UKZN academic is youngest SARChI Chair in Inclusive Cities

University of KwaZulu-Natal (UKZN) Lecturer, Professor Hangwelani Magidimisha-Chipungu (35), was recently appointed as the first SARChI Chair in Inclusive Cities in South Africa. The Chair is co-funded by the National Research Foundation (NRF) and South African Cities Network.

This is also the first Chair in the Built Environment Cluster at UKZN and speaks directly to the core courses in the Built Environment Cluster on cities. It provides a direct link between industry and academia while further creating a platform for funding opportunities for students from disadvantaged backgrounds to further their studies, enabling collaboration with various institutions from a range of disciplines, and creating a future research centre that focuses on cities.

Magidimisha-Chipungu is proud of her achievement, saying, “This Chair provides an opportunity to further deepen my knowledge on the cities studies. It also serves as a motivation for other young academics with an appetite to be SARChI chairs – You do not have to wait until you are 50 or 60-years-old to become a SARChI chair, you can be anything you want at any age, as long as you put effort into what you do.”

Responding to the good news, the Dean and Head of the School of Built Environment and Development Studies at UKZN, Professor Ernest Khalema said Magidimisga-Chipungu’s accomplishment is well deserved, “She is a fantastic scholar, hardworking academic leader, and influencer of note within communities of practice.”

Magidimisga-Chipungu is an NRF-rated researcher and made history as the first black-female South African born to graduate with a PhD in Town and Regional Planning from UKZN. She is also the first black South African born women to be appointed Associate Professor in Town and Regional Planning at UKZN with a Masters in the same field and a degree in Geography and Environment – both from UKZN.

Magidimisha-Chipungu’s awards include the 2018 Mail & Guardian top 200 Young Influential South Africans recognition, 2018 UKZN Best Young Academic, College of Humanities Teaching Excellence Award, and the International Society of City and Regional Planning Award of Excellence.

Her research and publications record spans the authoring and co-authoring of a number of book chapters and peer-reviewed journal articles. She recently published a book – Spatial Inequalities in South African Cities: Towards Redistributive Justice, and was awarded funding by the NRF to undertake research on spatial inequality.

Magidimisha-Chipungu briefly served on the City Planning Commission for eThekwini Municipality with a strategic responsibility of advising the Executive Committee and Councilors’ in the Municipality. She also served on the advisory committee of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs (COGTA-KZN) with a focus on spatial equity in the province.

She is a Board member of SACPLAN – a national professional body that governs the teaching and practice of town planning in the country. And as a professional town planner, she served on the KwaZulu-Natal Tribunal whose mandate was to resolve town planning disputes in the province.

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