Biography

Trained as a classical singer, Alida van der Walt (mezzo-soprano) holds BMus and BMusHons degrees in vocal performance from Stellenbosch University, as well as an MMus degree in Musicology from Rhodes University. Alida’s Master’s project, which investigated expectations of female respectability in classical vocal performance in South Africa, contained an artistic research component, thus positioning Alida in a space between practical musicianship and academia. Simultaneously musician and academic, her musical and academic projects are mutually constitutive and inform each other in an ongoing loop. Alida is currently a second-year PhD student, supported by the National Research Foundation through the SARChI Chair in Violent Histories and Transgenerational Trauma.

Current Research Project

Alida’s PhD project, entitled ‘Sensing sexual and gender-based violence in South Africa: Vocal performance as witness and apology’, investigates the act of bearing witness and/as apology through vocal musical performance in the context of sexual and gender-based violence in South Africa. A necessarily interdisciplinary project, this study is situated at the intersection of trauma studies, studies of music and violence, and performance studies. As such, the study takes the form of an integrated PhD, consisting of both an artistic performance component and a full monograph. The thinking in this project is guided by the following questions: How may vocal performance bear witness to the transgenerational trauma of sexual and gender-based violence in South Africa? What are the ethical considerations at play when bearing witness to the trauma of sexual and gender-based violence through vocal performance? Moreover, how, if at all, can vocal performance—and the performing arts more broadly—serve as a vehicle for ethical apology for the harms of sexual and gender-based violence? What might an ethical apology through vocal performance or another artistic medium look like?

Supervisor: Dr Samantha van Schalkwyk, Dr Carina Venter (Music Department) and Minette du Toit-Pearce (Music Department)

Email: 18643442@sun.ac.za