Recording of the course:
Course description:
This class examined how the creation and governance of protected areas has played a role in the colonisation of peoples and their territories. It examines the idea of decolonisation and its importance in the context of environmental conservation and decisions about what environments are to be protected. Considering protected areas through a decolonial lens requires us to closely examine what and who is protected, and what and who is excluded. With reference to Indigenous knowledge, the class also examined the relationship between knowledge and landscapes, and the need for decolonising research methodologies in the context of environmental education. Lastly, this class examined approaches to decolonising protected areas and the role protected areas can play in decolonisation efforts.
Recommended Readings
Tuck, E., & Yang, K. W. (2012). Decolonization is not a metaphor. Decolonization: Indigeneity, education & Society, 1(1), 1-40.
Khupe, C., & Keane, M. (2017). Towards an African education research methodology: decolonising new knowledge. Educational Research for Social Change, 6(1), 25-37.
Christopher H. Trisos, Jess Auerbach & Madhusudan Katti (2021) Decoloniality and anti-oppressive practices for a more ethical ecology. Nature, Ecology & Evolution https://www.nature.com/articles/s41559-021-01460-w
Vinti C (2019): The right to mine in a ‘protected area’ in South Africa: Mining and Environmental Justice Community Network of South Africa v Minister of Environmental Affairs, South African Journal on Human Rights – https://doi.org/10.1080/02587203.2019.1662325
Vinti C “An analysis for the interplay between the twin provisions of section 48 of the National Environment Management: Protected Areas Act and section 48 of the Mineral and Petroleum Resources Development Act, in respect of “protected areas” (2017) 38(2) Obiter 394 – 406 – https://journals.co.za/doi/pdf/10.10520/EJC-d1f354a47
Instructors:
Constance Khupe is a student academic advisor in the Faculty of Health Sciences at the University of the Witwatersrand. Her work experience spans through teaching in high schools, pre-service and in-service teacher education, as well as research in school improvement. Constance’s experience as a first-in-family graduate raised in a rural community contributes to her passion for the support of first-year students and students in transition. Her research interest lies in Indigenous knowledge systems and indigenous methodologies, language and learning as well as in student success. Constance holds a PhD in Science Education.
Tshepo Madlingozi is Associate Professor and the Director of the Centre for Applied Legal Studies (CALS) at WITS University. He has master’s degrees in both law and sociology and he received his PhD degree from Birkbeck, University of London. He is a Research Associate at the Chair for Critical Studies in Higher Education at Nelson Mandela University. Dr Madlingozi has shown a deep commitment to social justice not only through his teaching and extensive publication record, but also in his activism. Prior to joining CALS, he served as the national advocacy co-ordinator and a board member of the Khulumani Support Group, which represents over 85,000 victims and survivors of apartheid-era gross human rights violations.
Clive Vinti is an Executive Committee Member of the Environmental Law Association of South Africa, Regional Director for Africa for the GNHRE and he lectures Law at the University of the Free State, where he teaches the environmental law modules at undergraduate and postgraduate levels. His main research interests are in protected areas, mining law, water law and international trade.
Jess Auerbach is a senior lecturer in anthropology at North-West University in South Africa and a Research Affiliate of the Centre for Research in Higher Education at Nelson Mandela University. Her work bridges curriculum studies and ethnographic analyses of South Atlantic and Indian Ocean knowledge systems, and she writes regularly for both popular and academic audiences. She is the author of From Water to Wine: Becoming Middle Class in Angola which is freely available for download in Portuguese here, and the forthcoming Archive of Kindness: stories from the other side of the South African pandemic. She completed her undergraduate training at the University of Cape Town in South Africa, an MSc in Forced Migration Studies at Oxford University, and a PhD at Stanford University in anthropology. She has taught in Angola, Brazil, Mauritius, Mozambique, the UK, US and South Africa.
