Moving Ideological Mountains
Physically there’s not an awful lot of him, but Dr Crispin Hemson has a quiet inner strength and the kind of stamina that has seen him tirelessly and consistently push and work to improve himself and enable and uplift others and our environment.
Crispin has an association with Glenwood that is deeper in many respects than most- and predates his 1991 move to this Durban suburb. Take the road names Alan Paton and Rick Turner for example. These are people that Crispin interacted with when active in student politics at the then University of Natal’s Howard College.
Indefatigable Crispin has always actively advocated for peace, education, and non-violence. He has played different roles in education, formally and informally. His teaching posts at several schools displayed a trend of confrontation with “the system”. He later wrote booklets for a Catholic youth movement, then worked briefly with NGOs working against apartheid.
He was elected to the Durban City Council in 1978 and served there 10 years, but in 1984 he started an academic career with the University of Natal (later the University of KwaZulu-Natal), in adult education and later as Head of the School of Education, and is the former Director of the International Centre of Nonviolence (ICON) at the Durban University of Technology (DUT)- culminating in a PhD: Doctor of Philosophy in Management Sciences Specialising in Peace Studies, as well as being appointed to South Africa’s Steering Committee of the National Dialogue by President Cyril Ramaphosa.
Culminating is perhaps not the best word, since this 78 year old shows no signs of slowing, and certainly not stopping.
Greening With Meaning
Beside his education work, when Crispin and his twin brother Jonathan moved to the area, they purposely selected a home near to Pigeon Valley Nature Reserve as both enjoy close contact with nature. Their long-term involvement with Pigeon Valley was sparked by an interaction with one of the reserve rangers who stated, “This reserve is finished. The Ipomoea indica is taking over’” to which Crispin replied, “Do you mind if I take it out?”
Crispin is key to the Friends of Pigeon Valley who carry out alien clearing and other work in the park- such as getting the engineering cohort from the nearby university to put their minds to the storm water issues in the steeply sloped reserve, and he greatly assists the Pigeon Valley Urban Improvement Precinct, a non-profit, volunteer run organisation that is uplifting and greening the area.
Crispin Hemson explaining how two water flows meet. Across the gabion walls is an area recently cleared of alien vegetation.
Pigeon Valley is a tiny (11ha) treasure trove of biodiversity surrounded by suburbia but, despite the attendant challenges, it has a bird list of over 165 bird species, 108 locally indigenous tree species- including the rare Natal Elm and the Natal Tree Loquat- and countless understory plants and even a small grassland.
Crispin Hemson explains to third year students the use of Cryptocarya leaves for pest-free bedding. The Cryptocarya tree behind him has not been conclusively identified – it is either a hybrid or Cryptocarya liebertiana, a species found mainly far to the north.
Crispin is deeply committed all round, whether it be offering free guided walks in the reserve to the public on the second Saturday of each month, arranging similar for student groups, eradicating aliens, identifying flora and fauna- and helping people with their identity.
Purple crested turaco
African firefinch
Grey duiker
Green twinspot
”Creating ways in which we can really come to understand other people is the root also to creating ways of understanding oneself” says Crispin. “There’s an interactive process that is very life affirming and the work I’ve been doing most recently- on a programme I was running over weekends at DUT- is so valuable and rare. The comments that people who’ve been through this process have made have been very affirming, of the significance for them, and the change that it then makes possible for them. One of the projects I want to do when I finally retire is actually to work on a programme of leadership development that incorporates that kind of work at its core”.
Then there’s the book he’d like to write, if he ever finds the time.
