Muzi Sikhakhane
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Editorial EDITOR’S NOTE Wits improves in Time, memory World Rankings Make the most and meaning Facebook post caught my eye recently: of being a Witsie. “We are now closer to the year 2033 than The QS World University Rankings by Subject for 2015/16 QS Graduate Employability the year 2000”. The year 2036 would do were announced on 22 March 2016. Wits has improved in 10 Stay connected Rankings 2016 just as well but perhaps there is a futuristic subjects that the QS World University Rankings measure A ring to the 33rd year of the third millennium. Y2K feels according to a university’s six performance indicators: like just the other day but 2033 sounds like an exotic Academic reputation; student-to-faculty ratio; citations per Wits University has been ranked faculty; employer reputation; international faculty ratio; and and distant future where cars fly, Mars is colonised international student ratio. in the and machines are deep in thought. rd As scientists will tell you, time is relative. Geologists “Live as long as you may, the first world and astronomers see the whole of human history as 20 years are the longest half of number Archaeology 33 just a blip on the cosmic radar screen. For a seven- in Alumni Outcomes* year-old, a day can feel like an eternity, while for many your life. They appear so while www.facebook.com/witsuniversitywww.facebook.com/witsalumni Engineering of us older folk a year seems to go by in a flash. * QS considered the educational background of over 20 000 highly they are passing; they seem to (Mineral & Mining) influential employers, sector leaders, and award-winning professionals, Seven-year-olds don’t spend too much time reflecting as well as individual professionals to rank which universities are proving one themselves as sources of successful employees and employers, and can on the past. They live in the moment. But being over have been so when we look back in South Africa Dentistry claim to have positively influenced their alumni’s development. 50, I find myself fondly and vividly recalling my student on them; and they take up more Materials Science days. room in our memory than all the www.twitter.com/witsalumni Robert Southey’s observation over two centuries Anthropology Performance indicators for ago is now accepted science. In the past decade years that succeed them.” QS subject rankings memory researchers have studied what has been – Robert Southey, English Romantic Poet aptly termed the “reminiscence bump” – a majority of Wits ranks Academic reputation 40% memories in our brain are indeed from our teenage to a time will come when we will want the comfort of University of the Witwatersrand Alumni early adulthood years. Student-to-faculty ratio 20% knowing we led a meaningful life, whether through our internationally There are many reasons for this. Strong emotions relationships and emotional connections, being part Citations per faculty 20% create strong memories, helped along by the influence of something more significant than ourselves, leaving of hormones, novel experiences, music and natural a legacy, or simply knowing we had a positive impact 14th Employer reputation 10% selection. From an evolutionary perspective we need TOP and made some difference to others or the world. Development Studies to be curious about and remember the types of International faculty ratio 5% www.ickr.com/groups/witsie And the good news is that we may have more classmates we encountered so that we can identify time to make a difference. Life expectancy has risen International student ratio 5% the types of people who will either help or hinder us 26th globally for centuries and increased by almost a Archaeology in life. An interesting by-product of this process is a 50 decade since the 1960s in wealthier countries. If human propensity for holding grudges – it protects us youthful memories occupy so much space in our See more benefits at from being taken advantage of again. [email protected] memory bank, perhaps it should be an incentive for us Communication & Media Studies www.wits.ac.za/alumni Most of us have experienced the powerful TOP www.wits.ac.za/alumni to retain a youthful outlook regardless of what we see TOP TOP History emotions and memories that music can evoke. A reflected in the mirror. seminal experience I had as a student was listening 200 Medicine to Pink Floyd and the haunting lyrics of “Time” from 100 150 Pharmacy & Pharmacology Peter Maher Alumni House the sublime album, The Dark Side of the Moon. I Geography English Language Alumni House Director: Alumni Relations & Literature Politics & International Studies WitsWits ClubClub && Barns Barns Complex Complex interpreted its message as a cautionary one; that