Unisa online - Renowned development academic delivers fifth Founders Lecture

Dr. Thirumalayaperumal Karunakaran delivering his Founders Lecture address

Principal and Vice-Chancellor Prof Barney Pityana, Dr. Karunakaran and Deputy Vice-Chancellor and Vice Principal: Student Affairs and Learner Support Professor DL Mosoma

The fifth UNISA Founders Lecture was delivered by Dr Thirumalayaperumal Karunakaran in Senate Hall, Muckleneuk Campus, on 7 August 2008. With a degree in Electrical Engineering and a PhD in Systems Theory, Dr Karunakaran has had a distinguished academic career, and is presently Director of the Mahatma Gandhi Institute of Rural Industrialisation at Wardha.

Expounding upon the topic, "The concept of a university in a developing society", Dr Karunakaran emphasised that by “developing”, he meant not the usual dichotomy between developed and developing, which he castigated as “countries that are ruined” and “countries that are rushing to be ruined”; but rather a society committed to sustainable development and sustainable techologies.

The focus, he said, “has to be not on a consumeristic society but a conserving society with concern for global welfare”. Speaking about Mahatma Gandhi's famous Wardha or 3H model of education - head, heart and hand (which, as he pointed out, had its origins in the educational experiences of Gandhi at the Tolstoy Farm not 90km from UNISA) - Dr Karunakaram examined how this had influenced the concept of a rural university as it had developed in post-independence India.

Regional development through knowledge connectivity

What emerged was the picture of an institution that had as its aim the development of graduates who were not only prepared to pay back their debt to their villages, but were expected to become leaders rather than rulers - leaders with the capacity to lead through reconstruction action. Such education resonated with the Gruntwig principle of "education for life and education through life". This had not happened overnight, but the Gandhigram Rural University was an example of a university that functioned as an agent of regional development through knowledge connectivity by acting as a centre of rural extension that incorporates the resources of universities, colleges, schools and NGOs in the region.

Dr Karunakaran painted an exciting picture of success stories he had seen in which this connectivity had provided knowledge support to rural communities and enabled such communities to become self-reliant and able to engage emerging globalism. He then went on to posit some ways in which a similar concept could be developed using South Africa's 31 ecozones as the basis for regions, and offered practical suggestions to enable universities to:

Become centres of excellence.
Partner with grassroots agencies.
Draw on indigenous knowledge systems.
Provide sustainable action through consultative mode.
Develop practice-based and problem-solving curriculums, preferably with entrepreneurially associated programmes.

People’s education

Dr Karunakaran also touched briefly on ways of reaching the unreached and the concept of people's education. Innovative techniques, such as the morphological sequences method he developed that allows learners to write Tamil and Hindi in a matter of days, or the zooming style of skilling that enables originally illiterate people to move into the mainstream and become knowers were outlined.

In conclusion, Dr Karunakaran posed a series of challenges that could be taken up by South Africa in general, and UNISA in particular.

A thought-provoking response was provided by Dr Catherine Odora Hoppers, DST/NRF Research Chair in Development Education and the vote of thanks was provided by Dr Maggi Linington, Executive Dean of the College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences. The evening's proceedings were graciously managed by programme director, Dr Thandi Sidzumo-Mazibuko, Executive Director: Corporate Affairs. Click here for the complete speech of Dr Karunakaran.

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