UKZN Research Chair Spearheads National Debate on GBV and Justice

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The South African Research Chairs Initiative (SARChI) in The Study of the National Question - officially launched in September last year - began the academic year with a two-day programme titled: ‘Gender-Based Violence and the National Question: Teaching and Learning Initiatives for Critical Research in the Next Decade’.

Hosted by the University of KwaZulu-Natal (UKZN), the event positioned gender-based violence (GBV) at the centre of South Africa’s broader struggle for justice, equality and meaningful nation-building.

At the forefront of the initiative is Professor Rozena Maart, SARChI Chair in The Study of the National Question and one of the country’s leading scholars in decolonial thought, critical race theory and Black Consciousness philosophy.

Maart reminded all those present that the ‘National Question’ is not abstract theory. It refers to South Africa’s lived history of land dispossession, racial inequality, forced removals, gender injustice and structural violence.

Her own life story, born in District Six in Cape Town and forcibly removed as a child, continues to inform her scholarship and her commitment to social justice.

“We cannot speak about building a nation,” Maart said during the launch panel discussions, “while ignoring the violence that structures everyday life, in our homes, in our communities, and in our institutions.”

She emphasised that teaching and research spaces are not neutral. “If we are not interrogating the roots of violence,” she said, “then we are reproducing it. Teaching and learning are sites of struggle. They must equip students to think critically about power, history and harm.”

Maart’s appointment as SARChI Chair cements her as one of South Africa’s foremost thought leaders. The SARChI programme, supported by the National Research Foundation, recognises research excellence and national impact. Under her leadership, the Chair is driving critical enquiry into land, identity, state power, inequality and now, urgently, gender-based violence.

The keynote address was delivered by Professor Anthony Collins, an interdisciplinary scholar and former UKZN academic, who urged participants to move beyond seeing GBV as a series of isolated incidents.

“Violence is not only an event,” he said. “It is a structure. It lives in institutions, in policies, in the everyday assumptions we carry about whose lives matter.”

He challenged the audience to think critically about hidden forms of harm. “Some violence remains unrecognised because acknowledging it would demand deep systemic change,” he said. “And that is uncomfortable work.”

Collins’ reflections on trauma and the politics of violence resonated strongly with participants, particularly his warning that societies often lack the language to describe coercive control and long-term psychological harm. “Slow violence,” he noted, “can be just as devastating as physical assault.”

Also presenting at the seminar launch was Professor Sarah Gibson of UKZN’s Centre for Communication, Media and Society. Her contribution focused squarely on the teaching and learning dimension of addressing gender-based violence within the university space.

Gibson outlined several initiatives already underway, explaining how curriculum design, classroom practice and research supervision needed to intentionally create space for critical engagement with GBV. “We cannot treat gender-based violence as an add-on topic,” she said. “It has to be integrated into how we teach, how we research and how we engage with society.”

She emphasised the responsibility of universities to create safe but challenging learning environments where students can confront difficult histories and lived realities. Gibson noted that communication, media literacy and critical dialogue are essential tools in shifting harmful narratives and stereotypes.

“Part of the work,” she explained, “is helping students recognise how violence is normalised through language, images and everyday discourse.” Her presentation reinforced the broader message of the launch: that meaningful change begins in the classroom, where knowledge production and social transformation meet.

Doctoral candidate Ms Philile Langa added a powerful dimension to the programme with her presentation on gender-based violence during armed conflict in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

“Gender-based violence during conflict is not only physical,” Langa said. “It is also epistemic, it determines whose suffering counts and whose suffering is erased.”

Her research challenges dominant narratives that overlook violence against men during armed conflict. “If our theoretical frameworks cannot see certain victims,” she explained during the launch seminar engagement, “then those frameworks are complicit in the violence.”

The two-day launch programme was attended by staff and students across disciplines and moved beyond formal presentations into active dialogue.

Participants raised concerns about limited funding for GBV research, the emotional toll of trauma-focused scholarship, and the need for survivor-centred methodologies.

Maart returned to the theme of responsibility in closing the session. “We must push nation-building beyond criticism and complaint,” she said. “Our task is to develop creative and dynamic ways to transform our institutions and our society.”

She highlighted that the SARChI Chair’s work extends beyond academic conferences. Through the National Question Network, a platform she established, scholars, civil society actors, grassroots organisers and policymakers engage in transparent dialogue about inequality and justice in South Africa.

Support for the initiative has been strong within UKZN, with backing from the College of Humanities leadership and national stakeholders. Colleagues have praised Maart for building bridges between scholarship and lived experience, and for ensuring that research remains accountable to communities most affected by violence and exclusion.

Throughout the two days, one message was consistent: gender-based violence cannot be treated as a side issue. It is central to understanding the unfinished business of South Africa’s democracy.

Collins reminded the room: “If we do not address the systems that reproduce violence, we will keep responding to its symptoms.”

And as Langa affirmed: “Shifting the parameters of reason is part of the work. We must change how we think, if we are serious about change.”

Participants and presenters met at the end of the two-day programme, to formalise their individual written papers for a joint journal publication.

Words: Oliver Meth

Photographs: Supplied