Hamish Mabala Neill is a theatre-maker and performer, Applied Theatre practitioner, and director of the Drama for Life Theatre Company. Having completed an MA in Dramatic Arts and Applied Drama, Hamish has applied his skill as a creative and critical force in theatre, community and lecture spaces alike. As Drama for Life Theatre Company director, Hamish works as both co-performer and director with the ensemble, to craft contemporary theatre pieces for youth that address issues of health and wellness in relation to Sexual and Reproductive Health.

Caryn Green is an arts advocate, manager and trainer, who has served as a member of the Arterial Network South Africa Executive Committee, Wits School of Arts Transformation and Research Committees, and Drama for Life Management Committee; received the Ampersand Foundation Fellowship; and authored a book chapter on Practice-Led Monitoring and Evaluation: Reflections on Drama for Life Playback Theatre. In her current role as Monitoring, Evaluation and Research Manager, she oversees Drama for Life’s Creative Research Hub archive and network; Applied Performing Arts and Arts Management short courses; and Africa Research Conference and Festival. She is passionate about exploring best
practice methods to measure impact; and produce and archive new and previously undocumented indigenous knowledge in the Arts for Education, Healing and Social Transformation for the collective and inclusive development of relevant, responsive and sustainable arts-based approaches to address challenges, develop markets and maximize resources in local contexts.

Melike has been fascinated with the brain from an early age, realising that this remarkable organ holds the key to our dreams and creativity, but also our fears
and prejudices. Her research interests fall within the domains of social psychology and social neuroscience. Specifically, her research focuses on intergroup relations and identifying the factors that affect how we see and respond to members of social (racial) outgroups. She believes that a deeper understanding of implicit brain processes that drive behaviour is key.

As a senior researcher in the Historical Trauma and Transformation unit at Stellenbosch University, she leads the neuroscientific investigation of empathy, specifically in intergroup contexts. This research is central to understanding the enduring effects of racial discrimination, and how these effects may impact the way people respond to outgroup members. This work is of particular importance in the South African context, with our unique cross-cultural environment and historical divisions that continue to persist after apartheid.

Melike is interested in examining indigenous knowledge systems in Africa in the
area of contemplative practices, much in the way the Tibetan yogi’s were initially investigated using scientific methods. In this regard, traditional healers (sangomas) routinely make use of rituals and practices of which the underlying mechanism of healing and/or scientific merit remains unexplored. Work of this nature would contribute an African perspective to the rich dialogue between the East and the West on the science of contemplative practices.

Karen is a PhD Neuroscience student at the University of Cape Town, South Africa. Her current PhD project tested the hypotheses that attention and well-being can improve in novices with mindfulness meditation training. Her study investigated changes in brain activity associated with attention after mindfulness training, as well as cortical volume, thickness and surface changes of the brain associated with attention after mindfulness training. My areas of interest are contemplative practices, structural and functional neuro-imaging, and human brain mapping.

She hopes to make a difference in my country and in Africa. Neuroscience and brain imaging are very recent developments on the African continent. She was the first student to conduct an fMRI experiment in Pretoria. Teaching students from different faculties about imaging and developing our potential in mapping the brain, here and in Africa, is currently one of her primary objectives.

African contemplative practices and mindfulness are relatively unexplored in this country and it is therefore an equally primary and personal objective to grow this field. South Africa is fraught with poverty, crime, racial tension and violence. We have been celebrated internationally when we’ve demonstrated our strong desire to heal past tragedies and embrace our cultural differences. She believes African mindfulness-based interventions may provide a significant tool for healing and well-being in South Africa, both at an individual and societal level. She also believes that African contemplative practices could play a significant role in peace, reconciliation and social justice in South Africa and Africa, and importantly, contribute significantly as the third partner at the dialogue table between Science and Buddhism.

I served on the planning committee of the first ever contemplative neuroscience conference in Stellenbosch, South Africa in 2014. I also served on the Logistical and Program Committees for the first African Mind & Life dialogue with his Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama that was scheduled to take place in Botswana in August 2017. I’m currently the facilitator of Africa Mind & Brain, the first ever African contemplative neuroscience lab at the Neuroscience Institute of the University of Cape Town, South Africa.

Bandile Seleme is an emerging Black-queer Drama Therapist, performer, academic and activist. He works for a non-profit organisation (NPO), Lawyers against Abuse (LvA) in Diepsloot that offers psychosocial and legal services for survivors of gender-based violence (GBV).

In his work, Bandile is interested in how drama therapy may be a relevant process that is critically reflexive of an individual’s contextual needs and aspirations. Ultimately, how may drama therapy within a South African context facilitate the process to achieve social justice and transformation?’