My vision for the future of research at UP and how I will contribute to this development
Research is significant in terms of our teaching. Thus, it is critical that in further efforts to continuously improve research within the institution, our research activities are those that can provide new academic insights, which in turn informs our teaching. South Africa is faced with a number of challenges as a result of our political past. One of the avenues to deal with such political baggage is to transform the academic sector not only in the racial profile of those behind knowledge production, but also through research projects that challenges past knowledge. My heritage management publications to date have been within the same chain of thinking. I have challenged what I define as a Western?derived paradigm that put more emphasis on the physical aspects to heritage management. This is also informed by a heritage legislation, which even though it was passed during a democratic South Africa, has much more similarities with the pre?democratic South Africa than with the desires country. It is my hope that in the future, not only will the teaching of heritage management be informed by African?inspired principles, but the heritage legislation which serves as the basis for how we perceive and manage heritage, will be significantly transformed.