourses in their own indigenous ways over time, and for them, climate change is not a new phenomenon.