Profile South African Journal of Science 105, November/December 2009 397

Mary Seely, visionary scientist and dedicated teacher, turns 70

Viv Ward and Joh Henschel

Mary Seely’s name has been indelibly ecology, physiology, geology, geomor- associated with environmental science phology, archaeology and sociology. in southern Africa for more than three What, during this first phase of Mary’s Klintenberg P. decades. Her name is also synonymous career, were the keys to her success? It is with that of Gobabeb, a place in the clear that a convergence of fate, fortune Namib Desert which marks the beginning and Mary’s own special brand of energy, of her journey into the science of arid focus and self-motivation, all worked in of the Desert Research Foundation of ecosystems. The year 2009 is significant her favour.The locality and research func- Namibia (DRFN) opened a gateway in for two anniversaries: Mary’s 70th birth- tion of Gobabeb provided the perfect Namibia that served to connect science to day, and 50 years of research at Gobabeb. springboard to her career, together with development, translating desert knowl- The story begins with an expedition of the support of several colleagues and edge into policy, training and capacity, scientists in 1959, searching for a perfect friends who helped to open doors, which awareness and sustainable development. site for the study of the unique insect life she had no hesitation in entering! Much She simultaneously activated Gobabeb as in the Namib. They found that Gobabeb— of the success of the Gobabeb research a site for integrated training, as well as derived from its name in the Topnaar programme related to Mary’s commitment maintaining its research and long-term language, /Nomabeb, meaning the ‘place of to facilitating other people’s research and monitoring functions, while dedicating the fig tree’—met their criteria, and it was becoming directly involved with research enormous energy to securing funding for established as a research station in 1962. projects that were out of her own field, the research station. Easy access to three distinct ecosystems of- but that added to understanding of the Mary’s work pioneered desertification fered great opportunities for comparative Namib ecology. Gobabeb became a place and land degradation interventions, studies: the vast sand sea to the south; the where all were welcome. She has always action-based as well as published. As stark gravel plains stretching to the north; worked tirelessly and without complaint, the driving force behind Namibia’s separated by the ephemeral Kuiseb River. immersing herself fearlessly in the big Programme to Combat Desertification Mary, an American biochemist, arrived issues, ever seeking out (and implement- (Napcod), her efforts have linked a range there as a post-doctoral student in 1967 to ing) ways to do things better. She will be of United Nations conventions, govern- work under the late Charles Koch, director heard saying, ‘Make use of what you ment departments, the NGO sector and of the Desert Ecological Research Unit. have, then build on it.’ She demonstrated communities. So effective is this approach She was appointed director after his this from the beginning, making minimal that most Namibian land degradation pro- death in 1970—a young woman having funds go a long way, while doggedly grammes are based on Napcod principles. such a leading position in that time and building up an increasingly viable and By now in 2009, Mary’s 70th year, she is context, was, to say the least, both contro- professional institution. An empathic recognised widely for her contributions versial and challenging. Undeterred, Mary human being, she is quick to offer a help- both as an academic and as an applied led Gobabeb to become an international ing hand whether on a personal level, or scientist: she has been awarded three focal point for desert research, attracting to facilitate study and career opportunities honorary professorships, a fellowship visiting scientists from countries world- for her protégés. ‘Out of the box’ thinking and several D.Sc. and medal awards, and wide. She developed a prolific research is Mary’s challenge to all, be they aspirant most recently has been appointed as land platform at Gobabeb which included scientists, peers and colleagues, or young degradation advisor to the scientific and several post-doctoral positions, while also people who are ‘finding themselves in technical advisory panel of the Global drawing on the cooperation of many the desert’. Her favourite (and famous) Environmental Facility. She is author or scientists based elsewhere. comment on reviewing first drafts of co-author of more than 130 peer-reviewed Most significant for Mary were allian- publications is ‘So what?’, forcing the publications, ten books, and numerous ces with several leading South African author to go back and find the ‘gee whiz’ environmental reports, conference pro- scientists, including Bob Brain, Shirley aspects of the subject, and cut the waffle. ceedings and popular articles. Through Hanrahan, Gideon Louw and Duncan Mary’s characteristic focus on her goals, her research, publications and supervision Mitchell. From abroad came Cliff Craw- and her perseverance in meeting them (some 60 Masters and Ph.D. candidates), ford, Bill Hamilton, Nick Lancaster, Gary against all odds, paid off at the time of she has inspired several generations of Polis, and many more. Over the course of Namibia’s independence in 1990. The scientists. Mary’s commitment to training three decades, with Mary at the helm, second phase of her career began at this and education is evidenced by the many Gobabeb functioned as a productive scien- time, with a crisis: South African funding students participating in the programmes tific hub, with an output of more than which had underpinned Gobabeb was she has established, who now excel in 1 200 publications on desert climatology, withdrawn, and closure was imminent. natural and social science fields. She is But Mary saw beyond Gobabeb, to the regarded as a mentor by many leading or Gobabeb Training and Research Centre, P.O. Box 953, Walvis Bay, Namibia. E-mail: [email protected] and potential for applying science in the upcoming scientists in the region. [email protected] development arena. Her establishment Although Mary retired in 2006 from her 398 South African Journal of Science 105, November/December 2009 Book Reviews

position as director of DRFN, she has since continues her full involvement as active friends and colleagues, to initiate and par- focused her efforts on the union between Gobabeb associate and member of the ticipate in programmes, however busy the Namibian Nature Foundation and board of trustees. Her advice on environ- she may be. When asked what motivates DRFN. The emergent Namibia Institute mental matters is called upon by numerous her incredible drive and commitment, she for Sustainable Development is a greatly influential people from institutions and replies, ‘Because I believe in the potential strengthened NGO, which promises to governments in Africa and worldwide. waiting to unfold, potential in the human effectively leapfrog many environmental She certainly lives up to the adage, ‘if you resources that will ensure equity, effi- hurdles. It will no doubt also offer Mary a need something done, give it to a busy ciency and environmental sustainability‘. challenging third phase in her career! person’; she is well known for her uncon- We thank Shirley Hanrahan, Carole Roberts, Emily Never neglecting her desert roots, she ditional willingness to help or advise Mutota and Sharon Montgomery for comments. ❏

