Redakteurs Raad | Editorial Board

Quentin Williams is Director of the Centre for Multilingualism and Diversities Research (CMDR) and an Associate Professor of Sociolinguistics in the Linguistics Department at the University of the Western Cape (UWC). He is also the Ghent Visiting Professor (Leerstoel Houer) at the Centre for Afrikaans and the study of South Africa at Ghent University (Belgium) (2020/2021).

Emile is a multiple award winning South African Hip Hop Pioneer, founder of Black Noise Hip Hop Group and Heal The Hood Project. He qualified as a schoolteacher in 1988. In 1993 he created South Africa’s 1^st Hip Hop Magazine called Da Juice. In 1997 he was part of the South African breakdance team that won 3^rd place at the World Breakdance Champs. In 2010 Heal the Hood Project won the award for the Best Hip Hop Organization in the World.

Tanswell was born in his family home in Grassy Park, Cape Town in 1977. The youngest of 4 kids, he gravitated towards his older brothers, getting involved in all the teenage crazes sooner than most his age. He became an active participant in Breaking Culture at the age of 5 and was soon a member of “Pop Glide Crew” in the early 80’s. This early involvement brought him closer to Hip Hop Culture with his brother, Emile and some of the Pop Glide Crew members later becoming Black Noise. He spent a month with the crew in Johannesburg in 1996 during a break year and was interested in how the Hip Hop scene had grown.

Robyn Gelant is an undergraduate student at the University of The Western Cape (UWC), majoring in Linguistics and Industrial Psychology. She has been a recipient of the Deans Merit Awards (2018/2019/2020) and is a member of the Golden Key International Honour Society. She was selected as a peer mentor for the First Year Transition Programme (FYTP) at UWC, and also enjoys mentoring youth members within her community. She plans to pursue her postgraduate studies in the field of Industrial Psychology.

Adam Haupt is Professor and Director of the Centre for Film & Media Studies at the University of Cape Town, South Africa.  He is co-editor of Neva Again: Hip-Hop Art, Activism and Education in Post-Apartheid South Africa with Quentin Williams, Emile Jansen and H. Samy Alim. He co-produced an EP, #IntheKeyofB, for the book project with Bradley Lodewyk and is the author of Static: Race and Representation in Post-Apartheid Music, Media and Film and Stealing Empire: P2P, Intellectual Property and Hip-Hop Subversion. Haupt is Coordinating Editor of Global Hip Hop Studies with J. Griffith Rollefson and serves on the advisory board for the first Hip Hop Book Series by University of California Press and on the advisory board of CIPHER: Hip Hop Interpellation.

I am a first year BA undergraduate student at the University of the Western Cape, with the aim of majoring in industrial psychology, anthropology and linguistics. I recently completed a Higher Certificate in Economic development at the same university. Previously, I have been an assistant teacher at Greenlands Primary. I was born and raised in the township of Bishop Lavis, and for the last year or so, I have been a community compiler on the Trilingual Dictionary of Kaaps project. I aim to support working class kids in poorer communities that require language and literacy attention in Kaaps (Afrikaaps) as a way to give back to my community on the Cape Flats.

Tara-Leigh Adams is currently pursuing her PhD in Linguistics at the University of the Western Cape (UWC), focusing on multilingual repertoires at a private higher education institute. She has been lecturing Linguistics at Eduvos since 2018, and in 2020 took on another role as Online Educator at SACAP. She is passionate about acknowledging and celebrating all languages and dialects, and is particularly excited to see the impact of the Trilingual Dictionary of Kaaps (TDK) in South Africa, and beyond. Growing up, she was actively involved in church initiatives and jumped at every opportunity to be at any, and all, community drives. She says she has always dreamt about the day she would be able to do something greater and believes that being a part of this project is it.

Pejamauro T. Visagie is a multifaceted, multi-talented academic and performing artivist. He is a published Hip Hop Linguist in development and is currently completing his BA (Honours) degree in the discipline. Pejamauro is particularly concerned with the revitalization of his Native language family, Khoekhoegowab. His endeavors are currently motivated by the means in which Hip Hop artistry may be utilized to develop a cohesive and resilient social consciousness and identity by re-negotiating particular ideologies. He is a former deputy chairperson of the Gender Equity Unit’s (UWC) mentoring program where his fundamental mission was to assist socially disadvantaged youth to achieve personal and academic progressive achievement. In addition, Pejamauro is known amongst his peers for his penchant for human rights education and critical philosophy.