University of Nyisists: a theatrical investigation of rural black students’ experiences of mental wellness at the University of KwaZulu-Natal.

Abstract

Grounded in Paulo Freire’s Pedagogy of the Oppressed and framed through an applied theatre methodology, this qualitative research investigates the lived experiences of rural Black students at the University of KwaZulu-Natal, Pietermaritzburg campus, with a particular focus on mental wellness. Using critical ethnography and Augusto Boal’s theatre methods, the study explores how structural, cultural, and institutional factors shape students' perceptions and expressions of mental wellness. Selected through purposive sampling, a small cohort of participants engaged in a series of theatrical workshops that served as dialogical spaces to reveal, interrogate, and reimagine their relevant experiences. The study foregrounds themes such as rural background dislocation, institutional silencing, Black Tax, curriculum mismatch, and coping mechanisms, captured in expressive constructs such as Kuningi. These themes emerged as culturally embedded narratives that reflect the psycho-social and emotional struggles students face in a higher education environment, often misaligned with the lived realities of their upbringing. Rather than pathologizing these experiences through Western psychiatric frameworks alone, the study highlights the importance of listening to the students’ own languages, metaphors, and performative expressions as valid epistemologies of mental wellness.This research contributes to the growing body of decolonial scholarship that calls for responsive, culturally grounded mental wellness support in South African universities. It recommends that institutions incorporate performative, grassroots-driven interventions that affirm students’ identities and foster spaces for healing, dialogue, and transformation. Ultimately, the study asserts that mental wellness in higher education cannot be separated from context, culture, and creative resistance.