DUT will confer an Honorary Doctor of Technology in Arts and Design to distinguished playwright; Ronnie Govender, for his contribution to literature and the arts in general as well as his contribution to democracy, peace and justice in South Africa through theatre.

Govender will receive this award on Wednesday, 16 April 2014 at 09h00, during the Arts and Design Faculty’s graduation ceremony at the Fred Crookes Sports Centre on the Steve Biko Campus at DUT in Durban.

Govender has written and directed more than 16 plays, including box-office hits Swami, Beyond Calvary, At the Edge, which was hailed as a “hymn to humanity,” Off-Side and The Lahnee ‘s Pleasure – which held the record for the most number of performances by a South African play in the seventies. The critically acclaimed Beyond Calvary was written during his eleven year teaching career.

An anti-apartheid activist, Govender used theatre to fuel consciousness against apartheid and the Tricameral Parliamentary system. He was a founding member of the SA Congress of Writers, a non-racial body in opposition to apartheid and he was also involved in the South African Council on Sport (SACOS) which was established in 1973 as a non-racial sports Council.

Govender founded the Shah Theatre Academy. Many current theatre personalities were tutored by him. Without grants or subsidies, the Academy went on to train several leading actors, directors and playwrights.

In 1991, Govender was appointed marketing manager of the Baxter Theatre and two years later became director of Durban’s Playhouse Theatre.
He has also received several awards, including a medal by the SA English Academy for his contribution to English literature in 2000, the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize for his collection of stories At the Edge in 1997, a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Department of Arts and Culture in 2006 and another Lifetime Achievement Award, this time from Arts and Culture Trust of SA.

– Sinegugu Ndlovu

Pictured: Ronnie Govender