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The Thesis Begins In Earnest…
*Featured image: Mkuyu Guiding School. The building of the project that will very soon constitute my thesis has been a lengthy process steeped in meaningful relationships with people who I feel as ‘family’, and a place that I increasingly recognise as ‘home’. It has always been undertaken with love, excitement, enthusiasm, and friendship, with goals…
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Academic Research: The Pursuit of Ignorance (aka Farting Around In The Dark!)
“You’re a perfectionist with an inferiority complex!” That about sums up the standard response to my moping about not being ‘cut out’ for academia, despite being a consistent high achiever. Sometimes, I angst that my grades reflect nothing more than a capacity to ‘bullshit my way through’ assignments, and have little to do with how…
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What’s The Correct Answer? Learning More-Than-Human.
I hate maths! But I love animals, plants, elements, ecology and understanding how systems work, and what they mean to us as humans. I’m a nature person, maybe even a science person, but definitely NOT a maths person! Basic mathematics has always been a problem – my autistic mind works in sensations, affective (not geometric) patterns,…
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Academic Writing: Being of service…but to whom?
Long have I agonised over what we are doing here, as academics. Five years of writing within the restrictive, opinion-less neutrality of science left me feeling so disenchanted that I had to question what it meant to the world we were supposedly setting out to assist through knowledge sharing. If I – after years of…
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Engaging the Anthropocene through the Final (vertical) Frontier!
Space, the final frontier? Engage! “Space: the final frontier. These are the voyages of the Starship Enterprise. Its five-year mission: to explore strange new worlds; to seek out new life and new civilisations…to boldly go where no man has gone before.” Flourishing in a family of nerdy space geeks, these words have been an almost holy mantra…
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The Social Construction of Africa’s ‘Lion Kings’
Like most Western kids growing up in the 90’s, I experienced the cinematic glory of the Disney film The Lion King when it was released onto the big screen in 1994. Breath-taking wilderness scenes overflowing with magnificent, vibrant wildlife – the full grandeur of this mysterious continent, synonymous with the very best nature documentaries, laid out…
“Upside-down for a Bat is right way up.
~ Sara Kianga Bat ~
They’re like me – different, but made with the
right stuff to be who they are.
We’re upside-down people.”
Little Bat 