General

You have to wonder what liberation really meant for the ANC if the organisation can bar one of the world’s greatest beacons of freedom and enlightenment so as not to offend a repressive but powerful regime. You have to wonder whether it was more about achieving power than attaining freedom. There are a few rare […]

While studying in Delhi some years back, the sociology department organised a “study trip” for our class to the north Indian hill station town Dharamsala, where his holiness, the Dalai Lama has lived in exile for the last five decades along with about 8 000 Tibetan refugees. Like most “study trips”, there was no studying as […]

Well, well then. If last week was a “day off”, what on earth will Sir Alex call Saturday’s meltdown at Craven Cottage? It is rather unlike United to lose, never mind lose two matches on the spin. If it was hairdryer stuff in the change-rooms after the Liverpool drubbing, then Saturday’s post-match verbal volley must […]

Recent events in the Western Cape region reveal the smug face of white middle-class cultural activity and consumption that refuses to transform. There was the Fleur du Cap Theatre Awards, for instance, which revealed the unchanging “whiteness” of the event with only one African nominee on the list, Mwenya Kabwe, winning best actress in leading […]

Many thinkers, ranging from as far back as Plato and Aristotle to as recent as Hannah Arendt, spent inordinate amounts of time trying to make sense of the world we live in. With similar intensity and dedication, pioneering psychologists such as Sigmund Freud and Jean Piaget devoted significant energies in an effort to understand the […]

Here we are at exactly 43% of the Super 14 tournament done. There are upsets galore and the Bulls and Sharks are still up there with 22 and 21 points respectively as number 1 and number 2. A great achievement and a wonderful place to be for the balance of the tournament because now it […]

To be the change you want, you see Is not as easy, as it seems You have to listen, learn and believe To be the change for real For this life of ours, is nought, but strife This life of ours, is not the, promised life We’ve been denied, the rainbow, of our dreams Just […]

I interrupt the series of pieces that I have been writing on the “twelve big questions of science” in order to address something that has obtruded itself so frequently in recent weeks that I feel constrained to say something about it. I hope that the minister of education, Naledi Pandor, whom I have met, and […]

This post is born of my curiosity about something quite obviously apparent in the photography industry at present. As more and more cameras are produced, of course the prices get lower, and the entry level cost for aspiring photographers becomes easier and easier to attain. All in all, this shouldn’t be a bad thing, and […]

This week’s Talkback question on the Mail & Guardian Online: Should the charges against Jacob Zuma be dropped?

From Jiang Rong’s Wolf Totem*: “…[Chen] spotted a large wolf slipping out of the bed of flowers and pouncing on one of his sheep, pinning it to the ground. Chen’s face turned white from fright, and he was about to scream when Dorji stopped him. He swallowed the scream and watched as the wolf tore […]

Most South Africans can’t count. This is a much more serious handicap than you might think. Of course numeracy is a major challenge even in the so-called First World. I read somewhere that only 6% of Britons exhibited a satisfactory grasp of the concept of a percentage in a survey. If the stat is true, […]