UCT inaugural lectures for September 2024

Dear colleagues and students

The University of Cape Town's (UCT) Inaugural Lecture series not only affords us an opportunity to celebrate colleagues who have been promoted to the rank of professorship. It also accords us a platform to hear first-hand from these colleagues as they share more on the impactful and important work they do.

I am therefore excited to invite you to embark on an intellectually inspiring journey this September through two lectures in the UCT Inaugural Lecture series. Mark your calendars for these lectures to be delivered by Professors Floretta Boonzaier and Gregory Smith on 11 and 19 September respectively in front of their family members, relatives, friends, students and colleagues.

These lectures aren’t just celebrations of academic achievement; they are windows into groundbreaking research and ideas made accessible to all. Whether you are a staff member, student, keen on partnering with us, investing in this research or just passionate about learning, these lectures are not to be missed.

Professor Floretta Boonzaier (Faculty of Humanities)

Professor Floretta Boonzaier will present her lecture, "Finding Hope and Healing While Researching Violence: Decolonial Feminist Explorations into Gender-Based Violence and Femicide", on Wednesday, 11 September 2024. Join us at 17:30 SAST at the Chris Hani Lecture Theatre, University Avenue North, upper campus, for this insightful and powerful discussion.

What are the stories that we tell ourselves and others about gender-based violence and femicide? How and why does victim-blaming continue to be a central narrative in discourses on gender-based violence and femicide? Why does this violence, in the popular imaginary, have a black face, specifically a black and poor one? How do we build spaces of safety, care, hope, healing and solidarity in our work on violence and trauma?

In this lecture, Professor Boonzaier reflects on the questions that have shaped her two decades of research on gendered and sexual violence. She charts a decolonial feminist path, deeply rooted in her personal history of intergenerational and historical trauma – of silences and erasures – while striving for epistemic justice, hope and healing. Professor Boonzaier offers a decolonial feminist perspective on gender-based violence and femicide, one that encourages the asking of previously unthought questions and centers on dignity, humanity, voice, positionality, geographies, histories, ethics and the pursuit of healing justice.

Professor Boonzaier is a professor at UCT’s Department of Psychology, and co-director of the Hub for Decolonial Feminist Psychologies in Africa. She is noted for her expertise in feminist, critical qualitative and decolonial psychologies and her writing on gendered and sexual violence. She is a widely published scholar.

• Register to attend the lecture.

Professor Gregory Smith (Faculty of Science)

Titled “The Marriage of Organometallic Chemistry – Something Old, Something New, Something Borrowed, Something Blue”, Professor Smith’s lecture will be held on Thursday, 19 September 2024, Hahn 2, First Floor, PD Hahn Building, upper campus at 17:30 SAST.

Organometallic chemistry is where the worlds of inorganic and organic chemistry collide, giving rise to compounds that are the backbone of innovation in fields like catalysis, materials science, medicinal chemistry, and organic synthesis. For a country like South Africa, which holds a staggering 90% of the world’s platinum group metals (PGM) reserves, the challenge of maximising the value of these resources remains a pressing issue. The lack of beneficiation and value addition is a significant obstacle for the nation’s minerals industry.

In his inaugural lecture, Professor Smith will take us on a journey through his research roadmap, crafted to meet the future needs of organometallic applications, particularly in the context of beneficiation. His work has been centered on the creation of both small molecule and macromolecular organometallic compounds. These compounds are not just scientific curiosities; they are key players in organic transformation reactions as catalysts, and they hold promising potential in the realm of medicinal chemistry for therapeutic applications.

Professor Smith is a professor of inorganic chemistry and leads the Organometallic Chemistry Research Group within the Department of Chemistry at UCT. He followed a PhD in Chemistry with a prestigious Postdoctoral Research Fellowship at the University of Bristol (UK). An active contributor to the scientific community, Professor Smith is affiliated with various esteemed organisations, including the Royal Society of Chemistry, the Society of Biological Inorganic Chemistry and the South African Chemical Institute. He serves as an editorial board member for the Global Journal of Inorganic Chemistry.

Join us as Professor Smith delves into the exciting possibilities that lie ahead, showcasing how his research could pave the way for South Africa to not only harness but fully realise the benefits of its rich mineral wealth.

• Register to attend the lecture.

These two lectures promise to challenge, provoke and inspire action in us, and therefore I encourage you not to miss them. We will get to hear more around this scholarship that is shaping our country, our continent and the world.

Sincerely

Professor Mosa Moshabela
Vice-Chancellor

Read previous communications:

• From the UCT Executive
• Campus Announcements