Dear Humanities Colleagues

Our colleagues have been very busy over the past few weeks!

First, let me congratulate Ben Schoeman (School of the Arts) who played a piano recital at St. Mary’s Perivale in London, which received excellent reviews. He also played the 32 Piano Sonatas of Beethoven, a celebration of Beethoven’s 250^th birthday. 

I would also like to recognise Karina Sevenhuysen (Historical and Heritage Studies) who received the Prize for the Best Use of Language at the annual Student Symposium for Social Sciences and Humanities that was organised by the South African Academy for Science and Arts (SAAWK). Her paper visualized the concepts of the “model native township” and “paternalism” and was featured in an article on MaroelaMedia. 

And, the Unit for Academic Literacy announced the winners of their #UPLovesLiteracy competition, click here to see the winners.

Here are the highlights from the past few weeks:

• Roland Henwood (Political Sciences) was interviewed on: 
  • RadioPretoria: he commented on the DA Leadership Candidates, and on the election campaigns of Joe Biden and Donald Trump
  • RSG: he spoke about the war of words between Transport Minister, Fikile Mbalula and the MKMV. In a separate interview he commented on the warning delivered by Olesya Vartanyan that a regional conflict is unavoidable. He gave another interview on the frustrations residents in the Tshwane Metro have over water and electricity cuts following the waterpipe burst in Solvokop, and discussed the impact of Donald Trump testing positive for COVID-19. 
  • Kyknet: he discussed President Cyril Ramaphosa and the Zondo Commission’s enquiry into State Capture, the DA and the ANC, and commented on Donald Trump, The Hawks and Ace Magashule. 
  • SAfm: he was interviewed as part of the world view update.
• Thula Simpson (Historical and Heritage Studies) appeared on Newsroom Afrika to discuss the argument between the Umkhonto WeSizwe Military Veterans Association and the transport minister, Fikile Mbalula
• Alf Nilsen (Sociology) was interviewed on SAfm about how top leaders in India were acquitted for inciting clashes that led to the destruction of a historic mosque. He also appeared on a New Frame podcast where he spoke about the politics of Hindu nationalism and co-authored a blogpost, “Liberalising Indian Agriculture” for the Centre for Development and the Environment at the University of Oslo.
• Bibi Burger’s (Afrikaans) review of the poetry collection bientang by Jolyn Phillips has been published in the Beeld. 
• Nkateko Ndala-Magoro’s (Psychology) article, "World Mental Health Day: ‘The lasting impact of the COVID-19 pandemic might be on mental health" was published on the UP Website and in the Tukkievaria, and appeared on the SABC News
• Alta Kritzinger’s (Speech-Language Pathology and Audiology) article on “Better communication with children and adults with Down syndrome” appeared on the Faculty website
• Shakila Dada (Centre for Augmentative and Alternative Communication) published an article describing a “UP project focuses on development of health education materials for persons with severe communication disabilities during Augmentative and Alternative Communication Awareness Month” on the UP Website
• Christopher Isike (Political Science) appeared on SABC to talk about the International Day of Peace dedicated to the fight against COVID-19. He also appeared on PhoenixTV to talk about Multilateralism and 75th Session of the UN General Assembly. 
• A review of Siona O’Connell’s (School of the Arts) film, In Gods Naam, was published in the Kerkbode. 
• Antony Goedhals’ (English) article “English: A Brief History” was published on the Pan South Africa Language Board’s website.
• Marc Wegerif (Archaeology & Anthropology) published an article for “World Food Day: Valuing our crops and history for sustainable food systems” appeared in the Tukkievaria

On academic platforms please see:

• William Kelleher (Unit of Academic Literacy) published the article “A linguistic ethnography of geomapped small stories: semiotic landscape and narrative interaction” in Sociolinguistic Studies.
• Jarred Martin (Psychology) has had two papers published: “The endorsement of traditional masculine ideology by South African Navy men: A research report” in The Journal of Men’s Studies, and “Exploring gender subversion and recuperation in anal fisting among gay men” in the South African Journal of Psychology.