/ 3 September 2008

Science in South Africa

How did scientific activity originate in South Africa?

South African-born professor of history at Sussex University, Saul Dubow, will answer this question in a series of lectures to be held in Gauteng, the Western Cape, Eastern Cape and KwaZulu-Natal this week.

The lecture series is hosted by the Academy­ of Science of South Africa.

Dubow is interested in the relationship between science and South African society over two centuries of colonial and post-colonial rule. He traces the development of scientific traditions in the 19th-century Cape and links this to efforts to create a sense of indigenous white colonial identity.

In the first decades of the 20th century he shows how Jan Smuts and others looked to scientific discoveries — such as the fossils found at Taung and at Sterkfontein — to develop a tradition of Anglo-Afrikaner South Africanism tied to the British Commonwealth.

In the post-1948 period he traces the way in which science and technology were captured by the apartheid government in pursuit of techno-nationalist white supremacy. In the contemporary moment, Dubow is concerned with the role of science and scientific institutions such as the Academy of Sciences: he suggests that science may be able to help advance the new South Africa in ways that promote reasoned debate and a culture of tolerant civic nationalism­.

Dubow has authored numerous articles and books. One of his published books focuses on a major study of the development of early institutionalised science and scientific knowledge in South Africa and is titled A Commonwealth of Learning: Science, Sensibility and White South Africa.

For more information about the lectures, phone Simon Rambau on 012 843 6486 or email [email protected] or contact Ntsheu Mangena at 012 843 6488, email [email protected]