From the Cape to Cairo | Summer School

FROM THE CAPE TO CAIRO

Jessica Nitschke, André van Graan, Sebastian van As, Dewald Bester, Joseph Koetsier, lecturers

Monday 15–Friday 19 January  7.00 pm  COURSE FEES R550; Staff and students R275

Curated by the Egyptian Society of South Africa, this five-lecture course aims to raise interest in the study of Ancient and contemporary Egypt. The guiding question of this course is: ‘How does Ancient Egypt inspire South African scholars, artisans and artists in Egyptology, architecture, medicine, comparative religious studies and in the arts and literature?’ The course draws on local expertise in the study of Ancient and contemporary Egypt.

Lecture titles

Ancient Egypt in Cape Town: the antiquities collection in the Iziko Museums of South Africa Dr Jessica Nitschke
The influence of Egyptian architecture on local architecture in South Africa Dr André van Graan
The Ancient Egyptian origins of western medicine Prof Sebastian van As
Reading Ancient Egypt: mainstream and esoteric conceptions Dr Dewald Bester
Poetry in Ancient Egypt Joseph Koetsier

Recommended reading

Stevenson, A. 2019. Scattered Finds Archaeology, Egyptology and Museums. London: UCL Press. https://www.uclpress.co.uk/products/95150

Humbert, J.M. and Price, C. 2011. Imhotep Today – Egyptianizing Architecture. Abingdon: Routledge.

Ahmed M., Metwaly, M., Ghoneim, I.H., Eissa, I.E., Ahmad M., Mostafa M., Hegazy, W.M. and Afifi, D.D. 2021. Traditional ancient Egyptian medicine: A review, Saudi Journal of Biological Sciences, 28, (10), 5823–5832. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1319562X21005027

Bester, D. 2012. The Veil of Egypt: The Constitution of the Individual and the Afterlife in Ancient Egypt as portrayed in The Secret Doctrine of H.P. Blavatsky, co-founder of the Theosophical Society. MA Thesis. UNISA. https://uir.unisa.ac.za/bitstream/handle/10500/9900/dissertation_bester_d.pdf;sequence=1

Deleanu, D. 2010. Poems in Hieroglyphic Egyptian. Lulu.com. https://www.amazon.com/Poems-Hieroglyphic-Egyptian-Daniel-Deleanu/dp/0557451558

TO BOOK:

https://www.webtickets.co.za/performance.aspx?itemid=1534474281

Dr Jessica Nitschke is a Research Fellow in the Department of Ancient Studies atStellenbosch University and Editor of The Ancient Near East Today. She received her B.A. in Classics and Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations from the University of Chicago, and her M.A. and Ph.D. in Ancient History and Mediterranean Archaeology from the University of California, Berkeley. She has carried out archaeological fieldwork at sites such as Tel Dor (Israel) and Tell Timai (Egypt) and is involved in the curation and study of Egyptian antiquities in South African collections, including the recent exhibit Kemet: Life in Ancient Egypt at the Iziko Museums South Africa

André van Graan is a heritage architect, working in Cape Town. He spent many years as an academic, lecturing in architecture at the Cape Peninsula University of Technology, where he was also the course coordinator, as well as lecturing on the MPhil Conservation of the Built Environment course at UCT. He holds a PhD from UCT and has a research interest in the influences on architecture in the 20^th century.

Professor Sebastian Van As has been head of the Trauma Unit at Red Cross War Memorial Children’s Hospital in Cape Town, South Africa for 20 years. His unit treats close to 10,000 injuries in young children every year and this is increasing with road accidents topping the list. In 2018 he won the Alan Pifer Research Award. The award recognises the important research he has conducted over the past 20 years into child safety in South Africa. During the last two years he developed research connections with the University of Limpopo.

Professor van As is an active member of The Egyptian Society of South Africa.

Dewald Bester (Phd) is long-standing member and current President of the Theosophical Society Cape Town Lodge. He is an independent scholar with an interest in the Academic study of religion and the emerging field of Western Esotericism. He is employed as a Customs Manager in the Logistics Industry.

Joseph Koetsier is a retired Senior Lecture in Cross-cultural Educational Studies and Lifelong Learning from Groningen University, the Netherlands and UWC. He did field work and consultancies in India, Sri Lanka, Mozambique and Suriname. He is a published poet and a committee member of The Egyptian Society of South Africa (TESSA), specialised in Ancient Egypt as a source of inspiration for classical composers and Egyptology in Eastern Europe.