UKZN Special Collections (Alan Paton Centre and Struggle Archives, Campbell Collections, Gandhi-Luthuli Documentation Centre and Centre for African Literary Studies) invites you to its open day entitled:

More Than A Library: UKZN Special Collections’ Role in Archival & Heritage Preservation and Research.

The UKZN Special Collections Open Day is an invitation to the general public to interact with the archival spaces attached to the University. Presentations will touch briefly on the history and activities of these collections, with Prof John Aitchison, Dr Vukile Khumalo and Aziz Hassim (frequenters, supporters and contributing makers of these collections) offering up pieces of their perspectives as informed by these collections. The day will round off with an opportunity to engage more deeply with each collection; through free interaction with staff members, perusal of displays and a tour of the Campbell Collections.

Date:           Thursday 6 October 2011
Time:           9H00-16H00
Venue:         Campbell Collections, 220 Gladys Mazibuko (former Marriott Road), Berea
RSVP:          Karen Ijumba – 031 260 1712 or Ijumba@ukzn.ac.za

Around 220 delegates from diverse sectors gathered together in Cape Town, South Africa, from 17 to 19 September 2011 in a meeting that gave way to the signature of the African Platform on Access to Information. The Pan African Conference on Access to Information (PACAI) was convened by the Windhoek + 20 Working Group, in commemoration of the 20th anniversary of the Windhoek Declaration. UNESCO supported the event together with other key partners, which included the African Union Commission, the UN Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Expression, and the Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Expression and Access to Information of the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights.

A number of important developments towards enhanced access to information have taken place in Africa in the past few years. Ten African countries now have access to information laws, as the international expert Toby Mendel explained during the event. There are also relevant on-going initiatives at the regional level, such as the Model Law for African Union Members on Access to Information, which is being developed by the Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Expression and Access to Information of the African Commission on Human and Peoples´ Rights. In the context of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), work is also underway towards the adoption of a binding Supplementary Act for a Uniform Legal Framework for Freedom of Expression and Right to Information. Moreover, many African countries are now part of multi-stakeholder efforts like the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative, the International Aid Transparency Initiative and the Open Government Partnership. In sum, a momentum in the direction of transparency is taking place on the African continent.

Delegates to the Pan African Conference on Access to Information reflected on the advances in press freedom, freedom of expression and access to information that have taken place in Africa since the Windhoek Declaration was agreed upon on 3 May 1991. However, such recognition by PACAI participants was accompanied by their emphasis on the still substantial obstacles that need to be overcome if access to information is to be fully guaranteed.

Most African countries lack access to information legislation, and its implementation, where it does exist, has faced critical difficulties. On the supply side, important challenges have to do with the need to set up proper procedures ensuring timely access to information, effective enforcement mechanisms and adequate record management practices. Insufficient human and financial capacities within public bodies, accompanied by a culture of secrecy, were also identified as key problems.

Viewed from the demand side, the majority of Africans fundamentally lack awareness about their right to know and about how to actually exercise it. The complex issue of exceptions to information disclosure (based, for example, on national security, personal safety or privacy considerations, among other things) was also discussed at length during the Conference. Other important topics addressed included ICT and public domain information, the role of journalists, the promotion of media and information literacy, and the link between access to information and gender equality. Also during the Conference, the African Union Commission launched the Pan-African Media Network.

PACAI took place simultaneously with a number of other events, such as the 2011 edition of Highway Africa and a series of UNESCO sponsored workshops. During the joint closing session of all the gatherings held under the umbrella denomination “Africa Media Summit”, the African Platform on Access to Information was adopted. Recalling the 1991 Windhoek Declaration, Frank La Rue, UN Special Rapporteur on the Promotion and Protection of the Right to Freedom of Opinion and Expression, highlighted that, once again, from the African region emerges a new Declaration “that is setting a series of principles that should be followed not only by all nations that are members of the African Union, but by all nations of the world”.

23.09.2011
Source: UNESCO

• Click here to view the programme ….

