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23 August 2021 | Story Dr Cindé Greyling | Photo Anja Aucamp
Prof Karin van Marle
Legal scholar Prof Karin van Marle.
Karin van Marle – Professor in the Department of Public Law, Vice-Dean of the Faculty of Law, and Programme Director: Research and Postgraduate Study. As an academic appointed at an institution of higher learning, she regards her main task as contributing to education and scholarship. She does so firstly through her own teaching, supervision of master’s and doctoral students, and research. And secondly, in the position of Vice-Dean and Programme Director, by assisting to strengthen the academic programmes and enhance the research culture and intellectual aims of the faculty.    

What is the best thing about your job?
To be able to live the life of the mind, always challenged by the life of action. Being an academic allows – but more than that – demands constant reading, thinking, reflection, judgment, and bringing it all to bear in enriching the lives of students and the public at large.

What is the best and worst decision you have ever made?
The best decision was to make the trip to go and see Leonard Cohen performing in Barcelona during his last worldwide concert tour. The worst decision was not to go and see Mikhail Baryshnikov giving his last performances in Toronto while I was there to see my doctoral supervisor. 

What was/is the biggest challenge of your career?
The biggest challenge remains the biggest attribute: to respond to the needs and demands of our times in a prudent and constructive way.

What does the word woman mean to you?
“No, woman, no cry.”

Which woman inspires you, and why?
Intellectually, the work of Hannah Arendt remains an inspiration and source of wisdom and ideas.

What advice would you give to the 15-year-old you?
Keep on reading and creating the world that you want to live in.

What is the one self-care thing that you do? 
Tempted to say reading, but to prevent sounding merely repetitive I will add listening to music, walking, and more recently, doing yoga.

What makes you a woman of quality, impact, and care?
I have a strong work ethic. I am interested in knowing ‘who’ someone is and not ‘what’ someone is (drawing on insightful work by thinkers such as Hannah Arendt and Adriana Cavarero); and I support the freedom to continuous becoming. 
 
I cannot live without … books.
My secret weapon is … coffee.
I always have … a number of notebooks ready to be filled.
I will never … say never, adhering to Njabulo Ndebele’s words: “Hold on to your options.”
I hope … to remain hopeful. 

News Archive

Horse-riding therapy improves self-confidence in children
2016-05-10


This group of Honours students in Psychology at the University of the Free State was honoured with the best postgraduate Service Learning award at the prize-giving function of the Faculty of the Humanities. From the left are Adriana de Vries, Hershel Meyerowitz, Simoné le Roux, Wijbren Nell, Melissa Taljaard, and Gerán Lordan. Photo: Marizanne Cloete.

Horse-riding therapy helps to improve self-confidence in children, and changes their perception of themselves. It puts them in a totally new environment where they can be free of any judgement.

According to Wijbren Nell, who achieved his Honours degree in Psychology at the University of the Free State (UFS), this is the ideal therapy when working with children with disabilities. He said it was amazing to see how they developed.

He was part of a group of Honours students in Psychology who received the best postgraduate Service Learning award in the Faculty of the Humanities for their community project. In 2015, this project by Wijbren, Hershel Meyerowitz, Gerán Lordan, Melissa Taljaard, Simoné le Roux, and Adriana de Vries, was part of their module Community and Social Psychology. They were honoured at the Faculty’s prize-giving function on 15 April 2016.

Purpose of project

“Our purpose with the project was to demonstrate to the children that they could still accomplish something, despite their disabilities,” Wijbren said. The students work on a weekly basis with learners from the foundation phase of the Lettie Fouché School in Bloemfontein. Marie Olivier’s Equistria Therapeutic Development Trust serves as the site for the community project. She has a long standing partnership with the UFS.

Horse-riding and therapy

According to Wijbren, the idea was to stimulate the psychomotor functioning of the children, as well as to promote their psychological well-being. He said research has shown that there is incredible therapeutic value in horse-riding. In this specific case, it has improved the children’s self-confidence, as they may have a poor self-image as a result of their disabilities.

“At the beginning of the year, there was a girl who didn’t even want to come close to a horse, let alone getting onto the horse. We kept on trying, and, once she was on the horse, we couldn’t get her down. This was the amazing thing about the project,” said Wijbren.

Award a surprise

Wijbren said the award was a honour and surprise to his group. He was full of praise for Dr Pravani Naidoo, a lecturer in Psychology at the UFS, who coordinates the therapeutic horse riding project. “She has a tremendous passion for this project, and challenged us to think on our feet. She is a real inspiration.”

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