Showcasing women scientists at the Sasol Scifest
This month Africa's largest science festival kicks off in Grahamstown South
Africa. We preview some of the attractions at this annual event.
International Women's Day has been commemorated since 1909, when it was used
to highlight women's desperate struggle in many countries for the right to vote.
As the majority of South African women only received the right to vote in 1994,
this day, celebrated by the United Nations, remains significant.
This year South Africa’s largest science festival, Sasol SciFest (21 – 27
March 2007) held in Grahamstown showcases an array of women who excel in fields once considered
off-limit to ladies. “It is our privilege to have international women
scientists such as Finland's Karoliina Luoto, on how to have an eco-friendly
2010 World Cup; rocket scientist Maggie Aderin-Pocock on space research; Sandra
Kemp on what a future face will look like and internationally renowned forensic
scientist Clea Koff , all visiting Grahamstown,” says SciFest Director, Brian
“Bugs” Wilmot. “We want to expose our 40,000 visitors to international
role models in the sciences. This bizarre belief that women do not have a place
in science must be done away with.”
Other local SciFest speakers include conservation biologist Dr Belinda Reyers,
listed in the Mail and Guardian newspaper's 100 Young people you have to take to
lunch and one of Cosmopolitan magazine’s Awesome Women of 2006. “Belinda
Reyers is coming to SciFest to present a lecture on biodiversity called Why
nature matters,” says SciFest Manager Anja Fourie. With the fate of humankind
inextricably linked to the environment, Reyers will probe into the reasons why,
at the same time, we seem determined to destroy the environment. Can humanity
and nature be reconciled? Last year Reyers won Department of Science and
Technology's Women in Science Award as well as the CSIR Most Promising Young
Researcher Award at the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research.
With global warming cooking our planet, it's appropriate that one of
SciFest's guests is geographer and climate analyst Dr Gina Ziervogel while
another is climate change writer and journalist Leonie Joubert, author of the
new book "Scorched." Women have a profound interest in ensuring that
the next generation inherits a liveable planet, after all. Although another
SciFest speaker, geneticist Himla Soodyall is looking backwards in order to
trace the very earliest history of humanity as a handful of women and men
survive Ice Ages and move out of Africa to colonise the world.
Also making her way to SciFest 2007 is Dr Jane Badham, a dietician, who will
dismiss short- term shortcuts in her SciFest talk, The magic bullet for weight
loss: Does it exist? Besides the harmful effects of extreme diets is another
no-no: skin lightening creams. Dr Nonhlanhla Khumalo, consultant and researcher
at Groote Schuur Hospital in Cape Town will warn against messing with mother
nature in her talk, entitled Under my skin. And Bafedile Kgwadi of the South
African Agency for Science and Technology Advancement will be discussing her
love for science in a talk called The Beauty of science.
More information:
 The complete programme for 2007 is online at
http://www.scifest.org.za
Dr Jane Badham speaks about diets at the opening lecture of SciFest on Human
Rights Day, Wednesday 21 March, in the lunchtime speaker's slot (12h30 to 13h30)
in the Guy Butler Theatre in the Monument Building at SciFest. Entrance is just
R8-00.
Dr Gina Ziervogel speaks at SciFest on Monday 26 March in the lunchtime slot
(12h30 - 13h30) series in the Guy Butler Theatre in the Monument Building at
SciFest. Entrance is just R8-00.
Dr Nonhlanhla Khumalo, who's based with Groote Schuur Hospital and the
University of Cape Town medical school, speaks on Saturday 24 March in the
afternoon speaker's series (15h30 - 16h30) in the Olive Schreiner Hall at the
Monument Building at SciFest.
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