The conversation series is organised by UP’s Faculty of Humanities, in partnership with the Law Faculty and the Mail&Guardian.

The second debate will take place on Monday, 11 October 2010, again at 17:30 in the Sanlam Auditorium. It is entitled “What is Academic Freedom?” The panel will include: Prof Kader Asmal from the Centre for Humanities at the University of the Western Cape and former Minister of Education; Professor Adam Habib, Deputy Vice-Chancellor, University of Johannesburg; Dr Lis Lange, Executive Director of the Higher Education Quality Committee at the Council on Higher Education; and Professor Nthabiseng Ogude, Vice-Principal, University of Pretoria. It will be chaired by Professor Pippa Green, UP’s Head of Journalism.

The third debate will take place on Monday 25 October at 17:30 in the Musaion Theatre on the Hatfield Campus. It is entitled “What makes us South African?”, and will include Toast Coetzer, writer, novelist, and musician, Professor Loren Landau, Director of the Forced Migration Studies Programme at Wits, Kgomotso Matsunyane, producer, director, writer, and television presenter; Edwin Smith, Director of UP’s Mamelodi Campus as well as Zukiswa Wanner, South African author. The last panel will be chaired by Mark Gevisser, writer-in-residence at UP.

According to Prof Sandra Klopper, Dean of the Faculty of Humanities: “Tshwane is ripe for such public conversations. They have become part of the cultural life of Joburg and Cape Town, and it’s time to make them happen here, too. We are, after all, the home of government, of the diplomatic corps, and of three huge tertiary institutions. We are ready to get out and begin talking to each other. Public debate is the lifeblood of a democracy, and we academics have a critical social responsibility in ensuring it happens.”