Events

Drama for Life presents the Arts in Conversation Series.

A conversation with Suzanne Venter facilitated by Leane Meiring. Venter is a senior investigative journalist at Rapport and winner of the prestigious Taco Kuiper prize for investigative journalism. Her work in the weekly Sunday newspaper inevitably resulted in an official inquiry by the health ombudsman and pushed the plight of psychiatric patients onto the national agenda after being severely neglected by the government.

About the Drama for Life Arts in Conversation Series

The World Health Organization (WHO) defines mental health as “a state of well-being in which every individual realizes his or her own potential, can cope with the normal stresses of life, can work productively and fruitfully, and is able to make a contribution to her or his community” (WHO, 2014). This definition of health as “a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity” highlights the intersectional relationship between mental health and human rights (WHO, 2014). It stresses the need to further investigate the connection in the academic sphere, to actively promote national debate around the fact that a serious neglect of mental health is present despite the protective policies and legislative frameworks offered by our constitution and the Mental Health Care Act of 2002.

With at least 141 psychiatric patients dead after being moved from the Life Esidimeni (meaning place of dignity) facility to various NGOs in Gauteng, it is clear that as South Africans we are witnessing a humanitarian crisis brought on by serious human rights violations of vulnerable groups living with psychosocial disabilities. This human tragedy has been called ‘the greatest human rights violation committed by the state since the dawn of our democracy’. In order for the healing processes to take root, deepen and become transformative, our social relationships, systems and structures have to change” (Nebe, 2016: 3-4). Our psychosocial condition is one of dislocation, which regardless of race or class, comes out of a socially constructed reality, based on the betrayal of the human spirit…In order for us to bring about a genuine healing in South Africa, we have to re-think our professions in terms of mental healthcare (Vetten, 2005). Through these conversations “Drama for Life aims to bring down the imagined binary walls that exist between the personal and the political, the psychological and the sociological” (Nebe, 2016: 5).

 

2018 Varsity Hockey Fixtures - Varsity Hockey 2018 Fixtures

Wits Fixtures

4 May: Wits vs UCT, 18:45 - Wits Astro

5 May: Wits vs Maties, 18:45 - Wits Astro

6 May: Wits vs Tuks, 18:45 - Wits Astro

7 May: Wits vs UJ, 18:45 - Wits Astro (TV Game)

11 May: Wits vs NWU, 13:30 - UP

12 May: Wits vs Kovsies, 13:30 - UP

13 May: Wits vs Madibaz, 13:30 - UP (TV Game)

The Africa Day celebrations at Wits take place ahead of the annual May 25 activities which commemorate the establishment of the Organisation of African Unity (OAU) on 25 May 1963. The OAU was later renamed the African Union.

This year's keynote address will be delivered by Professor Patrick Loch Otieno Lumumba, Kenyan scholar, pan-Africanist and advocate, on Friday, 4 May 2018, at 12:30. He will speak on the topic: Militarisation of democracy and democratic space: implication for higher education and engage in a panel discussion entitled, Revisiting militarisation of democracy and democratic space: implication for higher education at 14:00 with Wits academics Dr Dania Mupotsa and Dr  Samuel Ravengai.

The Wits celebrations will conclude with an African Classics and Jazz Concert at 19:30 in the Great Hall. Nomthandazo Mkhize Solomon, a well-known figure in the South African classical music scene, will lead performers in this tribute to Mother Africa. 

Programme

 

The firm was founded in 1968. Harris has also been involved in the politics of ivory and serves as the Principal Political Representative of the International Ivory Society and Managing Director of the Ivory Education Institute. He is a member of the Advisory Board of the International Wildlife Management Consortium.

Harris holds degrees from Stanford University and the University of California, Los Angeles and has had multiple listings in Who’s Who in America and Who’s Who in the World.

This lecture will be presented by Professor Roger Seymour, University of Adelaide, and will show that the physical size of skeletons and the holes in bones that pass blood vessels can indicate the rate of blood flow and hence the metabolic rates of the organs that they supply.

The South African education system is undergoing fundamental change amid calls for decolonisation and transformation across the broad spectrum of society. But do we really know what these two terms entail? Join Mandaza Kandemwa, a traditional healer and inspirational speaker, and others, as they unpack and translate transformation and decolonisation from the point of view of African Indigenous knowledge.