Ekuphakameni

Below is the municipality’s article:

A number of major sites connected to the Shembe faith have been awarded Cultural and Religious Heritage landmark status, thanks to efforts by the Municipality. Provincial agency Amafa/Heritage KwaZulu-Natal approved a nomination by the Municipality to proclaim the Shembe Ebuhleni and Ekuphakameni villages, as well as the pilgrimage route and Nhlangakazi Holy Mountain, in Ndwedwe. eThekwini’s Senior Project Manager Peter Gilmore said the Municipality and the Inanda Community Tourism Board made the nomination to Amafa in an effort to make the newly launched Woza eNanda heritage route more attractive to international tourists and to preserve important heritage and cultural sites along the route. The Shembe, or Nazareth Baptist Church, was founded in the province by Isaiah Shembe in 1910 and its members are said to now number about 4 million. The annual Shembe pilgrims’ walk to the faith’s holy mountain is one of the largest religious pilgrimages on the continent, said Gilmore. Mandla Nxumalo, a curator at the Ohlange Institute, which is on the Woza eNanda route, welcomed news of the granting of Amafa status. “This will add value to our route, this is one of the places which has a rich history in our province. “I hope that this will improve access for tourists in the area and further developments can take place,” he said. Gilmore said efforts were now being made by the Municipality to apply for national heritage status for other facilities on the Inanda Heritage Route, including the Gandhi settlement, John Dube museum and Inanda Seminary.

source

Using state-of-the-art digital mapping and the latest 3D laser scanning technology, this R8.8million National Lottery-funded project aims to preserve KwaZulu-Natal’s rich cultural and historical heritage, by creating computerised visual records of the province’s historic buildings and monuments.

ACT is project managing the project in conjunction with UKZN’s Programme of Geomatics and AMAFA KwaZulu-Natal (Heritage KwaZulu-Natal), who will be the custodians of the completed archive material.

The high-tech ‘GigaPan’ equipment used takes thousands of high-resolution digital photos that are stitched together into a single 3D image accurate to the last millimetre, showing both the exterior and interior of buildings, including foundations, interior walls and plumbing.  The digital images  are then incorporated into a geographical information system (GIS) by ACT’s GIS specialist  Michelle Dye, which provides a 3D surface model of the surrounding area, allowing sites to be viewed in context of their geographic and physical environment.

The project will be used for a variety of purposes, including conservation, heritage and research, and will be of benefit to researchers who can use the web to view a building or site in detail without having to travel to the actual location. The archive will also be used if reconstruction work is required on a historical building due to damage by flood or fire.

A ten minute DVD with clips of the Mandela Archive will be shown before the Lecture.

This Lecture will take place at 12h45 for 13h00 on Thursday, 5 May 2011 in the Colin Webb Hall, UKZN PMB Campus. This Lecture has been arranged by the Alan Paton Centre & Struggle Archives.

E-mail Jewel Koopman on koopmanj@ukzn.ac.za for more information.

The racialised collection policies of the past and exclusionary access to memory institutions for much of the population as well as (many argue) unsatisfactory postapartheid efforts to address these imbalances, mean that digital heritage resources in the present should be significant to and engage the vast majority of the population. Therefore, it is not enough to simply digitise past collections without addressing the issue of  transformation and whether or not these digital resources will have relevance to South Africans at large, regardless of improved access.

I feel that in order for digital heritage objects to have greater significance in South Africa, we should try and democratise the modes of production as much as possible. We should utilise ubiquitous mobile technologies and let those for whom these resources should be important, play a part in developing them. The policy is now being finalised for submission to the Minister and Cabinet, following amendments based on input and comments that the policy team has received on the draft version.

Mesthrie wrote the book as he feels that our current dictionaries of English in South Africa, excellent though they are, merely skim the surface of the riches that lie behind dialect, regional and ethnic usage in the country. As English spreads globally it’s bound to diversify. Sociolinguists like Mesthrie sees language as played out in living, changing communities, rather than something fixed and stored in dusty Oxford dictionaries and crusty Cambridge grammars. It is up to properly trained linguists to support and give credence to ordinary language used by ordinary people.

Mesthrie offers a few examples. There are religious terms like ‘Diwāli’, ‘Eid’,and ‘Kāvady’; culinary terms like ‘biryāni’ (so spelled), ‘bunny chow’, ‘rōti’ (not ‘rooti’) and ‘dhanya’. There are also neologisms (or new coinages) like ‘healthy’ meaning ‘fat’, and ‘future’ meaning ‘one’s future husband or wife’ (possibly an archaism from Victorian times). And of course, lots of slang: ‘lake’, adapted from the Afrikaans lekker, ‘pōzi’ for ‘house’ adapted from the Great War usage, meaning ‘going back into position’.

source: UCT paper