The Day Keith made the front page of the Cape Times!
It was way back in the 80’s I think, when South Africa was experiencing turbulent times. Workers on the UCT campus were agitating for better working conditions and as was common, external elements from off campus were also getting involved. Over the space of a few days, the situation escalated from being collections of workers sitting on the grass, withholding their work, to much more disruptive strategies. For the most part, academic programmes continued as normal.
On one notable day, however, when Keith happened to be delivering an early morning lecture in the tiered lecture theatres of Leslie Commerce building, groups of workers decided to embark on a rampage through campus to disrupt lectures. They stormed through classes, shouting, whistling, overturning desks and dustbins, tearing up notes and throwing paper into the air.
A few unfortunate souls elected to enter Keith’s lecture.
Such was his commitment and passion for teaching that rather than stand back passively to allow the disruption to continue, he confronted the vandals, stood up to them and tried (albeit with limited success) to evict them from the class.
The moment was captured by a press photographer who was following the action, and the next day, a picture appeared on the front page of the Cape Times: a close up of two people’s profiles in an angry face-off: one defending a students right to education, and the other determined to disrupt it! My memory of that picture epitomises for me the tension between constructive and destructive strategies for change that endure even until today.
[Thanks Keith for many singular memories like this one, and for being one of my role models!]
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