we Engineering AlumniWest Lane, Campus West Campus need to be conscious of the ephemeral nature of life PS. Wits is turning 96 this year, looking better than ever and Minerals & Mining Earth & Marine Tel +27+27 11 11 717 717 1090 1090 and that we would want to avoid feeling regret as we just getting into its stride as the countdown to its centenary in Physics & Astronomy Fax 086 406 4146 Anthropology Sciences TOP300 Fax 086 406 4146 look back through the passage of time. We know that 2022 begins. Email [email protected] Source: 2011-2016 QS Intelligence Unit (a division of QS Quacquarelli Symonds Ltd) 2011-2016 QS Intelligence Unit (a division of Quacquarelli Source: 2 WITS REVIEW APRIL 2018 1 Editor: Peter Maher [email protected] Contributors: Heather Dugmore [email protected] Lyrr Thurston [email protected] Ufrieda Ho [email protected] Graphic Design: Jignasa Diar [email protected] Printing: Remata Circle of Excellence Award 2017 (Council for Advancement and Support of Education) Best External Magazine 2017, 2016, 2015, 2012 & 2010 (MACE) Best External Magazine WITS REVIEW – APRIL 2018 2014, 2013, 2012 & 2011 Inside (SA Publication Forum) Editorial 01 Honorary Published by the Office of Alumni Relations, 70 doctorates University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg. Letters 04 Address: Private Bag 3, Wits, 2050, Witsies with South Africa the edge T +27 (0)11 717 1090 E [email protected] Social 06 72 www.wits.ac.za/alumni UPDATE CONTACT DETAILS: Chinese www.wits.ac.za/alumni/updateyourdetails 78 Witsies SUBSCRIPTIONS PER COPY: Sport 14 South Africa R25 (incl. VAT & postage) International R50 (incl. postage) Books PAYMENT OPTIONS: Research 16 82 Online payment using a Visa, Mastercard, Witsies American Express or Diners Club credit card at: Obituaries www.wits.ac.za/alumni/payment or by electronic around the world 32 93 transfer or bank deposit to: First National Bank, Account No. 62077141580, Branch Code 255-005, Ref.No. 29613 (+ your name) or by Cover story:RAG 107 Wits end cash or credit card payment at the Alumni Office. 42 GAIL WITSReview is published twice a year. The views expressed in this publication are not necessarily those of the editor, Leadership: KELLY the Office of Alumni Relations or of the University of the 56 © Witwatersrand. Copyright of all material in this publication is JULIAN vested in the authors thereof. Requests to reproduce any of Leadership: BARLING 62 the material should be directed to the editor. Cover: Rag street collection Story on page 42. Giving back 66 Image: Courtesy of Tiso Blackstar 2 WITS REVIEW APRIL 2018 In loving memory of our colleague, 3 Nicole Sterling (1971 – 2017) SECTION Stay in touch Please share your news and remember to update your contact details. We’d especially love to hear of Witsie families and Witsies who share a birthday with the University (1922). Please help us to keep in touch with all our older alumni if they don’t have email addresses or social media accounts. Please email letters to [email protected]. Deceptive appearances Lash le Roux meets his maker us made it to graduation. Lettershe review of Jonathan Ancer’s book aving received the October edition of • The lawns in front of the Library were liberally on Craig Williamson (WR October Wits Review (Vol 38), my pleasure turned populated with ex-Second World War rectangular 2017) evoked a vivid memory to delight when I read the letters to the Nissen huts. One was the cafeteria. The Rag office T for me. In 1974 I was in my first HEditor. The letter from Rev Ian Bird (BSc too, which was home to a never-ending poker year and attended a NUSAS weekend at Eng 1957) referred to a poem in the Rag magazine, school. Wilgespruit. While several luminaries, such Wits Wits, which began with: “Lash le Roux went • Our Maths 3 lectures were in one hut with a small as Steven Friedman and Horst Kleinschmidt, to the Plaza, like Samson to the Gates of Gaza”. blackboard which the lecturer quickly covered with provided their analyses and insights about the My delight stems from the description of this as a scrawled differential calculus. apartheid state, Craig Williamson was seen to brilliant epic poem, since my brother Jerome, Denis • The overflow men’s residence was at Cottesloe in be bustling about as the organiser in chief. He Pryor and I wrote this – what we called our “Ode to Nissen huts in a barbed wire enclosed site. I knew had the appearance of a neo-hippie with his the Haggard Riders”. an ex-serviceman who had been taken POW at long straight hair, beard, sloppy clothes and This was submitted to Wits Wits as humorous Tobruk and, after he’d spent five years in Germany, sandals. He ensured we had food, furniture, verse about the motorcyclists and the young men’s Wits put him in “Cot”.