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08 July 2021 | Story Rulanzen Martin | Photo Supplied
For Prof Anthea van Jaarsveld, the balance between science, theoretical and practical experience is important for a balanced industry.

Her unique approach to Drama and Theatre Arts makes Prof Anthea van Jaarsveld the most suitable person to take over the reins as Head of the UFS Department of Drama and Theatre Arts. Prof Van Jaarsveld was officially appointed as head of this special department this year. 

The Department of Drama at the UFS is one of the biggest in the country, and according to Prof Van Jaarsveld it is also the best, because the department produces some of the finest in the industry. Her main goal as head of department is to bring about a subtle change in emphasis that will ultimately make a real contribution to employability, a greater variety of job opportunities, and practice-orientated research. “My ultimate goal is therefore an approach within which academy and practice will find each other for the benefit of both,” says Prof Van Jaarsveld.

Science, theatre and drama collide 

Prof Van Jaarsveld has a scientific approach to drama and theatre arts. She never acted professionally. It is precisely from a scientific perspective that her knowledge of the theorising and contextualisation of drama text, theatre concepts, and the film industry is applied in order to maintain a balance in a profession where the emphasis on practical experience is overwhelming.  

She studied Drama at the UFS and was also employed as Drama teacher at Eunice Girls’ School. Following this, she started working as lecturer in the Department of Afrikaans and Dutch. “There I focused on the Drama genre in Afrikaans; therefore, I never actually left drama and theatre,” says Prof Van Jaarsveld. In 2018, she returned to the Department of Drama. 

Upon her return to the department where she started her studies, her aim is to ensure that the department again complies with the total package of the UFS and to make sure “that our students are prepared for a multifaceted and dynamic industry on a practical level”. 

Prof Van Jaarsveld took over from Prof Nico Luwes who retired in 2019. 

News Archive

Gender bias still rife in African Universities
2007-08-03

 

 At the lecture were, from the left: Prof. Magda Fourie (Vice-Rector: Academic Planning), Prof. Amina Mama (Chair: Gender Studies, University of Cape Town), Prof. Engela Pretorius (Vice-Dean: Humanties) and Prof. Letticia Moja (Dean: Faculty of Health Sciences).
Photo: Stephen Collett

Gender bias still rife in African Universities

Women constitute about 30% of student enrolment in African universities, and only about 6% of African professors are women. This is according to the chairperson of Gender Studies at the University of Cape Town, Prof Amina Mama.

Prof Mama was delivering a lecture on the topic “Rethinking African Universities” as part of Women’s Day celebrations at the University of the Free State (UFS) today.

She says the gender profile suggests that the majority of the women who work in African universities are not academics and researchers, but rather the providers of secretarial, cleaning, catering, student welfare and other administrative and support services.

She said that African universities continue to display profound gender bias in their students and staffing profiles and, more significantly, are deeply inequitable in their institutional and intellectual cultures. She said women find it difficult to succeed at universities as they are imbued with patriarchal values and assumptions that affect all aspects of life and learning.

She said that even though African universities have never excluded women, enrolling them presents only the first hurdle in a much longer process.

“The research evidence suggests that once women have found their way into the universities, then gender differentiations continue to arise and to affect the experience and performance of women students in numerous ways. Even within single institutions disparities manifest across the levels of the hierarchy, within and across faculties and disciplines, within and between academic and administrative roles, across generations, and vary with class and social background, marital status, parental status, and probably many more factors besides these”, she said.

She lamented the fact that there is no field of study free of gender inequalities, particularly at postgraduate levels and in the higher ranks of academics. “Although more women study the arts, social sciences and humanities, few make it to professor and their research and creative output remains less”, she said.

Prof Mama said gender gaps as far as employment of women within African universities is concerned are generally wider than in student enrolment. She said although many women are employed in junior administrative and support capacities, there continues to be gross under-representation of women among senior administrative and academic staff. She said this disparity becomes more pronounced as one moves up the ranks.

“South African universities are ahead, but they are not as radically different as their policy rhetoric might suggest. A decade and a half after the end of apartheid only three of the 23 vice-chancellors in the country are women, and women fill fewer than 30% of the senior positions (Deans, Executive Directors and Deputy Vice-Chancellors)”, she said.

She made an observation that highly qualified women accept administrative positions as opposed to academic work, thus ensuring that men continue to dominate the ranks of those defined as ‘great thinkers’ or ‘accomplished researchers’.

“Perhaps women simply make realistic career choices, opting out of academic competition with male colleagues who they can easily perceive to be systematically advantaged, not only within the institution, but also on the personal and domestic fronts, which still see most African women holding the baby, literally and figuratively”, she said

She also touched on sexual harassment and abuse which she said appears to be a commonplace on African campuses. “In contexts where sexual transactions are a pervasive feature of academic life, women who do succeed are unlikely to be perceived as having done so on the basis of merit or hard work, and may be treated with derision and disbelief”, she said.

She, however, said in spite of broader patterns of gender and class inequality in universities, public higher education remains a main route to career advancement and mobility for women in Africa.

“Women’s constrained access has therefore posed a constraint to their pursuit of more equitable and just modes of political, economic and social development, not to mention freedom from direct oppression”, she said.

Prof Mama concluded by saying, “There is a widely held agreement that there is a need to rethink our universities and to ensure that they are transformed into institutions more compatible with the democratic and social justice agendas that are now leading Africa beyond the legacies of dictatorship, conflict and economic crisis, beyond the deep social divisions and inequalities that have characterised our history”.

She said rethinking universities means asking deeper questions about gender relations within them, and taking concerted and effective action to transform these privileged bastions of higher learning so that they can fulfil their pubic mandate and promise instead of lagging behind our steadily improving laws and policies.

Media Release
Issued by: Mangaliso Radebe
Assistant Director: Media Liaison
Tel: 051 401 2828
Cell: 078 460 3320
E-mail: radebemt.stg@ufs.ac.za  
02 August 2007
 

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