The Environmental Humanities (EH) at the Centre for the Advancement of Scholarship was introduced in 2019 to stimulate and support humanities– and social science-led research on our time's most pressing environmental challenges. While the natural sciences are important for identifying ecological changes and measuring their impacts, addressing environmental crises requires a deeper reflection on their cultural, political, historical and ethical dimensions. This is where the humanities and social sciences become essential, providing tools to question underlying values, expose hidden power dynamics and foreground the lived experiences of communities affected by environmental change.
Our project responds to the recognition that environmental issues are not solely ecological or technical, but are also intensely social. Climate change, biodiversity loss, and land degradation are not evenly distributed problems, but are entangled with histories of inequality, political contestations and struggles over resources. The EH project contributes to developing more just and inclusive responses to these global challenges by examining how societies imagine, narrate, and govern their environment.
Our work focuses on extraction, which we understand in its broadest sense. In our work, extraction is not limited to oil, minerals, timber or gas, but includes the exploitation of labour and bodies, the harvesting and commodification of data, and the imposition of monocultural agricultural systems that erode biodiversity and indigenous knowledge. In this broader frame, extraction is both material and symbolic. It reorganises landscapes, social relations, and knowledge systems, often producing inequalities and reinforcing global hierarchies of power. This expansive understanding of extraction allows us to link Africa’s long histories of resource plunder to contemporary struggles over land, resources and labour rights.
By bringing scholars from History, philosophy, political science, literature, and related fields, the EH project explores how extraction in its varied forms is presented, contested, and lived. We ask questions around:
- How African development is organised around extractive and capitalist logics,
- The extent to which new forms of extraction reproduce inequalities or even create new ones,
- What environmental justice looks like in societies where extraction is both a source of livelihood and dispossession.
- Through these enquiries, the EH Project demonstrates how the humanities and social sciences can enrich environmental scholarship.
Current Projects
Lives between the Mine and the Steam Trains: Reading the Violence of Extraction in Southern African Cultural Imaginary
Dr Stephen David
The project examines how cultural texts reflect on and make legible the links among embodiment, extractive violence, mobility, transgenerational trauma, and practices of governmentality. It takes the steam trains and the mine as important sites for thinking about racialised extractive violence and the entangled memories of extraction in Southern Africa. The project draws on Black feminists’ scholarship to examine how multiple identities intersect to produce a range of embodied encounters with, and experiences of, extractive violence. This is to remedy the tendency to propose a one-size-fits-all approach to thinking about the ruins of “capitalocene” in Africa. Beyond the fact that this homogenises the multiple manifestations of violence, it also renders black bodies as fungible, replaceable and consequently metonymic. The project asks: How has literature archived and reflected on the memories of extraction and its traumatic afterlives in Southern Africa? What role does the body play in these artistic engagements and reflections? How do axes of identity, such as gender, race, class, dis/ability, and sexuality, create distinct encounters with extractive violence?
Buffalo grazing in iSimangaliso Wetland ParkPicture taken by Ronald Bafana
Conservation politics, extraction and violence
Buffalo grazing in iSimangaliso Wetland ParkPicture taken by Ronald Bafana
Project 1: Labour, conservation and extraction in iSimangaliso Wetland Park, KwaZulu-Natal. South Africa
Ronald Bafana
Grounded in a political ecology theoretical framework, this study mobilises the lens of labour to interrogate the assumption that conservation is an antithesis of extraction. Focusing on the stretch between St. Lucia and Cape Vidal in iSimangaliso Wetland Park, KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa, it examines how the enduring legacies of land dispossession and racialised exclusions structure labour practices. By tracing these continuities, the study shows that labour relations in conservation are not divorced from extractive logics but are deeply entangled with them. In this sense, conservation emerges as a form of extraction in its own right—an enterprise that appropriates labour, land, and livelihoods under the guise of ecological protection.
Elephant carcass in the Sikumi Forest Reserve, ZimbabwePicture taken by Tafadzwa Mushonga
Project 2: The Conservation of Violence
Dr Tafadzwa Mushonga
This broad research theme investigates the endurance of colonial conservation practices in Africa’s protected areas. Using case studies in Zimbabwe and South Africa, this theme investigates how violence is a historical feature of conservation and how it is continuously reproduced, legitimised, and sustained in the governance of land, forests, and wildlife. Attention is given to the multiple forms this violence takes—ranging from physical coercion and displacement to structural and epistemic violence that marginalise local communities and knowledge systems. The project situates these dynamics within the broader entanglements of conservation and capitalism, and is carried within political ecology and decolonial thought. This work seeks to critique and opens up space for imaging alternative forms of conservation rooted in social and broader environmental justice.
