The University of the Western Cape (UWC) has launched Queer Dubs, a new staff-led forum aimed at creating a safer, more inclusive space for LGBTQIA+ members and their allies.
The forum was officially launched on October 24, marking another step in UWC’s ongoing commitment to equality and diversity.
UWC rector and vice-chancellor Prof Robert Balfour said the forum represented a step towards building a more welcoming community on campus.
“We are not only about affirming the history of what it has meant to be outside of inner circles, but we are about creating the new inner circle in which everybody is welcome,” said Balfour.
He said the university aimed to create spaces “where visibility leads to understanding, and we will make sure the understanding leads to change”.
Balfour encouraged members of Queer Dubs to continue shaping UWC into a place where everyone feels they belong.
“We are invited by being together [in this forum] to talk through the worlds we have yet to win rather than the world we’re in,” he said.
Dr Fikile Vilakazi, director of the gender equity init and chairperson of Queer Dubs, described the forum as " a revolution of love and healing", saying it was about “making love visible”.
Speaking as a proud black lesbian woman and UWC alumna, Vilakazi reflected on the university’s long legacy of activism.
“We are the people we are talking about,” she said. “It is not people out there. We are the people.”
She paid tribute to generations of queer students, staff and alumni who fought for equality, including Imam Muhsin Hendricks, Dr Susan Holland-Muter and Adrian Haynes.
“The work is about life and death,” she said.
“Let their blood speak through this work. Let their sweat speak through the work. Let their spirit speak through the work.”
Kenyan writer and queer activist Kevin Mwachiro urged Queer Dubs members to use their platform to inspire broader change.
“I think the freedom we want as queer Africans will be rooted here in South Africa,” he said.
“Be in spaces that we cannot be yet and encourage us to dream.”
TimesLIVE
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