On this continent one is well advised
to practice the methodology of listening

MURRAY HOFMEYR

University of Venda

Conference: International conference on Humankind at the intersec-
tion of nature and culture, 4-6 September 2006, held in Berg-en-Dal,
Kruger National Park – organised by North-West University Vaal Tri-
angle Campus in partnership with the Kulturwissenschafliches Institut
Essen, North-Rhine Westphalia, Germany.

The New Humanism Project recognises that today’s problems can only
be solved together. This is a togetherness of others that constitute
humanity. This realisation makes the intended humanism new. The
Project is about negotiating rules and procedures for a culture of dif-
ference. And one of today’s gravest problems is the construction or
destruction of nature.

The conference was informed on the (South) African experience per-
taining to:

• Witchcraft and healing;
• The environmental history of Africa;
• The ecological disasters caused by gold mining;
• The cultural history of the Vaal River;
• The problem of shrinking space (physical and cultural); and
• Theatre for development and communities bordering the Kruger

Park

Wider problems have also been addressed. They include:

• Continued whale hunting suggests that destruction comes natu-
ral to us;

• The dialectics of reason and sustainable agriculture;
• Maps and control.

TD: The Journal for Transdisciplinary Research in Southern Africa, Vol. 2 no. 2, December 2006, pp. 507 508.



508

The latter topic brought about the one major controversy of the con-
ference: What is culture? Do birds have culture? How are we to distin-
guish between human culture and animal culture while insisting that
we are part of nature, bipedal animals with big brains?

The mediator in this controversy did the same in the first great oppo-
sition that defined the conference: Optimism in its extreme form pit-
ted against provocative, misogynous pessimism. Nothing clears the
mind like having extreme positions defended with intelligence.

Can we be trusted to change our nature? Or will we mess that up just
as we have everything else, all of the rest of nature?

The possibility of a new answer comes from the new view of the brain
that says we are not determined by our rodent or crocodile lymphoid
system. We can and do shape our brain. We can choose to breed less
and be a gentler species, more humane, realising the enigmatic uni-
versals of care and love, if we work at it, if we want to, if we practice,
if we know ourselves, if we connect with and learn from children.

Genetic engineering is another fad, another refusal to face up to the
real question and the consequences of its answer. If you want the best
for your children as a responsible parent, connect, face to face, and
see what happens – before you start tinkering with the genes. They
are overrated anyway.

When dealing with the African other, we are tempted to immediately
find positions on the Western ‘map’. On this continent one is well
advised to practice the methodology of listening, to keep one’s own
terms in suspension while one allows the other to say something that
one has never heard before.

Do we have time? There will be no shortcuts. ‘Together’ entails the
nitty-gritty work of inclusion.

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