‘Knowledge in the Blood?’: Race, Consciousness and Understanding book by telling the story of his arrival at in South African Higher Education Tukkies (the University of Pretoria); his committee-work and the role he was Knowledge in the Blood: Confronting Race and the Apartheid Past. By Jonathan Jansen. called upon to play in supporting the path Pp. 336. Stanford University Press, Stanford, California. R250. ISBN 978-1-91989-520-8. opened up by the rector; his meetings 2009. with parents of young Afrikaans-speak- ing men and women who come to assure Jonathan Jansen's Knowledge in the Blood of conflict such as our own. The work is, in themselves that this new black dean will is one of the most important books on these terms, simultaneously a memoir, a pass muster; his decision to make sense of higher education to have come out of political analysis and also a scholarly the psychology of the Afrikaans white South Africa in recent times. It has been text. Jansen is able to traverse all of these community and his consequent immer- widely reviewed in the South African terrains, having honed his craft as a sion in its world of patriarchy, faith and press and has, on the one hand, evoked scholar of curriculum theory over two conservatism. fascination, admiration and respect, but decades; having worked as a journalist; As a story-teller Jansen is powerful. The on the other, ridicule and condemnation. and most recently having operated in the book is rich in the carefully narrated Much of the latter is written in criticism of public domain, where his own life story description of his weekly meetings with Jansen’s initiatives around the notorious has served as the backcloth against which his students, black and white. It tells of ‘Reitz Four’, the young men at the Uni- he has sought to engage South Africans of his work in leading the make-over of his versity of the Free State who made a video different backgrounds in the process of faculty and particularly that of bringing in in which they are seen to humiliate five finding their common humanity. But, as new sophisticated young black scholars workers in their university residence. he discovers in writing this book, holding who present a view of people of colour One reviewer even describes the book all of these together at the same level of that his older white colleagues are not as a ‘tear-jerker’ (Claire Jackson, ‘Tear- intensity in a single text is intellectually only surprised by, but which actually jerking Jansen’ in Mail and Guardian, difficult. intimidates them. He contextualises this Friday October 30 to November 5, 2009, This difficulty notwithstanding, Knowl- story through an analysis of the sense of p. 21). edge in the Blood is important for several loss of control which white academics That Knowledge in the Blood has elicited reasons: it is a partial biography of an feel: ‘but the empirical status of transition the strong responses it has is hardly sur- extraordinary South African; it tells the is not what impresses whites. It is the prising. South Africa, Desmond Tutu’s story of the contemporary encounter psychological state of being defeated ‘rainbow nation’, stands at a pivotal point between South Africans of different expe- that clouds any interpretation of what is in her history. Has the country been able riences and histories; it engages with the happening in the country’ (p. 29). to transcend its heritage of intolerance challenge of learning in environments of How do the ‘defeated’ then bring their and inequality? What are we to make of social conflict; and, most critically, it seeks children up? It is one of the central objec- an apparent resurgence of suspicion to make sense of the intensely puzzling tives of the book to explain this process. amongst people of different background? phenomenon of the university as a site of Jansen looks to the literature of the Holo- Where are our young people going, at human bigotry. caust to help him explain how environ- least in their heads? The book attempts to Knowledge in the Blood uses Jansen’s ments of ‘perpetrators’and ‘victims’ work speak to this complexity, and South Afri- experience as the first black dean of edu- as pedagogical spaces. In this he comes to cans are looking to it to help them think cation at the University of Pretoria to look at intergenerational relationships, their way through it. For the purposes of describe his experiences of working in an the role of the family, the church, sport a review, the question has to be asked historically Afrikaans-speaking univer- and schools and so on. It is here that whether the book manages to do what sity. The text itself is framed around his the paradox of ‘knowledge in the blood’ people seek from it? Does it speak to this experience of entering the University of surfaces. Working his way through many complexity? Pretoria and his first encounters with its theories and explanations he arrives at a It certainly does so, and in ways which liberal rector, Johan van Zyl, and its pro- crucial point in his analysis to argue that are both courageous and innovative. It foundly complex institutional climate, ‘someknowledges are imbued with deter- is this very combination of courage and characterised by deference to authority. mining attributes of which individuals innovation which makes the work The text uses this framing to describe the may not consciously be aware’ (p. 181). methodologically a challenging enter- contradictions that he encounters daily— It is here, in his disquisition about prise: Jansen is seeking to take his own incredible civility and an apparent sense knowledge, I want to argue, that the book personal experience and to use it as the of humaneness in one context; and its demonstrates its most critical signifi- empirical substrate upon which to de- very opposite, inexplicable incivility and cance. For many in South Africa the book velop a theory of pedagogy for conditions inhumanity, in the next. He begins the will provide a rich repertoire of stories of