Highlights from Diversity Week.Diversity on Display on UKZN Campuses
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The International Office recently hosted a week-long event that encouraged diversity, giving international and local students a chance to display and share their food and traditions on each campus.
In partnership with the UKZN Psychology Clinic and the Master Health Promotion Class of 2019, the Howard campus focused on unity and diversity, staging a march to protest against issues of xenophobia and gender-based violence.
UKZN Postdoctoral Research Fellow Dr Kemist Shumba spoke to the gathering and urged individuals to stop the practice of othering (treating a person or people as if they are different from yourself) and start appreciating people from all walks of life to give South Africa a chance to realise its dream of being a truly rainbow nation.
Ms Jes Foord, founder of the Jes Foord Foundation, pleaded with victims of sexual abuse to report their cases which would help get perpetrators off the streets. Foord called on parents to start teaching their children how not to become rapists, rather than teaching them how to prevent being a victim of the crime. ‘We need to be open with our children, by being the change we want to see because a lot of rapes happen close to home. Teaching our children to speak up if people’s behaviour makes them uncomfortable is important,’ she said.
A student counsellor on the Howard College campus, Ms Ronel Msomi focused on the issue of consent and how “no means no”. Msomi highlighted the cycle of abuse, where to go for help, and the options open to an abused person as well as the different types of abuse ie physical, sexual, emotional, financial, and social.
A group of UKZN students known as: Usiko Lethu, provided entertainment with a performance of isicathamiya.
On the Edgewood campus there was an open platform to discuss issues of diversity among nations, languages, cultures and traditions, while on the Westville campus there was a fashion show, music, dance performances, and exhibitions from representatives of countries such as Kenya, Ghana, Nigeria, Sudan and the Congo.
On the Pietermaritzburg campus there was an exhibition of marriage rites and rituals practised by the Maasai Mara people of Kenya; the Baganda people of Uganda, and the Fulani, Igbo and Yoruba tribes in Nigeria. Traditional food, served at marriage ceremonies was also provided.
Different traditional wedding customs were explained from traditional Maasai foot measurement and shoe making rituals for the bride-to-be, signifying the beginning of her life as a wife and home builder, to a dance, done by the Igbo to symbolise fertility.
The Baganda showcased traditional wedding outfits for the gomesi (bride) and the kanzu (groom).
Words: Hlengiwe Precious Khwela
Photographs: Sethu Dlamini and Andile Ndlovu