The culturally gendered pastoral care model of women caring for refugee girls in a context of HIV/AIDS

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Abstract

The objective of this article is to investigate how women caregivers who look after Unaccompanied Refugee Minor (URM) girls in a context of HIV/AIDS, understand their pastoral care practice. Though women are traditionally understood as the caregivers in society, their views with regard to how they understand and give meaning to care-giving are not heard. When their views are sought, their views can oppose generally accepted ideas of what counts as "oppressive". For the purposes of this article, empirical research was undertaken at the Methodist Community Centre in Soweto with caregivers there who provide care for URM girls from Zimbabwe. This is a qualitative study, with a grounded theory approach. The purpose is to investigate the understanding members of these women caregivers have of the pastoral care they provide to the URM girls. The results of the empirical study are evaluated through the lenses of African women's theology and Margret Mead's Cultural Adolescent Development Theory. The study finds that the members of this group of women assume that the proper implementation of cultural-gendered practices can be effective in guiding and conducive to the well-being of the girls in their care. For these women, the extension of care is culturally gendered and feminised. Their notions of effective pastoral care can seem to perpetuate attitudes that feminist thought generally regards as oppressive to women.

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The Discovery of Grounded Theory

Barney G. Glaser, Anselm L. Strauss (1967)

Most writing on sociological method has been concerned with how accurate facts can be obtained and how theory can thereby be more rigorously tested. In The Discovery of Grounded Theory, Barney Glaser and Anselm Strauss address the equally Important enterprise of how the discovery of theory from data--systematically obtained and analyzed in social research--can be furthered. The discovery of theory from data--grounded theory--is a major task confronting sociology, for such a theory fits empirical situations, and is understandable to sociologists and laymen alike. Most important, it provides relevant predictions, explanations, interpretations, and applications.In Part I of the book, Generation Theory by Comparative Analysis, the authors present a strategy whereby sociologists can facilitate the discovery of grounded theory, both substantive and formal. This strategy involves the systematic choice and study of several comparison groups. In Part II, The Flexible Use of Data, the generation of theory from qualitative, especially documentary, and quantitative data Is considered. In Part III, Implications of Grounded Theory, Glaser and Strauss examine the credibility of grounded theory.The Discovery of Grounded Theory is directed toward improving social scientists' capacity for generating theory that will be relevant to their research. While aimed primarily at sociologists, it will be useful to anyone Interested In studying social phenomena--political, educational, economic, industrial-- especially If their studies are based on qualitative data.