Science, Technology, and Communication

Researchers working in this area, focus, amongst others, on how scientific and technological developments impact social structures, cultural values, and political power dynamics. This includes exploring questions such as: How do new technologies affect how we communicate and interact with each other? What are the cultural and social implications of scientific advancements such as artificial intelligence? How do knowledge and technological developments shape our understanding of the world and our place in it? What are the ethical and moral implications of using new technologies in different contexts? This includes understanding how the media and other forms of communication shape public perceptions of science and technology, and how different groups within society may have different levels of access to scientific and technological knowledge. This interdisciplinary domain integrates insights from social sciences, humanities, and communication studies

Research Clusters

Poverty, Inequality, and Development

Gender, Sexuality, and Feminist studies

Race, Culture, and Identity

Language and Society

Health, Welfare, and Human Security

Politics, Governance, and Citizenship

Ethics, Social Justice, and Human Rights

Land, Environment, and Sustainable Development

Conflict, Violence, and Reconciliation

Science, Technology, and Communication

Performance and Visual Arts

Department	Researcher	Areas of Focus
African Languages	Prof Mawande Dlali	Interpersonal communication and language endangerment and marginalisation.
	Mr Thulani Simayile	Academic Literacy development and language teaching, Literary linguistics.
	Dr Zameka Sijadu	Human Communication, Argumentation Theory, Translanguaging, Political Discourse, Media Discourse, Humour, Language and Gender.
	Prof Marianna Visser	Morphosyntax and its interfaces, second language teaching and learning,
Afrikaans & Dutch	Prof Sven Tarp	Lexicography; terminology; information science.
Afrikaans & Dutch	Dr Amanda Marais	Digital humanities and literary studies.
CEBITA	Prof Christo van der Merwe	Bible translation as intercultural communication.
CREST	Prof Heidi Prozesky	Human resources for science, technology and innovation in South Africa
	Prof Marina Joubert	Researchers’ perceptions, motivations, and responses re public engagement with science; as well as interfaces (media, digital, in-person) between science and its publics.
	Prof Nelius Boshoff	Research uptake and the broader impact of research, research collaboration, and bibliometric analysis with a focus on research in Africa.
DSI-NRF Centre of Excellence in Scientometrics and Science, Technology, and Innovation Policy (SciSTIP)	Prof Johan Mouton	Predatory publishing, funding of science in Africa, the mobility of South African doctoral graduates and the state of knowledge production at SA universities.
	Dr Milandre van Lil	Human capacity for higher education, and science and technology; sociology of science; research methods and methodology.
	Prof Robert Tijssen	Assessment of research excellence in science systems of countries in the Global South.
CRUISE	Dr Anele Horn	Smart Cities and the application of technology to improve livelihoods in cities.
General Linguistics	Prof Anne Baker	Brain and cognitive science.
	Dr Schalk van der Merwe	Mobile technology and urban youth culture in Africa.
	Prof Heather Brookes	Ethnography of Communication.
Geography & Environmental Studies	Ms Lodene Willemse	Application of statics in the field of Urban Regional Science.
Geography & Environmental Studies; Centre for Geographical Analysis	Dr Zahn Munch	Cartography, web mapping and geographic communication.
Information Science; Centre for Knowledge Dynamics & Decision Making; Computational Thinking for Artificial Intelligence	Mr Richardt Barnett	Programming; website analysis; information technology and science.
	Dr Douglas Parry	Communication science; human-computer interaction; media/cyberpsychology; media uses and effects; measurement of media use; examination of methodological practices in media effects research; digital wellbeing, self-regulated learning; media multitasking; media use and attention, distraction, and task performance.
	Dr Daniel le Roux	Communication and technology studies; media studies & conceptual frameworks; online vigilance amongst university studies; media multitasking and attention; systems thinking; information systems; automation and employment.
	Dr Christiaan Maasdorp	Knowledge and technology in organisations.
	Prof Arina Britz	Computational logic; automated reasoning; mathematics and artificial representation; ontology in information systems.
Journalism	Dr Gabriël Botma	Journalism and communication.
	Dr Michael Eckardt	Press history; communication studies.
	Dr Marenet Jordaan	The influence of emerging digital technologies on journalism and education.
Modern Foreign Languages	Mrs Renata du Toit; Prof Rainer Kussler	Computer-use in language learning.
Music	Dr Gerhard Roux	Music technology.
Music	Ms Leonore Bredekamp	Music Technology, in education and as tool to open up access to students from different socio-economic backgrounds.
Philosophy; Centre for Applied Ethics	Dr Tanya de Villiers-Botha	Philosophy of mind and cognitive science.
	Mr Phila Msimang	Philosophy of science.
	Prof Anton van Niekerk	Philosophy of human sciences.
	Dr Susan Hall	Ethics of technology; ethics of biotechnological human enhancement.
	Prof Louise du Toit	Biosemiotics in the context of eco-phenomenology.
RADAR	Dr Robyn Pharoah	Robust forms of communication are key to saving lives and keeping people safe. Our work considers dissemination of early warning information, technology for recording and collecting data for risk-averse planning and development, while the role of social media in disasters is another area of interest.
Sociology & Social Anthropology	Dr Lloyd Hill	Science and technology studies; language and science; communication technologies, with an emerging focus on the social impact of large language models and generative AI.
Ton & Anet Vosloo Chair in Afrikaans Language Practices	Prof Ilse Feinauer	Machine (AI) translation; digital humanities and translation studies; corpus translation studies.
Visual Arts	Dr Karolien Perold-Bull	Multimodal communication design for public engagement and knowledge translation.