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20 May 2022 | Story Rulanzen Martin

The Africa Day Memorial Lecture has always been a platform for scholars to critically reflect on and engage with subject matter pertaining to Africa and her people. This year’s lecture will be no different when Prof Bagele Chilisa, post-colonial scholar from the University of Botswana, will deliver this year’s lecture on the topic: Research and knowledge production: Africa and the call for a fifth research paradigm.  

“In this lecture, Kwame Nkrumah’s call for Africa-centred knowledge, Claude Ake’s promotion of endogenous knowledge, and Ngungi wa Thiongo’s decolonisation of the mind recall Africa’s innovations in the COVID-19 crisis, celebrate Africa’s unity of mind, and claim Africa’s space in the global knowledge production,” writes Prof Chilisa.

The lecture is hosted annually by the Centre for Gender and Africa Studies at the University of the Free State (UFS). Previous speakers include, among others, Dr Rahul Rao, Prof Alcinda Honwana, and Prof Walter D Mignolo, who delivered the 2021 memorial lecture. 

Premiere at 19:00 on YouTube to join the lecture click on video below. 

Time: 19:00


For more information, please contact Portia Khate at KhatePB@ufs.ac.za

Click to view documentVisit the dedicated #AfricaMonth webpage here 



About the speaker: 
Prof Chilisa is a renowned post-colonial scholar, researcher, author, educator, and an important African thought leader. Some of the courses she has been facilitating for more than 30 years include research design, policy design, and measurement and evaluation courses, among others. As a full Professor at the University of Botswana, she has supervised more than 50 master’s dissertations and PhD theses with diverse academic discourse and has served as external examiner for PhD theses in the Southern African Development Community (SADC) region. 

Her interest in community-based research has driven her to write extensively on indigenous knowledge, as well as to publish a book titled Indigenous Research Methodologies – a book that has sparked international discourse on the importance of indigenous methodologies, especially in Africa.  With more than 80 publications, Prof Chilisa was recognised as the Researcher of the Year and awarded UB Research Team Leadership at the University Research Awards Ceremony in 2019.

Other UFS events celebrating #AfricaMonth 

2022 Africa Week: ‘African Higher Education – Celebrating African Education’

The University of the Free State Office for International Affairs, in collaboration with the Unit for Institutional Change and Social Justice, will be hosting its fifth annual Africa Day commemoration.

In accordance with COVID-19 protocols/rules, the different activities will have limited capacity for attendance, but live streaming will be made available to the rest of us. This may change at any given time, according to circumstances as determined by the relevant departments of the institution. 

You are all cordially invited to tune in; please RSVP on the links below for attendance (attendance is limited). In the meantime, save the date and the links below. 


Opening Ceremony: South Campus
Date: 23 May 2022
Venue: Open space outside the cafeteria
Time: 13:00-15:00
RSVP link: https://events.ufs.ac.za/event/1534/  


Celebratory Dialogue: Bloemfontein Campus
Date:
25 May 2022 
Venue: Centenary Complex 
Time: 16:00-19:00

Closing Ceremony: Qwaqwa Campus
Date: 27 May 2022
Venue: B11 EMS 
Time: 12:30-15:00

For more information, please contact Bhekumusa Zikhali at ZikhaliBN@ufs.ac.za 

News Archive

Doctors make history with unique heart operation
2012-04-04

 

Cardiologists at the university delivered the first Melody pulmonary valve in Africa.
Photo: Evert Kleynhans
30 March 2012

Academics of the Faculty of Health Sciences at the University of the Free State made history in Africa once again this week with the implant of a special pulmonary heart valve.

“Today we are extremely proud Free State citizens,” Prof. Stephen Brown and Dr. Danie Buys from the UFS Department of Paediatrics and Child Health said after they placed the Medtronic Melody pulmonary valve in two young patients at the Universitas hospital in Bloemfontein.

This is the first time in Africa that the Melody valve is placed.

To date there are currently only 3 000 of these valves place in the world.

“It feels incredible to be part of a team of experts from the faculty.”

The Medtronic Melody valve is delivered percutaneously through a catheter from the groin. This operation is for children and young adults who are born with a malformation of their pulmonary valve.

These children often require open-heart surgery at a very young age and later require additional open-heart surgeries to restore blood flow between the heart and the lungs.

Prof. Brown said that of all congenital diseases, heart disease is most common. A lot of children born with heart disease are diagnosed very late and many die without ever receiving specialised care.

In 2011, Prof. Brown and two other cardiologists from the UFS, Prof. Hennie Theron en Dr JP Theron also reached a medical milestone when they were the first cardiologists in South Africa to do a second generation Medtronic CoreValve implant on an elderly patient.
 

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