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03 January 2023
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Story Lacea Loader
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Photo Evert Kleynhans
Dr Dolf van Niekerk.
The University of the Free State (UFS) would like to express its condolences to the family and friends of South African author, Dr Dolf van Niekerk, on his passing.
Dr Van Niekerk, the recipient of an
honorary doctorate from the UFS, passed away on 31 December 2022. The UFS awarded a Doctor of Letters to Dr Dolf van Niekerk during its April 2021 graduation ceremony.
Dr Van Niekerk was a celebrated author who also achieved fame as a dramatist and radio presenter. An alumnus of the UFS, he received a BA degree from the university cum laude in 1949. He also played a role in academia and was an emeritus professor at the University of Pretoria until his retirement in 1994. His work includes 27 books in philosophy, poetry, fiction, drama, and memoirs, for which he has received numerous awards. These include the
Eugene Marais Prize, the MER Prize, and the Scheepers Award for Youth Literature.
“Dr van Niekerk is a Kovsie alumnus with a deep connection to the Free State. He played a significant role in the country’s literary history, and it was an honour for the university to award him with an honorary degree. A wordsmith of note, Dr van Niekerk’s contributions to South African literature, radio, and stage will live on," says
Prof Francis Petersen, Rector and Vice-Chancellor.
Environmental sociologist from the USA visits the UFS
2009-12-03
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From the left are: Prof. Bell, Dr Nola Redelinghuys from the Department of Sociology at the UFS, and Prof. Wijnand Swart, Director of Strategic Academic Cluster 4.
Photo: Lacea Loader
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The Strategic Academic Cluster 4 (Technologies for Sustainable Crop Industries in semi-arid Regions) at the University of the Free State (UFS) this week hosted a seminar featuring Prof. Michael M. Bell, Chairperson of the Agroecology Graduate Program at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, in the USA. The title of his seminar was, “Thinking Like a Holon: A Post-Systems Approach to Agroecology”.
By using examples drawn from issues of agriculture, food, and the environment, Prof. Bell argued for moving beyond systems thinking’s emphasis on connections to the contextual awareness of “holon thinking.” He also argued that holon thinking encouraged an ontological humility that fostered openness to interdisciplinarity.
Prof. Bell is an environmental sociologist and a systems theorist with three central foci in all of his work: dialogics, the sociology of nature, and social justice. He is the author of seven books, three of which have won national awards in the USA. His visit to South Africa, and particularly the UFS, was to explore possibilities for interdisciplinary collaboration between the University of Wisconsin-Madison and the UFS.
His seminar attracted numerous students and staff members from various departments in the Faculty of Natural and Agricultural Sciences and the Faculty of the Humanities. Follow-up discussions will hopefully encourage closer collaboration between researchers in Cluster 4 and Cluster 2 (New Frontiers in Poverty Reduction and Sustainable Development). |