The book <i>Academic Mothers</i> is about women who are middle class, who have some form of access to child care, who live in a democracy and who have legal rights and protections. More specifically it is about academics who are mothers. It is about the freedoms that we have not yet achieved, writes Venitha Pillay.

”Woza sisi, wozobona [Come sister, come and see],” say the braiders on the corner of Kerk and Eloff streets in downtown Johannesburg. Hundreds of women congregate here every day to provide a vital service to the city’s women: braiding. Thembelihle Tshabalala meets some of Johannesburg’s braiders.

Higher education legislation, along with the statutes and regulations of institutions, give students a say in governance and advisory bodies such as the council, senate, faculty boards and institutional forums. But there is a shocking dislocation between the rationale and historical contexts for such participation and the earnestness with which students view this co-responsibility, writes Chris de Beer.