Links to publications
Education, Environment and Society
Dr Caroline Adhola
This study seeks to critically examine the influence of environmental education on community knowledge, attitudes, and practices related to sustainability. It investigates how educational initiatives shape pro-environmental behaviours, foster ecological awareness, and enhance community participation in addressing environmental challenges. By assessing these dynamics, the research aims to generate insights into the extent to which environmental education functions as a transformative tool for promoting sustainable development and strengthening community resilience.
Links to publications
Operationalising a Just Transition in Africa
The Operationalising a Just Transition in Africa (OJTA) research project is funded by the International Development Research Centre (IDRC) and collaboratively undertaken by the Centre for the Advancement of Scholarship at the University of Pretoria, the African Research Impact Network and SouthSouthNorth. Research activities will occur over two years between July 2023 and July 2025.
With the need for accelerated global climate action in mind, the project’s research questions focus on meeting African energy access needs with a step-change investment in renewable energy. The manner and means by which these investments will be achieved provide myriad pathways. The considerations of justice within energy transitions, the socioeconomic implications for both energy and non-energy sectors and the role of finance in enabling or inhibiting scaled clean energy access make for timely enquiry.
The project outputs will include a combination of case studies that unpack the financing arrangements from African countries embarking on transitions that meet the goals of the Paris Agreement. Journal papers will expand on these case studies to contextualise their proximity to continental outcomes relating to renewable energy access. Complementing these papers will be a series of policy briefs focused on operationalising just energy transitions in Africa. Underpinning the research framework will be targeted capacity enhancement of the primary research audience, engagement with early career researchers, and impact outreach and dissemination of findings.
Public Engagement
The “Engaging the Environmental Publics” seminar series, launched in 2020, was conceived as a platform to foster dialogue and collaboration across diverse sectors engaged with environmental issues. It brings together voices from different academic disciplines, civil society organisations, the corporate sector, and government departments—collectively called the Environmental Publics. The series creates a space for open, critical, and interdisciplinary conversation on pressing environmental concerns of our time, particularly within the context of the African Anthropocene. By featuring diverse themes and case studies, the seminars examine how extractivism, climate change, conservation, and resource governance shape human and non-human life across the continent.
Through these engagements, the series deepens scholarly debate and works to bridge the gap between research and practice, enabling collaborations that advance theoretical insights and practical solutions. It seeks to refine perspectives on the environment, challenge dominant narratives, and foreground African voices and experiences in global environmental conversations.
Past seminars have explored topics ranging from the politics of biodiversity conservation and the ethics of extraction to grassroots movements for environmental justice and the role of traditional knowledge in sustainable futures. Each seminar contributes to building a growing community of practice committed to rethinking how we understand and act upon environmental challenges.
Research Team
Professor James Ogude
Prof James Ogude is a senior scholar and an A-rated researcher by the National Research Foundation (NRF). His research interests include the broad area of African literature in English and Postcolonial theories, specifically focusing on issues of memory and reconstruction of African history and identities. More recently, his research focus has shifted to popular cultures and literature in Africa, in an attempt to understand how these cultures produced from below help us to understand issues of power and its uses on the continent. He is also working in the area of Black intellectual traditions.
Dr Tafadzwa Mushonga
Tafadzwa Mushonga is a Research Fellow and the Environmental Humanities Project lead at the Centre for the Advancement of Scholarship, University of Pretoria, South Africa. Her work is grounded in political ecology and explores the complex relationships between people, the state, and conservation. She focuses on how state power and governance shape violent conflict in and around protected areas. She is the author of The Conservation of Violence: Statecraft, Forests and Coloniality (Routledge, 2025), which critically examines the state’s role in the reproduction of violence.
Dr Caroline Adhola
Caroline Adhola is an education scholar specialising in educational leadership, policy, equity, and social justice. She examines how systemic structures and institutional practices affect learners and educators, while mentoring emerging teacher educators and contributing to policy dialogues on inclusive leadership. Her current work examines the role of environmental education in shaping sustainable community practices.
Dr Stephen David
Stephen David, PhD, is a postdoctoral Fellow at the Centre for the Advancement of Scholarship. He holds a PhD in English Studies from Stellenbosch University and an MA in Literary Studies from the University of Ibadan. His research interests include Black Feminisms, representations of extractive violence, and the politics of memorialisation and belonging in African cultural texts. His research has won grants from funders such as the Harry Frank Guggenheim Foundation, the Social Science Research Council (SSRC), and the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD).
