Wits PhD students in Faculty of Humanities receive 2024 Ivan Karp Doctoral Research Awards

14 August 2024 - Wits University

Wits PhD students Sasha Rai (L) and Phindile Tabata receive the 2024 Ivan Karp Doctoral Research Awards.

The African Critical Inquiry Programme (ACIP) has awarded the 2024 Ivan Karp Doctoral Research Awards to Sasha Rai and Phindile Tabata, two PhD candidates in the School of Social Sciences and the School of Literature, Language and Media respectively.

These awards will provide significant support for their respective dissertation projects and enable them to conduct in-depth research and contribute valuable insights to their fields.

Grant amounts vary depending on research plans, with a maximum award of R50 000.

Exploring the shadows of South African sexuality

Sasha Rai is a student in the Division of History. Her research topic is What we do in the shadows: A history and culture of kink in South Africa.

Rai’s abstract outlines her research focus: “By tracing the political, legal, and social values within the colonial era, apartheid era, and in the new democratic South Africa, my research explores an underdeveloped area of sexuality studies in the Global South. Kink culture is one of these historical sites that has yet to be meaningfully examined. This project not only substantially develops understanding of a unique and underexplored community, but it also enriches South African and Global South discourses around sexuality, gender, resistance, and development.”

Redefining the publishing landscape

Phindile Tabata, a student of African Literature with a background in Publishing Studies, investigates Black women’s self-published literature and the publishing ecosystem in South Africa, 2010-2020.

Tabata says: “My study investigates the extent to which self-publishing, with the assistance of digital technology as an independent means of book production, has reconfigured the publishing ecosystem in South Africa. I aim to look at how the different elements of the publishing ecosystem interact with each other to meet the objectives of the whole system, and explore how the ecosystem and the roles within the system have changed with the rise of self-publishing.”

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Founded in 2012, the ACIP is a collaborative initiative between the Centre for Humanities Research at the University of the Western Cape in Cape Town and the Laney Graduate School of Emory University in Atlanta. The programme, supported by donations to the Ivan Karp and Corinne Kratz Fund, seeks to foster critical inquiry and debate on public culture, public institutions, and scholarship in Africa. Through initiatives like the annual ACIP Workshop and the Ivan Karp Doctoral Research Awards, the programme supports African doctoral students in the Humanities and Social Sciences enrolled at South African universities.

Information about the 2025 Ivan Karp Doctoral Research Awards for African students enrolled in South African PhD programmes will be available in November 2024. The application deadline is 1 May 2025. For more information, visit ACIP's website or follow the Ivan Karp and Corinne Kratz Fund on Facebook.