Heritage Day 2014

The annual Heritage Day event for 2014 consisted of a lecture held on 18 September. Professor Edgard Sienaert, the renowned Marcel Jousse scholar, led a discussion around his presentation titled “Revisiting Piet Draghoender’s Lament, or How to level the oralate-literate playing field?” Considering the oral nature of most of the South African cultures and traditions, the discussion centred on the debates of the oral tradition versus the written tradition, specifically the gravity of Draghoender’s spontaneous lament in the face of dispossession and loss of home. The highlights of the event included recognition of ‘othering’ in academic pursuits, focusing specifically on the general definitions of the oral against what it is not. His main argument was that the oral could not be defined as the unwritten. Further, literacy should be grounded in more than just the ability to read and write, because orality or orature also encompasses other qualities that are often disregarded, such as long memory and good recollection.

Heritage Day 2013

On 17 September 2013, the Centre for Africa Studies (CAS) hosted a film screening in anticipation of Heritage Day on 24 September 2013. Considering the on-going engagement of CAS with and about Africa, Heritage Day-related events – as a node for reflection about its legacies, meanings, interpretations and policy imperatives – are meaningful additions. Since the Centre focuses primarily on research, publication and postgraduate teaching in an effort to promote and facilitate projects with a strong Africa-driven imperative, this Heritage Day event provided a platform for executing that mandate.  This is noteworthy, as CAS has situated itself at the forefront of Indigenous Knowledge Systems and heritage-related scholarship. Furthermore, it serves to promote dialogue about tangible and non-tangible heritages now currently driven by the establishment of an Indigenous Knowledge (IK) Documentation Project within CAS. As the inaugural event, CAS screened a film about the intangible heritages that constitute identities and its impact on citizenship in a democracy. The film, It’s Us – Ni Sisi, is set in Kenya against a backdrop of elections where a community finds itself confronting issues of identity and rights. Unease spreads about who belongs and who does not. It’s Us-Ni Sisi is produced by the UK Charity organisation and Kenyan NGO called S.A.F.E., and has been screened at the Durban International Film Festival to critical acclaim. The film was initially released in Kenya in February. Dr Munene Mwaniki from the Department of Linguistics and Language Practice at the UFS illuminated the contextual and linguistic nuances of the film and led a discussion about the nature of citizenship and the dynamics of identity discourses.