Dr Takudzwa Musekiwa
Ronald Bafana
Ronald M. Bafana is a doctoral Fellow in the Sociology Department at the University of Pretoria. His research is hosted and funded by the Centre for the Advancement of Scholarship, Environmental Humanities project. His interdisciplinary academic journey spans Development Studies, Environmental Science, and Education. He holds a master's in Development Studies from the University of KwaZulu-Natal. Ronald’s research interests lie at the intersection of sustainable development, environmental justice, and community resilience
Environmental Humanities Network
African Observatory for Environmental Humanities
The Environmental Humanities Research Cluster is a member of Humanities for the Environment, a global initiative of regional observatories that examines how the Humanities may contribute to environmental solutions. CAS is the headquarters of the African Observatory, a network of scholars interested in African Environmental Humanities. Over the past 5 years, the environmental humanities project has created a network of scholars and practitioners
- Cajetan Iheka
- Veronique Tadjo
- Gregg Mitman
- Joni Adamson
- Steven Hartman
- Jabulani Shaba
- Eva Pesa
- Dr. Ephraim Mabena
- Robby Mokgalaka
- Adewale Owoseni
- Melanie Murcott
- Rory de Plessis
- Lorraine Chiponda
- Natalie Kapsosideris (UP student and climate activist)
- Fatima Valley (Mining Affected Communities United in Action (MACUA)
- Vasiliki Kioupi
- Cyril Obi
Past Projects
Climate Justice and Problems of Scale
Climate justice and problems of scale, was an international collaboration amongst six CHCI members, including the university of Texas Humanities institute, the Centre for American Studies and Research (American University Beirut) The Humanities Centre (Carnegie Mellon University, the Institute for Humanities Research (Arizona state University), the Sydney Environment Institute and the Environmental Humanities project at the centre for the advancement of scholarship (University of Pretoria). The EH project at CAS hosted the project’s summer institute at Future Africa from 31 July to 6 August, convening 22 senior scholars and 19 early-career scholars worldwide over 8 days. The goal was to create an interdisciplinary knowledge community to undertake collaborative work in the environmental humanities. The Institute’s inquiry was organised around three strands: Conceptualising scale for climate change; climate justice on the ground, and futures for climate change. Prof Melanie Murcott, from the Faculty of Law and an associate of the Environmental Humanities, Dr Caroline Adhola (EH postdoctoral fellow), Dr Adewale Owoseni (EH research associate) and Prof James Ogude (then Director of Cas and head of the EH project), were amongst the speakers at the Institute.
Understanding Sand Frontiers
This project, led by Dr Tafadzwa Mushonga, investigated the rise and consequences of sand mining in Zimbabwe, focusing on Eyrecourt Farm on the outskirts of Harare. It demonstrated that sand has become both a livelihood resource and a contested political commodity against a backdrop of rapid urbanisation, high unemployment, and growing housing demand. While sand mining offers survival opportunities for thousands of unemployed youths, it has also created heavily degraded landscapes, pitted residential areas, and intensified local conflicts over land and environment.
The study shows how sand extraction is an ecological and deeply political issue. Access to sand pits is often mediated through allegiance to political elites, particularly within the ruling ZANU-PF party, which shields miners from accountability. This politicisation fosters a frontier marked by lawlessness, corruption, and violence. Attempts by the state to regulate sand mining through policing have often escalated tensions, entrenching cycles of confrontation rather than achieving sustainable governance. By adopting a place-based political ecology approach, the project demonstrated that understanding sand frontiers requires attention to local socio-political dynamics. The findings challenge global narratives of a uniform “sand crisis,” highlighting instead the importance of localised contexts in shaping extractive geographies.
Link to publication
Environmental Humanities of Extraction: Poetics and Politics of Exploitation
This book project, co-led by Prof James Ogude and Dr Tafadzwa Mushonga, grew out of a colloquium held from 28 to 31 May 2019, which brought together African and international scholars to engage critically with themes of extraction and the environment. The colloquium highlighted the importance of centring African perspectives within environmental humanities debates. Discussions spanned a wide range of issues—including land, indigenous knowledge systems and spirituality, infrastructure and development, and the legal and policy dimensions of extraction—revealing how these themes carry particular weight on the African continent given the enduring legacies of colonialism and their ongoing social and environmental impacts. The richness of these conversations culminated in an edited volume, published in 2023.
Link to publications
Social Justice Jam
The Social Justice Jam was a collaborative project between the University of Leeds, the University of Pretoria, and two partner communities—Mamelodi in Pretoria and Seacroft in Leeds. Held online from 10–12 June 2024 and funded by the Horizons Institute (University of Leeds), the three-day event brought together students, academics, and community members to explore and co-create solutions to social justice challenges related to community spaces.
The project aimed to foster dialogue and collaboration between students, academics, and communities; present diverse, interactive learning activities, including workshops, group discussions, and inspirational talks; and enable participants to build cross-cultural networks while contributing meaningfully to community wellbeing.
The programme began with community presentations on local challenges, followed on the second day by themed workshops designed to analyse these challenges and develop solutions. On the third and final day, participants presented their proposed solutions back to the communities.
Outcomes emphasised co-learning, collaborative problem-solving, and building connections across geographical and cultural contexts. The Social Justice Jam demonstrated the power of partnership in addressing shared challenges and advancing community-driven approaches to social justice.
Link to publication