on Campus Issue 3 • April 2013 • For daily updates visit www.uwc.ac.za
Inside HIV in context: urbanisation and inequality page 3
Using nanotechnology to provide breast cancer warnings page 4
PhDs at the 2013 summer graduation page 12
What’s on at UWC sport fields page 22
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UWC honours struggle icons
UWC Chancellor, Dr Thabo Makgoba, caps James Matthews at the University’s graduation, looking on is Deputy Vice-Chancellor Professor Ramesh Bharuthram.
U
WC conferred honorary doctorates on two struggle icons, the late Hassan Howa and poet James Matthews, during the summer graduation ceremonies in March 2013. Howa was a founding member of the now defunct SA Cricket Board of Control (SACBOC), which worked resolutely to promote the sport among the oppressed. It was through SACBOC that Howa led a campaign throughout the 1970s against ‘white cricket’, raising support locally and internationally, and ensuring that the national cricket team was banned from participation in international cricket. He was also instrumental in the founding of the South African Council on Sports, or SACOS, which
Vice-Chancellor and Rector, Professor Brian O’Connell, and Chancellor, Dr Thabo Makgoba, with pursued non-racial sport. the son and widow of Hassan Howa. Howa’s son Sedick Howa accepted the honour on his late father’s behalf Black Voices Shout and Poisoned Well and at the graduation ceremony, which was also Other Delights, recalls that one reader had attended by his mother, Sybil Howa. concluded that he (Matthews) really hated all Matthews, 87, thanked the University for white people. the honour, and vowed to continue writing However, his writings were directed at the poetry. His current work is of a personal apartheid government. “All my writings were nature, Matthews said, but he revealed that aimed at helping to overthrow the racist his next project would be decidedly more regime,” he explained. political. Matthews was humbled by the recognition. “Due to what is happening in the country, “All this makes me feel like a rock star.” my next poetry collection will be about the This past graduation season, UWC state, because I did it with the previous celebrated the capping of 3136 students, [apartheid] state,” he said. including 37 doctorate and 238 masters’ Matthews, whose famous works include graduates.